Good Night, Sleep Tight: The Sleep Lady's Gentle Guide to Helping Your Child Go to Sleep, Stay Asleep, and Wake Up Happy [Hardcover]

Kim West (Author), Joanne Kenen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2005

Getting a young child to go to sleep and stay asleep is one of the most challenging aspects of parenting. Yet many parents resign themselves to enduring years of exhaustion. Practical help is not easy to find, and much of the available advice stresses letting even very young babies "cry it out," an option that is not comfortable for many parents. Kim West, known to her clients as The Sleep Lady®, has developed an alternative and effective approach that is gentler on both parent and child. West emphasizes that sleep is a learned skill and explains how parents can teach children to sleep, even at an early age. She starts with newborns, showing parents how to avoid sleep problems from the beginning. And she has solutions for older babies and children who have developed poor bedtime, nighttime, or nap time habits. The Sleep Lady method—including a gentle, practical, step-by-step program called The Sleep Lady Shuffle—has proven effective for hundreds of families. West has spent more than a decade successfully teaching parents how to help their children sleep soundly and independently through the night. She provides specific, achievable guidelines that work, while also taking into account the values, lifestyles, and parenting styles unique to each family. Most parents who adopt The Sleep Lady Shuffle see dramatic improvements in a few weeks, if not days. Good Night, Sleep Tight contains age-specific chapters from birth through five years old, in which West succinctly outlines what action to take; discusses important developmental changes; provides sample waking, feeding, and napping schedules; advises how to use The Sleep Lady Shuffle; and lays out common problems and solutions. Included throughout are real-life testimonies and anecdotes from parents West has assisted. Good Night, Sleep Tight also discusses co-sleeping, bedtime strategies for twins and siblings, and dealing with nightmares and illnesses. West even offers tips on how to minimize sleep disruption when families travel or experience other breaks in routine. Essential reading for any tired parent, or any expectant parent who wants to avoid the pitfalls of sleeplessness, Good Night, Sleep Tight offers a practical, gentle, easy-to-follow remedy that will work for all families in need of nights of peaceful slumber.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this expanded edition, first published in 2004, child and family therapist West (aka The Sleep Lady) further explores the ways parents can teach their infants and toddlers the indispensable skill of falling and staying asleep. West has added the latest pediatric research on sleep safety, pacifier use, and breastfeeding, as well as expanded sections on toddler naps, interpreting newborn cries, and phasing out nighttime feedings. She has also included sections on bedtime baby yoga poses, a chapter on room sharing and bed sharing (encouraging parents to carefully assess their attitudes before making a decision on whether to co-sleep) and postpartum depression. West eschews the cry it out approach, which may leave parents feeling guilty and exhausted. Instead, her Sleep Lady Shuffle is a gentle behavior modification technique that helps babies gradually master solo sleeping and self-soothing. The author covers such general sleep tips as creating a sleep-friendly environment and using loveys, and then offers individual chapters addressing various age groups from newborn to five; readers can readily find information pertinent to their particular child and situation. In this detailed guide, West advises parents to practice patience and consistency, and maintain a united front as they lull their baby into slumber land. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

'A godsend for tired parents everywhere. I highly recommend this book to the parents of infants and young children who have a problem sleeper on their hands' Howard Bennett, MD, author of WAKING UP DRY: A GUIDE TO HELP CHILDREN OVERCOME BEDWETTING 'GOOD NIGHT, SLEEP TIGHT is the first book of its kind to clearly explain why bedtime is such a challenge for so many kids and their parents, and to offer solutions that won't tortue anyone' Maura Rhodes, Senior Editor, PARENTING magazine 'Right after "Boy or girl?" the next question new parents often hear is "How's he sleeping"' after going through Kim West's painless, practical, and easy-to-implement program, they'll be able to honestly answer, "Like a baby"' Armin Brott, author of EXPECTANT FATHER 'Parents and children alike should welcome this commonsense, family-friendly guide to childhood sleep from birth to age five ... This book will teach parents to gently start to shape a baby's sleep in infancy, sparing them the months or even years of sleep deprivation that so many families endure' David Kessler, MD, former Comissioner of the Food and Drug Administration and current Dean of the UCSF School of Medicine '

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: CDS Books; First Edition edition (January 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1593150253
• ISBN-13: 978-1593150259
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (255 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #77,381 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #47 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Diseases & Physical Ailments > Sleep Disorders

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

213 of 216 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Easy to use, and it works. January 31, 2005

By Punkinheads Mom

Format:Hardcover

The Sleep Lady is the reason our daughter is finally sleeping through the night, after a long struggle with up to 12 night wakings every night. We attended a phone class taught by Kim West and then later bought her book.

