When you cannot bear to hear your baby cry

You have read the plans. You know the waits on Night 1 are only a few minutes. And still, the thought of sitting outside the door while your baby cries makes your chest go tight. Maybe you have already tried once and went in after ninety seconds.

Here is the short answer. If you cannot bear to hear your baby cry, you do not have to sleep train with a method that asks you to. There are gentler approaches, like the chair method and bedtime fading, that involve more of you in the room and less time apart. You can also wait, or decide sleep training is not for your family. None of these choices makes you a worse parent, and none of them is a failure.

Why it feels this hard

Your baby’s cry is designed to get your attention, and it works. A racing heart and the urge to go in right now are what caring about your baby feels like. The Cleveland Clinic and other sources are frank that timed-wait methods ask parents to hold back from responding straight away, and that this can be really tough.

Some parents find the crying gets easier to sit through once they understand what is happening. Others find it never does. Both are normal. Your reaction tells you something useful about which approach fits your family, and it says nothing bad about you.

If what you need is help getting through the waits of a Ferber night you have already started, our page on parent anxiety during the waits is written for that moment. This article is about the step before: deciding what to do when the crying itself feels like too much.

You are allowed not to do this

It is worth saying plainly. You can choose not to sleep train. You can choose to wait until your baby is older, until you are less tired, or until life is calmer. You can start a method and stop.

What the long-term research shows can help with the guilt in either direction. In a large Australian trial, families were followed until their children were 6. Children’s outcomes at age 6 were no different whether or not their families had sleep trained, including emotional and behavioral problems, stress, and closeness with parents (Price and colleagues, 2012). That cuts both ways: if you do sleep train, the study found no marked long-lasting effects, and if you do not, you have not missed a window. The research page explains the study and its limits.

Gentler options with less crying

A review of 52 studies for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine found support for several behavioral approaches, including graduated extinction (the family Ferber belongs to), bedtime fading with positive routines, and scheduled awakenings (Mindell and colleagues, 2006). In a smaller trial of 43 babies aged 6 to 16 months, bedtime fading and graduated extinction both helped babies fall asleep faster, though only graduated extinction also reduced night wakings (Gradisar and colleagues, 2016). Gentler approaches can still help, though they may be slower, or improve some parts of sleep more than others.

The methods comparison sets them side by side. The ones parents who struggle with crying most often consider are:

The chair method, or camping out. You sit beside the crib, patting or stroking your baby until they fall asleep, then leave. Every few nights you touch a little less and move the chair a little farther toward the door. The Raising Children Network describes this approach, says it is for babies over 6 months, and says it could take one to three weeks. There may still be some crying, but you are in the room for it. The chair method section has more.

Bedtime fading. You put your baby to bed later, at a time they already fall asleep easily, and then move bedtime earlier in small steps. Because your baby is truly sleepy, there is often less protest. See bedtime fading.

Pick-up-put-down. You pick your baby up to calm them, then put them back down awake, as many times as it takes. It can be slow and physically tiring, and some babies find being picked up and put down again more upsetting. See pick-up-put-down.

A softer Ferber. If you like the structure of Ferber but not the length of the waits, shorter waits that you choose in advance and use consistently are an option. Changing the waits mid-night because the crying is loud tends to make things harder, so decide before bedtime.

If you decide to try anyway

Some parents find the crying hard but decide the broken nights are harder. If that is you, a few things help:

• Know the plan before you start. Read the Ferber method chart and choose a review night, so you are not deciding at every wait whether to give up.
• Expect Nights 2 and 3 to be loud. They often are, and knowing that ahead of time makes them less frightening.
• Get out of earshot of the door. Many parents wait in another room with the monitor turned low.
• Let someone else take a turn. If you have a partner, they can do some nights while you sleep elsewhere.
• Stop for the right reasons. If your baby seems unwell, has a fever, vomits, or is crying in a way that sounds like pain, go in, comfort them and pause. Starting again later is always possible.

When the crying is too much for you

Sometimes the problem is bigger than sleep training. Every parent has moments when a crying baby pushes them close to the edge. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests putting your baby in a safe place, such as a crib or playpen with no blankets or stuffed animals, leaving the room, and letting your baby cry alone for about 10 to 15 minutes while you calm down. Call a friend or family member for support. When you feel calmer, go back and try soothing again. It is never safe to shake a baby, however frustrated you feel.

When you put your baby down, place them on their back on a firm, flat surface. The AAP’s safe sleep guide has the details.

If you are feeling low most days, so exhausted you can barely function, or having thoughts of harming yourself or your baby, please talk to your doctor. These feelings are more common than people admit, and help is available.

One thing to do tonight

Before bed, write down one sentence: what you want to change about your baby’s sleep, and how much crying you could honestly live with to get there. If the answer is “very little,” look at the chair method and bedtime fading first. If you are leaning toward a gentler approach, our article on how to stop rocking your baby to sleep covers small, gradual steps.

If you do choose Ferber, the app runs every countdown and alerts you when it is time to check in, so you can wait in another room instead of watching the clock.

Common questions

Is it bad if I cannot listen to my baby cry?

No. Finding your baby's crying hard to hear is a normal reaction, and it does not mean you are weak or doing something wrong. It is a reason to choose a method that suits you, which might be a gentler one, or to wait until you feel ready.

Are there sleep training methods with less crying than Ferber?

Yes. The chair method (also called camping out) has a parent stay in the room and move gradually toward the door over one to three weeks. Bedtime fading shifts bedtime later to when your baby is already sleepy, then brings it earlier bit by bit. A review for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine found support for bedtime fading and positive routines as well as graduated extinction.

Will my baby be affected if I stop sleep training halfway?

Stopping because it feels wrong for your family is always allowed. It may mean the old sleep pattern carries on for a while, and many families try again later or switch to a gentler method. If your baby seems unwell at any point, stop and talk to your pediatrician.

What can I do if the crying is making me feel overwhelmed?

Put your baby down on their back in their crib with nothing else in it, leave the room, and give yourself 10 to 15 minutes to calm down, as the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests. Call a friend or family member for support. If you feel low most days or are struggling to cope, talk to your doctor.

Sources

1. American Academy of Pediatrics (HealthyChildren.org): Calming a Fussy Baby
2. Raising Children Network: Camping out
3. Mindell JA et al. Behavioral treatment of bedtime problems and night wakings in infants and young children (Sleep, 2006)
4. Gradisar M et al. Behavioral interventions for infant sleep problems: a randomized controlled trial (Pediatrics, 2016)
5. Cleveland Clinic: What Is the Ferber Method?
6. Price AMH et al. Five-year follow-up of harms and benefits of behavioral infant sleep intervention: randomized trial (Pediatrics, 2012)