Rating: 
Summary: Torn between Sears and Ferber
Review: Even if you disagree with this book's program, it's worth a read. There is a great deal of valuable information on how babies sleep, and the theory of sleep associations and how they relate to a baby's sleep patterns is convincing -- especially if you're a mother for whom this program worked.On the other hand, this book desperately needs updating, especially as relates to breastfeeding. It's really meant for formula-fed infants who sleep in cribs in their own rooms. And the book rarely differentiates between 3-mo olds, 9-mo olds and 3-yr olds! Moreover, there is no information on how to maintain the good habits once you've "done" the program, which would have been useful. There is at base an unbridgeable chasm between Ferber and William Sears, the renowned advocate of "attachment parenting." Sears claims that by not responding to a crying baby at night, you teach your baby that mommy is unresponsive. That the baby who doesn't cry at night has "given up." And that attachment can suffer as a result. (He even states that "Ferberized" children do continue to cry out frequently at night, but that their desensitized parents do not hear them.) Ferber claims that you can teach your baby that you are still "there," but that your brief visits are not worth all the crying. Ultimately the baby learns to go back to sleep readily on his or her own. Until the book is updated, I recommend that parents familiarize themselves with both Ferber AND Sears, and then feel their way along. Many of my friends, like myself, practiced attachment parenting "by the book" for 6 months. Then, as the baby's increasing activity and alertness made this impossible, found varying degrees of success with "Ferberization." Flexibility and sensitivity to the baby are key.
Rating: 
Summary: Rest for the weary!
Review: I am the mother of a 5 month old and was searching for information to help him to sleep through the night. This book was recommended by a number of moms so I bought it, even though the work involved letting my baby cry, which I really wasn't sure I could handle. After reading the applicable chapters, my husband and I implemented Dr. Ferber's ideas and my son went from sleeping 5 hours before waking in the night to 8 hours - in 2 days! We have had consistent progress in improving his sleeping and napping habits and he is resting better each night. Last night he slept 11 hours straight and woke happy and well rested. The main thing this book taught me was the importance of being consistent - sending a consistent message to your child and doing so with love and caring. It also helped me to analyze my son's sleeping habits and look at what was behind his waking up to determine what should be done about it. I would highly recommend this book to parents who are looking to establish good sleeping habits or correct problems that have arisen.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't buy this book.
Review: Personally, I think that this book should be burned. It is of no value. We used this book to try to get my son to sleep better. By the time we finished; not only was he refusing to sleep in his crib, he was refusing to enter his bedroom & would scream every time he saw a crib. It took over 6 months to get him to be in his room without screaming after we tried this barbaric, worthless "sleep method". If you are looking for help with your child's sleep problems do not waste your money on this book. Buy "The no cry sleep solution" by Elizabeth Pantley, that book is very helpful. It took time, but her advice worked! Our son sleeps through the night in his own room now!
Rating:
Summary: Great book, tough row to hoe.
Review: Ferber has done us all a service with this book, clearly explaining the fundamentals of sleep patterns and body rhythms, as well as how classical conditioning can impede the development of proper sleep habits. I've found that its information was helpful during our daughter's infancy, and even recently (at age 8) with respect to nighttime fears. However, the program Ferber recommends for some children is not one that everyone can easily embrace. He basically prescribes putting the child down to bed fully awake (no rocking/singing/nursing to sleep), and letting the baby cry for ever longer periods of time until the child realizes that crying will not help him/her get attention. I believe in this approach, and think it's a good one. However, your resolve has to be firm; you will be listening to the child cry. If both parents are not in complete agreement on this approach, and are not fully committed, then pursuing it could lead to additional frustrations and disagreements. I feel that aspect is the only point missing from Ferber's otherwise excellent book; he has not alerted parents to the difficulty sufficiently. Aside from that, I wholeheartedly recommend this book - - like I said, it even helped us in the past couple weeks. Give it to a friend, too!
Rating:
Summary: The best method for teaching your child good sleep habits
Review: We have twin boys both with very different sleep habits. Using Dr. Ferbers' methods, from the time they were 5 months old, was the best thing we ever did to regain our sanity! Everyone needs to do what works best for them, but if you need your sleep and you don't want your child sleeping in bed with you, then THIS IS THE METHOD FOR YOU. The basic concept is that your child must learn to fall asleep on their own! If they are dependent on anything external to fall asleep; you will be required to get up every time that they do. YOU MUST FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS EXACTLY AS RECOMMENDED! If the method doesn't work, then it is likely you are doing something wrong. I read portions of this book over and over again and every time that they weren't falling asleep it was because I was missing some part of the method. If you aren't consistent it is actually harder on your child.
We started with intervals of 1, 3, 5 minutes of crying before a visit from mom or dad when they were infants and the program still worked in two days! You will need to go back and use the program over and over as different things mess up their schedule (teething, illness, vacations, moving to a big boy bed, etc.). The longest that either of my children ever cried was one bad night for almost 30 minutes (broken down into the recommended 5, 10, 15 minute visits from mom or dad). This book also has a chart showing you how much your child should sleep at different ages. A great parenting resource.
Rating:
Summary: Incredibly unimaginative & it made things worse
Review: I can't believe this guy is in charge of pediatric sleep disorders and the best thing he can come up with is making babies cry themselves to sleep!! I read many of the other poor reviews about this book prior to purchasing it but decided to get it anyway. My daughter is 5 months old and is intelligent, alert, and very happy. However, she has had trouble falling to sleep and staying asleep since she was 4 days old. After trying Dr. Ferber's method for a week (she did fall asleep eventually after crying) her condition hadn't improved, and in fact, got much worse. She is now afraid to be left alone not only in her crib, but in her playpen, her swing, her bouncer, etc. She doesn't trust me anymore and it will take some time to get that back. PLEASE (...) don't buy this book!!!