The most valuable part of this book is the Sleep Lady Shuffle. My husband and I tried using Ferber's method first, and my daughter cried until she just collapsed from sheer exhaustion. When I went in to check on her, finally asleep, I could tell she had slumped over from sitting up - with tears still drying on her face. This is not the picture of a child who has learned the art of self-soothing. We gave it up, and it took some time before I could shake the guilt. We tried the No-Cry Sleep Solution next for almost two weeks and did not see any improvement. I think that for us, the method was too difficult to implement. Our daughter would cry as soon as she left our arms... putting us into a pick-up-put-down dance for hours at a time, and after seeing no results over a few weeks, we quit.

The Sleep Lady Shuffle is something "in-between" these two methods. It's phased and gentle. It does involve some crying, but mom or dad is right there in the room to comfort and reassure baby... and although it took some time, our daughter did fall asleep peacefully and on her own. Over the nights it took less and less time for her to do this. We had some setbacks along the way - sickness and travel - and when those were over, we could just implement the Shuffle again in about half the time it took originally... we got our nights back, and we feel that our daughter is eating better and acting happier because she's getting more quality sleep.

You don't really need the book to implement the Shuffle.... We found the book valuable because we could use it for inspiration to continue being consistent, and to help shape our daily and nighttime routines. I also felt the anecdotes gave me confidence to work with Kim's suggestions for our own family's needs. For example, instead of cutting out night-nursing completely, I continued nursing my daughter once per night for a few months, and we were fairly successful at keeping her to this one night waking until the time was right to night-wean her.

All that said - I feel the book and method work very well for a young toddler, since we used it with success when our daughter was close to a year old. I have not used the sections on newborns or older children. As with any book, read it, take what you want and believe in, and throw away what doesn't apply to you. Her advice on breastfeeding, for example, didn't sit completely right with me, but I feel that I know enough now that I could tailor her suggestions for the needs of my particular baby.

If I were co-sleeping and did not plan on moving my baby to a crib, I don't think this is a book I would choose - her only examples of shaping the sleep of co-sleeping babies involved moving them to a crib.

This book is very well suited for people who, like my husband and I, tried to let their baby cry and could not handle the tears... and who find that avoiding crying at all costs is causing sleep-deprivation on everyone's part. It is sensible and gentle. It works! My family owes the Sleep Lady big time! We could not be more happy with the progress our sleep patterns have made. Read more ›

100 of 109 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Best solution for getting OUR baby to sleep through the night February 24, 2010

By J. Cherwak

Format:Paperback

I purchased this book along with Pantley's "The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night" out of desperation to find some way to help my then 8 month old son sleep for more than 3-4 hours at a time.

Some background data: my son is an extremely high energy, high spirited, self-determined little man. He's a very happy baby but not the kind who will be content to sit in a swing and "relax" for more than a couple of minutes. We phased out night feedings, with the OK from our ped, at about 5 months. After only a couple of rough nights at that, he was going to sleep rather easily and would sleep from about 7:30pm until 12am, get up once and have to be patted back to sleep (for about 10 minutes) then back to sleep until 6am. We had a "bedtime routine" in place at about 4 months- turn down TV, dim lights, feeding, bath, quiet play time, books, rocking and to bed drowsy but not sleeping. Getting up once wasn't that hard and we were content with our nighttime schedule and our son was getting enough sleep and very happy during the day.

Then at about 6 months he started to get ear infections- one after the other and the total time handling ear infections was about 2 straight months. Right after that he got his first cold which lasted about a week and a half. During this time his sleep schedule was really bad. We had to hold him most of the night because it hurt him too much to lay flat in his crib and he would wake a lot from the pain. After he was no longer ill, he became used to my husband or me holding him at night and being constantly with us.... So, he started waking up 3-4 times a night and it would take patting his back for about 10-25 minutes each time to get him to go to sleep again and sometimes he'd get so upset I'd have to pick him up and walk him around the house for 30 minutes or so before he'd fall asleep again. After many months of really poor broken up sleep I was desperate to find a solution.

