Rating: 
Summary: Use common sense
Review: I didn't realize this book was so controversial... All I know is we have twin boys who have slept through the night since they were less than two months old. This method is not incompatible with breastfeeding, since that was our babies' sole source of sustenance until they were over six months old. Our babies are a year old now and they are fat, loving, cuddly, happy, healthy babies. Did we follow this book to the letter? Of course not... USE COMMON SENSE! I didn't realize I was a child abuser for using a method that worked. So what if the guy doesn't have a college degree? I know a lot of intelligent, successful people who lack degrees. (What did mommy's do for thousands of years before they had college degrees?) Take this book (like everything) with a grain of salt. We thought it was great.
Rating:
Summary: Great reference book
Review: Great book! I wish I've gotten it earlier. Very clear and covers all the topics from breastfeeding to naps to night sleep.
Rating:
Summary: Recommended by other mothers
Review: This book was highly recommended to me by my cousins who had been referred by their peers. I had been told that it worked in helping a newborn learn how to sleep thru the night and how to comfort herself. I thought "yah right" but bought it anyway, the qucikly approaching reality of a newborn and sleepless nights was setting in. I read about 75% of the book before my baby was born. She refused to breastfeed so I followed the bottle plan. I didn't follow the concepts of the book to the "T" but used it as a baseline to help develop a schedule. At her 3rd week, she slept thru the night (8hrs) for 3 nights in a row. Then she reverted back to her 5 am feeding. At 6 wks old she was sleeping 8 hrs a night 100% of the time. She is 18 mths now and is still sleeping thru the night. I am sure that she wakes up during the night but knows how to comfort herself so she can fall asleep again. I also think a new mother needs to figure out when she wants to wake up. I was willing to stay up and do a 11pm or midnight feeding because I knew that I could get to sleep most of the night with disturbance. At the worst, waking up once at 4am is much better than putting baby to bed at 10p and then waking up at 1a and then again around 5a. Thank you Ezzo!!
Rating: 
Summary: Broken families, broken hearts
Review: As the President of Babywisers Anonymous, a support group for recovered & recovering Babywisers, I know personally the long trail of broken hearts & broken families that have finally woken up to the truth about the Babywise myths and mentality. The Babywise books were written by a man who has a secret disdain for children, and his thoughts and theories are simply his own unscientific, unChristian ideas. They may seem to work, but at what price? Infancy is not about training or controlling, and its not about independence (that comes all too soon enough!) Infancy was created by God to be a time of laying a foundation of love and trust (i.e. meet baby's needs--all of which are good needs--and baby will learn that he is loved, he is special, and he can trust "the powerful" to care for "the helpless".) This is the message of Jesus and the opposite of what Babywise espouses. After the foundation is firmly laid in infancy, then the training (gentle but firm) begins in toddlerhood. More dangerous than the methods of Babywise, is the mindset of Babywise. It pits parents against baby and warns uneducated parents that baby is out to control & manipulate them (a scientific impossibility) and ruin their marriage and their fun (which is as far from the truth as possible). It puts fear, doubt, & distrust into the hearts of parents. It causes Moms to see their babies as "opponents" rather than cherished blessings. It skews & distorts their thinking and destroys their perception of the miracle they have in their arms (a miracle that should be enjoyed, held, comforted, and cuddled all night if need be...for this is TRUE JOY!) I don't need to refute all the wrong advice about breastfeeding, sleeping through the night, and discipline...all I have to do is tell you that I have a house full of parents week after week who are grieving the irreparable damage done to their children because of being indoctrinated & brainwashed by this book. Sure they may have children who behave well on the OUTSIDE (albeit for the wrong reasons), but the real damage is done to the heart and the soul...and it often doesn't show up for 5 or even 10 years! Babies can't be spoiled (as Babywise asserts) and our job is to lavish them with love, just as we wish was done to us when WE were babies. Then, and only then, will our little ones adore & respect us enough to WANT to obey us. Strong bonding in infancy promotes easy discipline in toddlerhood. Babywise is all lies. As a mother of 7 obedient, well-mannered, compassionate kids, who are complimented wherever we go, I give you permission to throw away Babywise, unlearn everything written in it, and hold, nurse, sleep with, rock, and pamper your tiny, totally-dependent infant! In 40 years from now you will not say "I wish I hadn't spent so many hours snuggling with my baby!" I promise.
