Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby
by Melinda Blau, Tracy Hogg
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Book Summary Information
Author: Melinda Blau, Tracy HoggEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2002-01
ISBN: 0345440900
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Accessories:
- Health o Meter HDC100-01 "Grow with Me" Teddy Bear Scale for Babies and Toddlers
- Braun IRT 4020 ThermoScan Ear Thermometer
Book Reviews of Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby
Book Review: some good advice, not appropriate for newborns
Summary: 3 Stars
This book has some good points/tips in it. The most notable are:
1) Don't overstimulate your child
2) Get your child on an eat/play/sleep rotation
3) Respect babies
4) Talk to babies and tell them what you're doing as you're doing it
5) Give your baby cues before you do certain things
6) Catch your baby's nap signs before he/she becomes overtired
However, the book also doles out a lot of bad advice and unrealistic expectations. For example, I tried the sleeping methods in this book and they did not work for my baby at all! Just go to the babywhisperer website (full of believers in Tracy Hogg) to see all of the people who are also having trouble with pick-up/put-down and shhh/pat methods. These poor parents are staying up with their babies all night to try to get them to sleep in their own rooms/cribs and consequently not getting any sleep! My son would and still will only sleep in our bed and in my arms (He can be put down for up to 30 minutes, but then will wake up). After trying Hogg's methods out for a week, I decided it was making it impossible for me to get anything done and I decided to hold him for most of his naps. Talking to other parents, it seems that many of them have the same issue as I do. Tracy Hogg is very anti-co-sleeping and yet that is the only way I have been able to get any sleep for the past 4 months! After consulting with a child developmental psychologist, I was told that my baby would eventually outgrow this need, but for the time being, he needed bodily contact to feel secure, not an uncommon phenomenon. I seriously wonder about the effects of letting your baby cry and cry to go to sleep, even if you are staying with them, patting them on the back, while they cry. While this is not as cruel as traditional cry-it-out (leaving the baby to cry alone), it sends the same message: I'm not going to meet your needs so don't bother crying.
She also has this attitude that everything you decide to do, you should do from the moment your baby is born ("start out as you mean to go on"). Well I'm sorry, but a newborn and a 6-month-old are totally different creatures. The book does not address the types of changes that babies go through as they get older, such as not needing to nap in between every nursing, etc. It's ironic that she thinks consistency from birth onward is so important since she claims to be able to solve any problem in just 3 days.
This book also has an abysmal section on breastfeeding, in which the health benefits of breastfeeding are completely played down (if I didn't know better, I would think she owned stock in Enfamil). She also advocates timing feedings, and only nursing on one side per feeding. While I agree that you should empty one breast completely before going to the next one, most women aren't able to nurse only on one side per feeding. My breasts are very uneven with the amount of milk they produce (which is fairly common) and I was starving my poor baby for half of his feedings until I figured this out. He also wanted to nurse for an hour at a time for the first 2 months and I'm glad that I let him nurse for as long as he wanted.
Tracy Hogg justifies everything in her book by comparing babies to adults (you wouldn't want to sleep in the living room, neither does your baby, etc.) The notion that babies have the same wants and needs as adults is patently ridiculous. My son certainly didn't care what room he was sleeping in as long as I was in it, preferably holding him. She claims that when babies cry because you're putting them to sleep using her methods, it's only to tell you, "this isn't the way we normally do things." Well how does she know what the baby is trying to tell you when he cries? The bottom line is that this book was written by someone who has a lot of experience with babies but no expertise. It has some good advice, but a lot of bad advice too, so be careful what you choose to follow.
Having ranted about the book for several paragraphs, I still think it was worth the read, but only to take from it what makes sense for your child. I recommend "No-Cry Sleep Solutions" by Elizabeth Pantley and "Your Child from birth to age five" by Penelope Leach. These two books give much more realistic expectations about baby behavior.
More Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby reviews:
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Summary of Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby
?TRACY HOGG HAS GIVEN PARENTS A GREAT GIFT?the ability to develop early insight into their child?s temperament.??Los Angeles Family
When Tracy Hogg?s Secrets of the Baby Whisperer was first published, it soared onto bestseller lists across the country. Parents everywhere became ?whisperers? to their newborns, amazed that they could actually communicate with their baby within weeks of their child?s birth. Tracy gave parents what for some amounted to a miracle: the ability to understand their baby?s every coo and cry so that they could tell immediately if the baby was hungry, tired, in real distress, or just in need of a little TLC. Tracy also dispelled the insidious myth that parents must go sleepless for the first year of a baby?s life?because a happy baby sleeps through the night. Now you too can benefit from Tracy?s more than twenty years? experience. In this groundbreaking book, she shares simple, accessible programs in which you will learn:
? E.A.S.Y.?how to get baby to eat, play, and sleep on a schedule that will make every member of the household?s life easier and happier.
? S.L.O.W.?how to interpret what your baby is trying to tell you (so you don?t try to feed him when he really wants a nap).
? How to identify which type of baby yours is?Angel, Textbook, Touchy, Spirited, or Grumpy?and then learn the best way to interact with that type.
? Tracy?s Three Day Magic?how to change any and all bad habits (yours and the baby?s) in just three days.
At the heart of Tracy?s simple but profound message: treat the baby as you would like to be treated yourself. Reassuring, down-to-earth, and often flying in the face of conventional wisdom, Secrets of the Baby Whisperer promises parents not only a healthier, happier baby but a more relaxed and happy household as well.
The last thing new parents can find time for is quiet reading, so many helpful books on infant care rely on bullet points and a "let's get to the point" writing style. Tracy Hogg, a neonatal nurse, teacher, and mother of two, uses these techniques to good effect in Secrets of the Baby Whisperer. Focusing on newborns and their parents, her simple programs are a blend of intelligent intuition and methods based on years of experience. The first half of the book is devoted to E.A.S.Y--her name for creating a structured daily routine for you and your baby that makes the most of your baby's awake times and also leaves time just for you. These concepts aren't designed to force your bundle of joy into not following her body's needs, but rather to create a feasible middle ground between total rigidity and on-demand food and sleep (and no time for mom to shower). If it still strikes you as too regimented, keep reading. The author makes room for differences in personal style and includes short quizzes to determine whether you're a "planner" or a "winger", and what level of daily structure you are likely to find helpful. In the same chapter, she identifies five general temperaments of infants, how to get an accurate feel for yours, and what methods of care are likely to be the most effective for his temperament. Her statement that babies prefer routine is backed up by research from the University of Denver. While most of the book relies on anecdotes to get the points across, Hogg does find room to back up some of her statements with quotes from various researchers and institutions. Included at the end of the book are assurances that E.A.S.Y. can be followed even with a colicky baby or one who's been ruling the roost for the first few months. Frustrated parents might like to read the last page first: "all the baby-whispering advice in the world is useless unless you're having a good time being a parent" is an excellent reminder to enjoy this time with all of its ups and downs. --Jill Lightner
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