We tried Pantley's book first because I was extremely opposed to any sleep solution that allowed my baby to cry for ANY length of time. We implemented ALL the techniques in "The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night" for just over 2 months. At the end, the result for us was that it made our son need us even MORE to go to bed and during the night. He absolutely would no longer go to sleep on his own- if we put him to bed drowsy but not 100% asleep, as soon as he touched the crib he'd jerk himself awake and start to get hysterical if we didn't immediately pick him up. To even get him into his crib we'd have to feed him a bottle until he was almost asleep and stand and bounce him for at least 15 minutes each night until he was 100% asleep and he would wake up and cry for us 6-8 times a night and it would take rocking, patting, walking him around for a total of about 3-4 hours each night. My husband and I were beyond exhausted and so was my son. We were crabby. He was crabby. We even took him to the doctor to make sure there was no medical situation causing his lack of sleep (which I would definitely recommend every parent do before implementing ANY sleep solution- make sure there are zero medical issues hindering their ability to go and stay asleep). He checked out perfectly healthy. (The techniques in Pantley's book may work for many babies and families and I'd hoped that it would for our baby/family but it didn't. Every child is different and there really is no "one size fits all" solution when it comes to them.)

So, desperate for sleep, I decided to "give in" and try the sleep lady shuffle as described in Kim West's book (basically, put the baby in the crib drowsy, sit in a chair next to the crib, soothe him briefly by touch/words if he gets upset then sit back down and do this until he falls asleep. After 3 nights next to the crib, move a bit away from the crib/closer to the door and do the same thing etc.) I knew to expect some crying but by this point my son was just over 10 months old and I'd learned what his different cries meant- hysterical when he had a bad dream or fell down while practicing walking, whine type crying when he was tired or hungry, mad crying when he couldn't get what he wanted etc. Beforehand, my husband and I agreed that if my son got hysterical we would end it right away and we'd only try it for an hour- if he was still not sleeping and was upset/cranky/crying after 60 minutes, we'd end it and look for another solution. Personally I could never feel good about anything that made my son so upset he became hysterical (as in Ferber's CIO until you puke method- that's just me.) I made my husband do the first night as I did not want to hear my son cry. The first thing we did (after his normal bottle/bath/book bedtime routine) was explain to him what was going to happen- he's a big boy now and needs to go to sleep so he can get big and strong but daddy will be in the room the whole time until he falls asleep etc. We also gave him his favorite stuffed toy to sleep with. I listened/watched on and off from our video monitor. My husband put our son in his crib, covered him and sat in the chair next to the crib. At first there was no crying- he just stood up and looked at my husband as if confused on why he wasn't being patted to sleep. Then he started to cry. My husband just stayed completely calm and sat next to the crib. I was surprised to hear his cry sounded more annoyed than really upset. He'd cry for a bit then stop and listen to hear if we were going to get him. Cry again, stop for a couple minutes, cry for half a minute etc. Then he'd lie down, whimper, stop and listen, cry, stand up, lay down etc. This lasted just under 30 minutes and he fell asleep and slept through the entire night without waking ONCE- until 6:30am- 10.5 hours! The next night it was the same except he cried for 20 minutes (and slept through the night). By night 3 he cried for 6 minutes then fell asleep. He did wake up once at 2am and my husband went to check on him to make sure he was OK- hadn't peed through his diaper, wasn't sick etc. He was fine, so my husband told him it was "sleepy time", gently laid him back down, sat next to the crib and my son whimpered for less than one minute and fell back asleep for the rest of the night. Night 4 was even better. One thing we are doing though- which is what we do with ALL parenting books/advice - is take what we like and throw out the rest. Try what we liked, if it doesn't work, modify it or abandon it. I thought that only 3 days next to the crib and then moving to the door was too fast a transition so we're staying next to the crib longer and only moving a foot away at a time. I noticed that when I leaned over my son's crib to hug him, he'd cry harder after I let go - I found it best to just lightly pat his back or briefly rub his head and tell him "It's OK. I'm here. Go to sleep now." and "shh.. shh.." You just have to pay attention to your own child's signs and figure out what works for them.

Note: After about a week of this method, my whole family came down with the flu. Of course during this time, we did not use any "method" to get my son to sleep as he needed our touch and closeness to sleep since he didn't feel well. Once he was 100%, we started over with Step 1 of the shuffle and it worked again- fell asleep with minimal whine type crying and then slept through the night!

I was really against allowing my son to cry at bedtime- even slightly- even for a moment, but when my options boiled down to starting to irrationally resent being a mother because I was so sleep deprived I could barely see straight or my son shedding a few NON-hysterical, "I'm mad at you" type tears for a few nights only and then sleep wonderfully and wake up extremely happy- that was the lesser evil for me. With our next baby, if he/she is not as "high needs" as our son, I will try Pantley's methods again first (but not for 2 months this time). If they don't work with the new baby, I won't hesitate to use the sleep lady shuffle - as a couple of semi-rough nights are worth a baby (and mom and dad!) who is happy and healthy because he/she is getting enough rest.