Rating:
Summary: Extremely helpful for a new mother
Review: I first read this book when I was pregnant and since my son was born I have read it all over again. This book has been extremely helpful to me as a first time mother in many areas - breastfeeding, sleeping, baby growth, and countless other baby basics. This book is clear and easy to understand. I don't understand why some parents are so against this book and it's author, Gary Ezzo (who does not claim to be a doctor).
Mr. Ezzo helps parents get their baby on a realistic, predictable schedule of feeding, playing, and sleeping that is healthy for the parents and the baby. Mr. Ezzo is very clear that if your baby is hungry then feed your baby. He does not give cruel or unhealthy advice on feeding and caring for your baby. Ultimately, the proof is in the baby's behavior - with Mr. Ezzo's help I have a fat and happy 3 month old that has been sleeping through the night since he was 9 weeks old. Family, friends, and strangers all comment on his happy disposition. And I am able to enjoy breastfeeding without feeling like a human pacifier (doesn't require the breast to be comforted). Maybe Mr. Ezzo's toughest critics are simply angry and resentful because they have difficult babies (most likely due to parenting techniques, not the baby's personality). I truly feel that all healthy infants (and their parents) would benefit from this book. You may not agree with all of the advice in this book, but it is definitely worth reading. I just ordered Baby Wise: Parenting Your Pre-Toddler 5-15 months and look forward to reading it.
Good luck with your babies and God Bless.
Rating: 
Summary: This is not about following a strict feeding schedule!
Review: This book was extremely helpful to me. It strikes a wonderful balance between the regimented schedule type of advice and the "oh-my-gosh-the-baby's-crying-make-it-stop" type of advice. Contrary to some of the negative reviews, this book does NOT advocate putting your baby on a strict schedule dictated by the clock. If people will carefully read the book, they will realize that the point is to aim for a schedule, but to let your instincts as a parent tell you what your child needs. Sometimes babies just cry, and it doesn't mean they're hungry. Sometimes they are. You are the parent and will quickly learn to tell the difference in your child's cries if you trust yourself. Becoming a slave to the cry means that you will be breastfeeding constantly and exhausted; listening to see if your baby is crying from hunger or something else means that the baby will be well-fed, and you will learn to trust yourself to know what your baby needs and when he needs it.The most helpful part of this book to me was learning about bad habits to avoid when teaching your baby to nap. Once I got the napping straight and she learned to fall alseep on her own, she quickly sorted out the nights all by herself. She is a happy well-adjusted, well-fed child. The only thing dangerous about this book is not reading it thoroughly enough to understand the point.
Rating:
Summary: Highly Recommended
Review: As a working mom with only 12 weeks maternity leave, I was especially concerned about getting my kids to fall asleep on their own and sleep through the night by the time I went back to work. I used the methods in this book for both of my children. They are both fabulous sleepers. Bedtime is easy and pleasant. They were both sleeping through the night by 10 weeks. There isn't anything cruel about the book and I felt it was totally compatible with my desire to breast-feed and nurture my babies. Incidentally, all the advice I received from my pediatrician was very consistent with the book. The main idea behind the book is to introduce some structure into your child's feeding routine and to avoid feeding them to sleep. I think those who are uncomfortable with the book tend to try and implement the approach in a very rigid fashion - timing baby's feedings by the minute and feeling like they can't make exceptions. That is not the case. You can think of the book's methods as something to strive towards without making yourself crazy about it. I recommend it for families who like structure and routine. My kids thrived on it and were totally happy babies - just like the book claims. This book helps ensure that parents don't get into bad habits that haunt them later on and reinforces the notion that even little babies are capable of sleeping through the night. We all need sleep and we are all happier and healthier because we read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Followed this with three children
