Janet, I think that your indignation at RIE being reduced to ‘forced independence at an early age’ is similar to the indignation others are feeling at your reduction of attachment parenting to keeping babies in carriers all the time and giving them no freedom. Maybe that’s not what you meant to say, but it’s how the article was perceived by most readers. While I’m sure there are some parents who take baby wearing to the extreme, I think most of us do it in a responsive way. For example, my daughter as an infant was very alert and active and loved to be on the ground playing at home or at the park etc. But when we went for a walk, she was happier in the baby carrier than in the pram. She also slept better at naptime cuddled close to me in the baby carrier while I did things around the house than she did if placed in the bassinet. I think a lot of parents feel that RIE principles work better in some contexts and AP principles work better in other contexts.

Thanks for sharing your experience, Katherine. Just need to correct one thing… Dr. Pikler had a thriving and renowned private practice when she developed her recommendations. She based them on the thousands of hours she spent observing babies and families. It wasn’t until years later that she was asked to create and direct the orphanage setting at Loczy and adapt her approach to that setting.

When babies object to being placed down and away from their parent, Magda and Pikler believed we should definitely respect that. Their point was to consider the benefits of this freer time too, and not to give up on it. Babies evolve every moment. So Magda suggested that we continue to periodically offer them opportunities for free movement rather than deciding that a particular baby was needier and could not benefit from it. As parents, we are inclined to project. I’m not suggesting this is your situation, but often the nuances of Magda’s and Pikler’s teachings get lost in these conversations.

Kim, reaching across the years to say thanks for this comment; it really speaks to my experience. While pregnant with my first, I read both of Janet’s (and two of Magda’s) books, and felt extremely prepared to raise my RIE baby. I fully accepted the premise that any parent who paid sufficient attention to their baby would discover that baby’s needs align with RIE’s principles. Imagine my surprise when my 8-week-old started refusing to leave my arms! I don’t identify philosophically with Dr. Sears’s work, which I find paternalistic and patriarchal (nor do I feel the need to look to any man for permission to mother my baby in response to her cues) but now, at 7 months, we are bedsharing, breastfeeding on request, and spending as much time in the carrier as we both want, confident in our mutual instincts and the research that supports them.

In retrospect, I wonder about the wisdom of taking an approach developed by a pediatrician in a group care/orphanage setting — medical; traumatic; biologically abnormal — and attempting to apply it to the biologically normal case of the mother/baby dyad.

this comment made me feel deeply uncomfortable. Saying something like “you’re being manipulative” and then following it up with “only love in my heart” raises so many red flags for me. And “you’re smart enough to know what you’ve done here but…” makes me want to run for the hills.

It sounded like Janet had a very nuanced view of things that were not manipulative (intentionally or otherwise) even with her leaning toward one parenting style.

I’ll admit, I know next to nothing about either practice (I still don’t know what REI stands for), and I know that for me, intuitively it made sense to give my newborn son a little bit of space and “independence” of sorts.

It also made sense to give ME a little bit of space, as I struggled deeply with postpartum depression and being attached to my son any more than I already was felt suffocating.

My son needs a mother who is healthy, and that level of attachment would not have helped my mental health.

It sounds like we all have our own experiences and intuition. I hope that you find peace in your discernment and respect in others opinions.

My friends and I call it survival parenting. We’ve mixed the two parenting styles as well and adapt to the situation at hand.

I never intended to follow Attachment Parenting Principles, but my three children really would NOT sleep independently despite months and months of following all the “rules.” Similarly, they all hated strollers and car seats and loved being carried. I certainly put them in strollers and on the ground as much as I possibly could, but it would only last so long. For my three children, RIE’s approach makes me feel very inadequate because I “can’t” follow the suggestions despite lots of trying. I think the idea that parents need to pay attention and figure out their particular child’s personality and needs is the most important tenet of any parenting approach. Ignoring my children’s very clear preferences to be carried often and to co-sleep (not so much a preference for my children but a need) would have been impossible. I realize you may read this and just think I am a pushover or not able to implement the suggestions with fidelity, but I assure you that is not the case. Babies vary widely in their temperaments, preferences, and needs (RIE is clear on this) and some will thrive on the floor most of the day while others thrive in mom’s arms most of the day. To say otherwise, is unfair to moms and babies. This inflexibility is what frustrates me with parenting approaches.