The bottom line is: every child is different- some things will work for one child but not at all for another. So use common sense, follow your instincts as a parent, try out advice/solutions that you, as the parent, are OK with for THAT specific child and if it doesn't work, try something else. One of my friends has a 2 year old son who is very "chill" and calm. They tried Ferber's method when he was 7 months old and her son only cried slightly for less than 10 minutes, for less than 5 days and then went to bed really happy with no complaints and slept through the night ever since. She had also gone with her instincts as a parent and decided that if her son got too upset or cried longer than 15 minutes that she would get him - going against the Ferber technique. She took the parts that she thought useful to her and threw out the rest. I know for sure that method would not have worked with my son so I didn't even try it. Not every solution will work for every single child but the sleep shuffle technique did work for our son. Read more ›

57 of 60 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Like the method, not the book February 22, 2011

By Melissa

Format:Paperback

I really wasn't happy with several aspects of this book. This is the third sleep book that I've read, and I really liked the message. The other two books that I read were at very different ends of the spectrum; the Sleep Lady fell nicely in the middle, and really struck a chord with me since I'm straddling the fence of attachment parenting. I also read:
- Dr. Sears' Sleep Book - another chapter in the attachment parenting bible. However, 90% of the book is "why would you NOT want to cosleep? It's the answer to everything!" As much as I enjoyed my time cosleeping, with a squrimy 1-year-old and a small bed, it was time to stop. Not much advice at all in there on stopping, maybe just 2 pages on transitioning.
- BabyWise - the anti-attachment-parenting book. What a put-offish, angry tome. It spends the first several chapters belittling anyone would would think kindly of attachment parenting, and puts co-sleeping on the same level as heresy. I didn't even get to the actual method, I put the book down after three chapters. But it advocates a cry-it-out strategy.

The Sleep Lady Shuffle, as she calls her "sleep shaping" method, is assisted cry-it-out. You sit in the room at different positions, and turn a blind eye (and ear) to your baby's cries as they learn to put themselves to sleep. Your only role in the room is to let them know that you're there, that you won't abandon them. I'm not a fan of cry-it-out, but this seemed the gentlest approach, and is similar to what Super Nanny does.

Every baby is different, and the sleep training methods that work for one baby may not work for another. "Ferberizing" (cry-it-out alone with 10-minute checks & soothing) just did not work for my baby.... She got increasingly agitated as time went on, and let out a shrill, blood-curdling scream that lasted for two solid hours before I gave up. However, though she still did cry for two hours when we started The Sleep Lady, the tone and severity of the crying was much different, and she did end up falling asleep in the crib without my intervention.

For babies that respond well to Ferber, that method is faster. But for those who don't, give this method a try. The downside in comparison to Ferber is that this method does take longer, you need to "fade away" from them.

My biggest complaint was not the method or the philosophy in the book. I think a lot of the explanations and discussions of baby sleep needs at different ages and stages was very informative. However, the editing of the book was pretty atrocious, and whomever designed the layout should be fired. The number of 'breakaway' texts was ludicrous. You know how when you read a magazine article, they will take one or two poignant phrases and put them in large, bold font in the middle of the page? This book does that.. a lot. I've never read a book like this that has so many breakout phrases. They're littering the whole first section. And they are all phrases that appear right in the next paragraph. So, before you read a full paragraph you've already read half of it as a breakout text not 10 seconds earlier. To have that over and over and OVER again was annoying.

My other complaint was that all of the age-specific sections were copy-pastes of each other, with only a few differences between them. And as you read the sections for the older ages, a lot of tips will simply say "please see this item in the age 6-12 months section." If you're going to copy-paste whole swaths of text, why not copy that too? It would make a whole heck of a lot more sense to put it all in there once, and save all of those breakouts for an actual useful purpose, by highlighting strategies for specific age groups within the greater text of the steps of her method. No more copy-paste.

And instead of copy-paste text, they would now have room for more content. I found that most of the "good stuff" in the book was easily found online for free in various articles and message boards. What I really needed the book for were specific strategies and "troubleshooting" steps if we were to encounter them. And while there is a section called "routine busters" (teething, vacations, illnesses) there isn't a section called "what to do if your child starts ripping off her jammies while she's supposed to be soothing herself to sleep and you're supposed to be ignoring her." There isn't a section called "Days 1-4 went great but we've stopped making progress and now she's getting worse." And there is no section called "choosing and attaching to a lovey, 101". For all of those needs I've had to turn to the aforementioned message boards and parenting sites. I'd rather pay the book's price to go to a website that has a message board that *she* posts on, so I can ask questions directly to her for these issues, since that is where I would find the most value for my money. The book simply didn't provide enough value, enough 'new' content that I couldn't get elsewhere.

And here, the entire meat of the book is online for free by the author:
[...] Read more ›