Review: and would warn all parents to stay away! We truely thought that having our children on a schedule as early as possible would be the best thing for all involved. We still are highly scheduled people. Now our schedules come from our natural tendencies and routines that form early on in a child's life, though. We bought into this material hook, line and sinker. We wanted to raise "good" kids. What we got was not what we signed up for. We got a highly aggressive, angry 2nd born and a failure to thrive second born due to forcing OUR schedule on them. Mr (not DR, as some call him) Ezzo uses extreme examples to show that his way is the best way. In all honesty ANYTHING to an extreme is bad. His examples purposely draw a line in the sand - "which parent do YOU want to be?" When, honestly, parenting is not a formula set out by ANYONE - but a constantly growing, changing, living organism. He constantly contradicts his own advice throughout the book. ie: Encouraging you to be disciplined in staying with the program, while also telling you to be flexible with the schedule - yet if there's problems with the schedule, advising you to work on getting the child into the schdule. He lacks greatly in education and experience to teach about parenting. Do we want our children to grow up the way his have? (at last report Mr Ezzo himself said that he had a "cordial" relationship with his daughters. *CORDIAL*?!? - is that the relationship I want with my children? though, cordial is a step up from the not-so-long-ago "estranged" relationship they shared.) Mr Ezzo's materials are harmful to children. Some results of his parenting advice include: failure to thrive, ODD, RAD. and that's just the people I know personally (and more than one with the diagnoses) Before considering this book to learn parenting methods please check out www.ezzo.info and read through the site - esp the testimonials. Aslo - what IS all the hype about sleeping through the night? Children learn to sleep through when they are developmentally ready - and it DOES happen, but when weighing a full night's sleep against early return of menses, high risk of FTT (when forcing sleeping through on a child), higher risk of SIDS and possible attachment disorders - I'd rather stay awake ALL night than have those things, so getting up once or twice in my 8hrs of sleep is time well-spent for me! besides which, it's really the only time the baby and I ever have truely alone. Btw, our children are not wild miscreants as Ezzo would have you believe they are b/c we didnt follow his program. They are very well-behaved, five of them sleep through the night (baby's 7mo and it'll happen), we have a household schedule based on our own observation of routines and we're NOT these crazy stressed out ppl pulling our hair out b/c our children make us miserable. We find much joy in them and so do others. to quote a poster on the ezzo debate board:
anything good found in ezzo's books is not unique and anything unique found is not good
Rating:
Summary: Don't let that starving infant affect your life
Review: Please read the reviews for this book, and for Ezzo's other books. It is shocking that his books can rank in the top 300 of Amazon's sales. Many of the positive reviews stress that discipline is required to make this system work. The same "discipline" can be applied to starve children of any age. Eventually they will grow inactive or listless enough that they will sleep for long stretches, too, to conserve energy from lack of food. I watched a couple I know apply this system and they wonder aloud why two successive infants were screaming all the time, and in the next breath wonder why their weight percentile plunged, one from from 80th percentile birthweight to NEGATIVE percentile weight. They were hungry! The parents were the type of people I imagine wrote the glowing reviews; people who didn't want their schedules affected by the intrusion of a helpless child. We don't need to get tough with two-week old infants.
Rating:
Summary: Only way to raise a child
Review: My wife and I were given Gary Ezzo's book before our boy was born. It was given to us by my cousin, who had been using the book for their son. This book was a godsend for us. Our son was sleeping through the night after about three weeks. My wife breastfed, and the scheduling worked out fine. For my wife, the feeding schedule also worked well for her. Her body got adjusted to the feeding times. Her breasts did not swell and leak at odd times, only when it was time to feed our boy. Our boy is now 9 years old. He is a great kid, doesn't give us any problems and he is a straight A student in a private school (not a dumbed down public school). He is still basically on a feeding schedule. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are at pretty much the same time every day. He rarely snacks between meals, and is a healthy, active 9 year old boy. We absolutely recommend this book to anyone preparing to have a child. Read this book twice before your child is born, and at least once after birth. The only way Gary Ezzo's methods fail, is if the parents lack the discipline to make it work. Just go to the local mall and you will see evidence of the type of parents that don't have the backbone to start their children out right with a feeding schedule.
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