[.ca] Tears and Tantrums: What to Do When Babies and Children Cry (ISBN 0961307366)

Opening up my Mind and Heart:
"Tears and Tantrums -- What to Do When Babies and Children Cry" is a book that takes into consideration and advocates *attachment parenting* (ala Sears, Liedloff, McKenna, Thevenin, and others), *non-punitive discipline*, and *understanding and meeting our children's emotional needs*. Babies are not born with repressed feelings, but they are vulnerable to stress from mishandling and trauma from high-tech interventions. Efforts should be made to assure that babies come into the world in the most peaceful and humane way possible. It is quite passe to believe that infants feel no pain, unfortunately many babies do suffer trauma at birth, my firstborn did. What Solter's writings did for me and my husband was to open our minds and hearts to our little boy's crying. Not just the whimpers and cries to signal immediate needs (nursing, warmth, attention, closeness, being comfortable), but also to the cries he had when he was trying to recover from his hurts, or shed any stress that he was feeling. In this process, we became more attached with our son, and subsequently our daughter, too. I learned how to be present and empathetic, and nurture a close connection when my children were upset and no "fix" could be found. I took it to heart that no baby or child should ever cry alone and that one should always pick up and hold a crying baby. Solter's work gave me the confidence to try co-sleeping. When my son began to wake in the night as he approached the crawling stage, we heard about a method by Ferber but quickly rejected it, and instead we took our child into our bed so that we could better meet his needs. This book challenges some mainstream ideas about children and about the meaning of tears, I think it's an eye-opening and thoughtful book, very much worth a read.

Why Children Cry:
Crucial to the job of parenting is the necessity to create safety for a child, both emotionally and physically. This book so compassionately-and scientifically-brings that message home. My husband and I, like many parents, have struggled to overcome decades of child-rearing conditioning that told us in a zillion ways "children are to be seen and not heard." Historically, child rearing practices have advocated punishment, including corporal punishment, humiliation and pain as a way to teach children to learn, among other things, empathy, compassion, respect and responsibility. In addition to such punitive practices, there has been a cultural aversion to children expressing strong emotions, such as sadness and anger or 'tears and tantrums.' In this book, Solter lays the scientific groundwork-no doubt a product of her biology background-for the need to learn to comfort children when they cry or rage, rather than to try to stop the emotional release. Comfort, most likely, is something we would offer an adult friend who had an emotional outburst of sadness or anger, but it is not the common response given to children releasing the same emotions. In an empathetic voice, Solter explains the need to cry and rage to release stress begins at birth and never really ends. That's because all humans-including babies-have emotions and experience stress, and sometimes trauma, from the womb on. The need to cry and rage serves as a biological stress-reducing process, a necessary component of our nervous system. One profound piece of scientific research she mentions in her book to illustrate this is that researchers have discovered stress hormones, such as ACTH and cortisone, in tear drops released for emotional reasons. The stress hormones were not found in tear drops released because of an irritant, such as cut onions. That's one biological reason why we feel better after a good cry: We are eliminating the chemicals of stress from our body. Just as going to the bathroom several times a day is a necessary process of our species' waste elimination system, so is the need to cry, she contends. Just as our skin has a need to sweat so do our emotions need to be safely released. Overcoming decades of conditioning isn't easy, though. In the book, Solter also offers insights for us parents on how to deal responsibly with our own strong emotions that tend to rise up when our children cry or rage. My husband and I read this book when our son was 2 years old. He's 7 now. Putting into practice the skills outlined in this book has helped us to handle our son's emotions so much better. We see on a daily basis the amazing and wonderful results of how treating our son with respect for his emotions, his body and his 'being' helps create warm, non-adversarial bonds between us. We are parenting more the way we want to parent, with compassion, understanding and respect, and we are very thankful for that. We consider this book one of the best-if not the best-books on parenting!

What a bunch of ...!:
... I bought this book on a recommendation. My son throws tantrums and fits since he was 9 months old. I don't think there's been a day since that he's had a forehead without a bruise from his headbanging. This book is a bunch of \ostuff\c and no help whatsoever. Hopefully the 2 Dr. Sears books will provide insight.

Tears and Tantrums:
I think anyone who didn't "get" the meaning of this book shouldn't be a parent! I read this book when my son was nearly a year old. I wish I had heard about it before he was even born, then we (my husband and I) would have been much better parents. We, like many others, have always been taught not to let babies cry and that something must be wrong if they do. We tried everything to try and get our son to stop crying. Unforuntately it was only after reading this book that I realized that we were doing more harm than good. I tested her theory when my son was about a year old and it worked for us. I held him for nearly an hour just letting him cry and talking to him. When he was done, he looked at me and smiled! However, this was no "ordinary" smile, if he could talk I'm sure he would have said something like "Thanks mom, I needed you to do this for me, I now know that I can cry and that you will be there for me." Our relationship had just changed, changed for the good that is. No words were spoken, but we both felt it. He now cries a lot less and when he does, I know exactly what to do. Anyone who has a healthy relationship with themself knows that crying is good for the body, especially when you have someone who is strong enough to sit by you and hold your hand.

Tears and Tantrums:
Aletha Solter deserves an award for this book! Ever since I read this book I feel like a whole new world of parenting has been opened up to me -I no longer get stressed about my baby's crying now that I understand the 'why' and putting him to bed never takes more than 10 minutes and is effortless. This is a book for everyone -not only for parents -it will help you to understand your children better and put parenting into proper perspective. This book should be mandatory for every new mom!