The suggestion that sleep training will lead to a Prozac dependency later in life is as valid as suggesting that vaccinations lead to autism – dangerous, science-less hogwash. Dr. Darcia Narvaez (aka Doctor Nirvana) purveys the Dangers of Crying It Out in academic settings throughout the United States; she has proven to be a silver-spoon-in-mouth idealist with borrowed ideas from Attachment Parenting principles which critics say has led to an age of anxiety for parents in America. When Doctor Nirvana declared that “Mothers and babies should not use drugs and fetal monitors,” it begs the question whether she ever experienced childbirth herself. Her preposterous insistence on maternal pain in childbirth is matched by her utopian exhortations that mothers never relinquish control of a birth to medical personnel.

Such thinking is not only impractical, but criminally negligent.

Take satisfaction in the battery of redress being fired at helicopter mom sanctimony, specifically Dr. Amy Tuteur’s battle against the Sanctimommy Manifesto and the Festival of Stupid which berates mothers who don’t follow specific dogma:

• No induced childbirth
• Only Natural Childbirth
• No eye drops (vitamin K) after birth
• No wrapping of baby after childbirth
• Breastmilk on demand for at least three years

We don’t need a doctor telling us to avoid Cesarians. We don’t need a doctor to know that we pamper our newborns during the formidable time following birth. We know how to set up an environment where children can learn to soothe themselves, learn self respect and ultimately take responsibility for their own actions.

Innate moral code exists in nearly all parents and is the standard, not the exception.

In addition to medical consequence, there are serious emotional repercussions for parents subjected to naive child-rearing idealism. Dogmatic parental laws proscribe failure for new parents when insecurities turn to apathy because their parenting methods don’t fit the Sanctimommy Manifesto. They grit their teeth and cry, wondering why their instincts tell them discipline is needed while these self righteous pundits plea total acquiescence to a child’s will.

Nurturing discipline comes from enforcing what good parents learn works for them. They don’t need academics and idealism questioning every step along the way.