Rating:
Summary: Sleep at last!!!
Review: My 6 month old grew accustomed to being rocked and put in bed with us. After 3 months my husband and I decided we were ready to regain our bed! We read Dr. Ferber's book and decided to give it a try. Wow!!! After only two nights we were amazed at the results. I feel like a new woman. Not to mention my son is like a new child. He is actually getting good sound sleep at night. I know this is not for everyone, so everyone should not try it. Sleeping is not just a luxury for those without children, it is a neccesity to our well being. We all wake up well rested and ready to start our day. Those people who have negative comments obviously didn't follow it correctly. Dr. Ferber does not say you should let your child scream for hours at a time. He states to go in to them and reassure them that you are there. It is very hard, but what a small sacrifice on our part as parents. It is our job to help our children be the healthiest they can be. That includes good rest. I highly recommend this book to anyone with the backbone to make a decision on their child's behalf.
Rating:
Summary: This book has made a very good impact on our family's life.
Review: In Febrary of 1992 we were given a copy of this book and our family was changed instantly. Are daughter was about 9 months old and was not sleeping very well. We had to rock here for nearly two hours before she would fall asleep and then she would sleep for an hour and be back up again. She would not feed or need anything she just wanted to be awake. The very first afternoon after recieving this book we attempted it's method. To our supprise it worked. After the second wait period she went to sleep. It was an incredibly night. It only took a matter of a couple of days to train our child to sleep correctly. I do admit it felt extremely cruel at first, but our child was a much happier baby and the relationship between Mommy and Daddy improved. Seven years have now passed and we have 2 children that we used these techniques on. They are both wonderful happy children who sleep all night, do not wet the bed or have nightmares. Both are excellent students and very fit and athletic and Mommy and Daddy are still happily married. Our children have never had the problems that most of our friends have experience with illnesses or behavior, and there were a total of 5 children born in that same 2 month period as our first child. I cannot attribute all of these to Dr. Ferber's book, but I am sure it was a major factor.
Rating:
Summary: First understand your child's needs
Review: The book should be read entirely to understand what is the child's sleep problem before you decide to implement a "crying to sleep" plan, which is not what the book suggests. The book itself is very well organized, and you can find the "categories" of sleep problems separated per chapters. Here are two case studies on the implementation of the book. I admit that these are incredibly successful cases, but they are the ones that I lived. Case 1:
I have a very sensitive daughter (19 months), who is VERY attached to her mommy. She was used to be rocked for 15 - 45 mins prior to be put in bed and slept from 7:30pm to 7:00 am. At 14 months, because of family health problems, we were staying a lot with family in other towns, or family members stayed at our home. Suddenly, she needed more time rocking her, and started to get up in the middle of the night. This got to a point where she only slept when she was with us in our bed. The family situation was over and she would still sleep with us. At night, she slept holding our arms and neck to make sure that we did not leave her alone or even moved her, but slept her naps without problems at her daycare.
A couple of months passed, and there was no sign of change in her sleep patterns. It was obvious to us that her sleep problems occurred because of the month we suffered a lot of emotional instability, but we did not know how to address the problem since she would literally grab on to us. We searched for information on sleep problems and a lot of people suggested this book. We thought that letting a child cry was definitively torture for her and us, but after reading the book we understood better the training technique and saw our child's problem photographed in the content.
At 18 months we started what we called "sleep training". Following the suggestions in the book, the first night passed just as the cases in the book. The total time from setting her to sound asleep was 35 mins and she woke up the next day refreshed and happy. The second night was terrible. She jumped from her crib, she defecated twice so we would change her, she kept trying to jump from the bed, she requested milk, juice, rice, cookies, water, ice and every other word she knew. All this time we would follow the suggestions of the book, entering the room at separated intervals but not picking her up, letting her know that we were there for her and making sure that she was safe but saying that it was time to sleep in her own bed. It was hard for her and us, the second night was what we called "bad crying", but the total time from setting her to sound asleep was 45 mins and she woke up the next day refreshed and happy. The third night we told her it was sleeping time and she complained for a minute and went to sleep. Since then she would not even complain when we told her it was time to sleep. She is still VERY attached to her mommy, and still loves to heaven her daddy. Case 2:
After successfully implementing the sleep training, my sister tried to implement it. Her daughter was 13 months. She was used to sleep by being rocked with a milk bottle, and woke up every day at 4:00am to drink some more milk (not even an ounce). Because her parents had odd working hours, she was put to sleep at different times but mostly after 10:00pm and would wake up after 11:00am. She did not nap during the day. After reading the book, my sister understood that her daughters sleep problems were actually because she did not have a sleep schedule, and was relating "sucking" the bottle with sleeping. Following the suggestions on the book, a sleep time and a naptime were set. The next step was implementing the schedule. The first night the total time from setting her to sound asleep was 35 mins and she woke up the next day refreshed and happy (did not request bottle at night). In the first nap she complained for 5 minutes, but she slept 2hrs during the day. The second night the total time from setting her to sound asleep was 5 mins and she woke up the next day refreshed and happy (did not request bottle at night). The second day she was put to nap, but she did not sleep (she stayed in her crib). The third day and since she has slept and napped without problems. My sister thanks me every day for suggesting her reading the book.
Rating:
Summary: A terrible cost to the psyche
Review: This book may help you sleep a little more at first, but your child will suffer for it! There are kinder, gentler ways. A better option is the No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help your Baby Sleep Through the Night by Elizabeth Pantley. Please spare your child the agony of FrankenFerber's method!
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