This is not much of a surprise to me.
What interests me more, is how people/parents react to that behavior.
It’s pretty hard to ignore a crying 6 month old baby.
In “the baby whisperer“, Tracy Hogg describes how you can recognize the different kind of crying your child does. Once you can distinguish the “cry for food”, from the “I’m bored cry” it become possible to react in the appropriate way.
The situation also helps:
Last year when we went on holiday, our 2 year old was sleeping 50cm away from me. When he was crying at night, I could not let him cry for 1 minute. I tried multiple times, but when a child cries and you hear it that good, some instinct pops up you can not ignore. As a result it was very hard to get him back to sleep.
At home he sleeps in another room, there it possible to let him cry for 5 minutes. Most of he time he goes sleeping again after less then 3 minutes.
All the cry-babies(huilbabies)I know sleep in the room of their parents. I’m not saying that all these babies would not be cry babies if they weren’t. But I am convinced that for some of them, it would help if they sleep in another room. It’s just impossible to ignore a crying baby sleeping 50 cm away from you. And then you learn the child: “when you cry, I give you attention”
Who would not want that?
We should have a similar investigation, on leaders/managers and team members.
Maybe the reason why we have cry-babies in a team is because they are taught that is the way you get some attention.
Some of these people learned that at home. Others on the workfloor.
I am Yves Hanoulle, your virtual Project coach and you can reach me at blog at my last name.be
Filed under: Uncategorized
[...] Get the entire post from here. [...]
that is terrible! why wouldn’t you want your baby to know you are there for him or her whenever they cry? I know I want someone to comfort me when I cry. babies don’t manipulate their parents,.
It all depends on what kind of cry it is.
Please read Tracy’s book and you will understand.
Yes it is important to comfort people when they cry. It is also important to let people cry.
(A lot of parents say to their kids “oh it’s nothing, it will be over in just a second”. That is saying to the kid your feeling is not true. They do this to conform them, but in reallity they say to the kid (or adults) that their feelings don’t matter. Which is worse.
And I did not say let them cry for 10 minutes.
Tracy advises people to let their kids cry for a few minutes. And then go to their room, leave them in their bed, caresse them, and talk to them. When they are calm again stay a little bit and then leave again.
If you have a cry baby and still feel this is cruel, read the book, try Tracy’s advise for a week and decide after that.
I did not invent the “babies manipulate their parents title” it was the result of an investigation.
I know my kids knew very early how to get wthat they wanted. For me there is nothing wrong with that. As long as I as a parent know that.
Check out the story about our first family meeting to see how we deal with the older kids “playing their parents”.
i am talking from experience. my 7 month old manipulates me and his father 24/7. he sleeps in the same room with us although in his own bed. he got terrible sleeping patterns and is a very demanding baby. I had tried this pattern several times just to leave him crying but honestly he doesn’t stop. And I gave in numerous times.I know it’s a cry for attention because now he is doing it while driving and i have to stop the car literally just to hold him. It is terrible.