Are you ready for it? I admit, I'm a little nervous to post this because I'm sure the haters are going to come for me but it's got to be said! 😂

This is a MYTH! Sleep training is NOT damaging.

Do people have opinions about sleep training being damaging? Yup. Will you find blogs and articles of people expressing that opinion if you google it? Yup. Is there solid research to back up this claim? Nope. 🤷‍♀️

➡️Short term studies show us no negative affects of sleep training. In fact they show the opposite. That babies are happier and less fussy. See studies here and here and here

➡️Long term studies (at 1 and 5 years later) also show us that there are no differences in parent-child attachment, child emotions, child behavior, psychosocial functioning, stress regulation, child mental health, and child-parent relationship between sleep trained and non sleep trained children. See studies here

👌That's it and that's all folks. No studies showing any evidence of damage. Hard to argue with that.

🧐The position against sleep training is a theoretical one. These opinions are not based on research and evidence. They call upon unrelated studies to do so (such as looking at kids who grew up in orphanages) or drawing the wrong conclusions from other researchers' studies (I'm looking at you Dr. Sears 😮). For more depth on this one, check out this article

👩‍🔬The science is just not on their side with this argument of harm. And that's why this sleep myth needed to be tackled. This is a safe space for moms to learn about sleep, get the reassurance and facts that sleep training is a totally acceptable course of action (as long as it's the right move for your family).

💕If you're still reading this, you're a superstar! Please know, I support you in whatever sleep choices you make! If you decide you need to make a positive sleep change for the sake of your family, I'm here for you 100%!

Also be sure to check out this related blog post: Sleep training: what does the research say?

baby sleep myth