“But won’t my child feel insecure and abandoned if I let him cry it out?” An emphatic NO! to the softies who think babies hold some sort of long-term grudge or sustain everlasting insecurities as a result of tough love. Nurturing parents allow their children to fail, and these parents apply calculated measures to influence behavior. This is not negligence – it’s called nurturing discipline.  Nurturing discipline in infants will help your child take responsibility for basic life skills.

Forcing your child to sleep at nap time and nighttime can inspire episodes of crying. Taking away a toy that he or she continues to use improperly will frustrate the child. Putting a child in timeout – or dare we say spanking a child – causes real pain. But if we don’t set up hard and fast rules, most children will take every opportunity to regress and maintain their dictator status throughout childhood – until life inevitably forces the rules on them later. Getting beat up on the playground later in life creates real insecurities.

Don’t be those helicopter parents who scoop up the kid at the first sign of crying. After four months of total acquiescence to newborns, nurturing discipline allows us to take things away and teach our baby accepted behavior and life skills. So, get on a schedule and stick to it. Sleep training is a discipline that pays off in spades.