Pinky McKay

We all have sleep associations, we don’t bat an eyelid about our own quirks or needs around what helps us sleep. Yet, with even a very young baby, there is pressure to ‘teach your baby to self-settle’ – to fall asleep without any help from you.

After two little boys who had been fairly easy to teach about using the toilet - boys can have so much fun peeing on rocks and trees in the garden as they learn how their bodies function - my daughter simply didn't give a damn about peeing in the toilet. Until today.

“I was incredibly stressed and I knew something was very wrong but I thought, I am a mum, I should be able to cope,” says Sandy, a Melbourne mother of two who was diagnosed with postnatal depression when her first baby (now three) was three months old. Sandy’s bubble of pretence burst when, after a few days in a mother baby unit, she was told it…

Mostly, night time breastfeeds feel precious and beautiful. You know in your heart that these sweet moonlight cuddles will end soon but there are niggling doubts about night time nursing, especially if your baby is a ‘certain age’.

Around the middle of your baby’s first year, that is at about six months, your baby will start showing signs that he is ready for family foods: he will be able to sit up in a high chair or on your lap; he will have lost the tongue thrust reflex (that protects him against choking in the early months, but also means food gets thrust out of his mouth,…

If you are all played out, but your child isn’t, and you don’t want to resort to TV, it’s OK to cheat. If you are feeling desperately in need of some time out (for yourself, you cant lock your kids in a cupboard) , try these:

I'm not talking about exhausted parents, reaching out for help. Im talking here about rude, self entitled a'holes who talk about their babies as though they are objects – inconvenient objects at that. They use words like ‘stubborn’ and ‘manipulating’ to describe tiny helpless infants. 

We all have sleep associations, we don’t bat an eyelid about our own quirks or needs around what helps us sleep. Yet, with even a very young baby, there is pressure to ‘teach your baby to self-settle’ – to fall asleep without any help from you.

Mum question:I have spent the first few months of my daughter’s life feeding her to sleep and it works well but now I’m worried I’ll be doing forever! I am starting back at work in a couple of months so I would like to start gradually changing this habit so that she will be able to sleep when I am not there. Can you suggest how I approach this?…

Crying is your baby's language. At first, it is pretty much the only way an infant can communicate his needs and express feelings like discomfort, hunger, exhaustion and loneliness. It is also the only way he can release pent up stress.  As your baby grows he will learn other ways to communicate—through facial expressions, body language and,…