All Things Babywise / The Ezzo is a Horrible Human Being

[formergothardite]

Ezzo is like the Pearls. The Pearls technically never tell people to abuse their children or beat them to death and there are plenty of parents who use their advice without killing their kids but, if their advice is taken exactly like it is written, it easily leads to child abuse and child death. Ezzo technically never says to let a child cry if hungry but his advice easily leads to babies being allowed to cry when they are hungry. The parents who seem to be successful with both the Pearl and Ezzo methods are the ones who usually aren't really following their advice. If Snarkylark had actually followed the Ezzo advice in PFP she would have let a small baby cry for up to an hour, not wanted to be flexible for growth spurts because Ezzo warned against it and only fed her newborn seven times in a 24 hour period.

From PFP:

your [newborn] baby will only need to take seven feedings in a twenty-four hour period."

And after a month or so Snarklark would have not fed her baby at night and would only feed her baby five times a day:

you should be averaging five feedings in a twenty-four hour period with the baby having dropped the middle-of-the-night feeding.

Now pretty much every single expert thinks that this advice is dangerous and that the majority of babies need to be fed more. But Ezzo, technically doesn't say "let your baby starve", his schedule just did that to many babies.

And what does Ezzo say to do in PFP if a baby is crying because it is hungry all the time? Is it start feeding the baby on a more flexible schedule? Of course not. His advice is to look and see if a milk supply problem is caused by a meddling mother in law or not getting enough sleep but then warns mothers not to feed more often because:

leaving your routine or dropping feedings below three hours will not make a mother any more milk sufficient. Such attempts are at best temporary, at worse exhausting

Yes, you aren't going to find "let a hungry baby cry" in an Ezzo book, but that doesn't mean that his teachings don't lead to hungry babies crying.

And IMO if a book or person gives out advice that can lead to children suffering and dying then it doesn't matter if they also happen to give out some good advice, I'm not going to recommend them. That is one of the reasons I never tell new mothers to go to Mothering.com. Yes, there is some good advice on there, but there is also some very, very dangerous advice.

[formergothardite]

That makes sense. I will say that once they started talking they were told not to interrupt. That's just good manners.

I've always felt it was important for the kids to see us interact. We talk, flirt, and even fight in front of them (not all fights, but small squabbles). I think it's important to see the range a relationship has and still stays strong. That's all I took from the "couch time" reference. Maybe I just automatically filter out the weird shit.

I always found "couch time" and the "father ignores the children when coming home from work" some of the weirdest Ezzo advice. And since his own kids grew up to disown him I'm guessing he probably used a lot of his own advice and did not end up with a happy home.

Scheduling a time to sit and talk with a spouse isn't weird. Scheduling a time to sit and talk to a spouse while purposely ignoring a baby/child is weird. We would have missed so many great conversations with my oldest daughter if we had taken this advice. My husband and I would sit and talk while our daughter played and often she would pipe up to ask questions or give her opinion. If we had followed Ezzo she would have never felt comfortable doing this because she would have been raised from a baby to just sit quietly and watch us while not interrupting.

[OkToBeTakei]

I never read a parenting book. Or a baby book. The best piece of advice I ever received was to NOT read said books, it appears after reading this thread it was good advice. :shock:

Long before people spent money trying to perfect parenting they talked. Talked to their families, their friends, other Mums, their own Mums, Dads. Each other.Neighbours, random strangers with babies in the same boat. LONG before child raising became the internet Mommy wars, parents were having kids. Sure, times change as does the ways we care and raise our babies/children. Information re. health, development etc. This information can come in many ways, not just from one catch all book or even two or three.

What has led people to seek these books, methods? What is driving parents to reinvent......parenting over and over and over. I don't understand it.

I've followed this thread from the beginning with interest not being familiar with the book/books mentioned. The cry it out/sleep training thing was around when my child was born. I didn't like the sound of that. I do though, fall into the category of decent maternity leave and pay demographic, if I didn't I still can't see the me of then being attracted.

My overwhelming take away from this thread is sadness. My kid is about to be a teen. Those sleepless nights of which there was quite a few, are a distant memory. Such a short period of time in the big scheme of things.

My own Mum told me at the time when I was particularly moany that I should cherish that time because it would be over soon enough and the next challenge would come, and the next, and the next. She told me I would one day wish to go back to having a wee baby in the middle of the night crying as my only overwhelming parenting hardship. She still to this day says after four kids (three under three) they are her happiest memories. Even though at the time it was ........far from ...pleasurable :lol:

I wonder what has changed over generations leading to this? This need to follow...something.

[DaisyD]

I had no interest in experiencing the new motherhood that my mother did. I grew up in a house without seam rippers after my mom was frightened by the thoughts she was having while trying to sew. I suspect the want to do better than our parents did is one reason for seeking outside advice.

Online mommy wars indeed. I was telling my husband how vindicated I feel having an intelligent conversation about this instead being shouted down and called names simply for agreeing with any little part of it. I don't yo to mommy boards anymore. The pride of lioness waiting to pounce just gives women a bad name.

[formergothardite]

Mothering boards and cloth diapering boards are the worst. :lol:

People like Ezzo, Pearl, and Gothard prey on parents who are looking for a way to do better or parents who are desperate and looking for a solution. I think they are all basically mean people who value money more than children.

[polecat]

I never read a parenting book. Or a baby book. The best piece of advice I ever received was to NOT read said books, it appears after reading this thread it was good advice. :shock:

Long before people spent money trying to perfect parenting they talked. Talked to their families, their friends, other Mums, their own Mums, Dads. Each other.Neighbours, random strangers with babies in the same boat. LONG before child raising became the internet Mommy wars, parents were having kids. Sure, times change as does the ways we care and raise our babies/children. Information re. health, development etc. This information can come in many ways, not just from one catch all book or even two or three.

What has led people to seek these books, methods? What is driving parents to reinvent......parenting over and over and over. I don't understand it.

I've followed this thread from the beginning with interest not being familiar with the book/books mentioned. The cry it out/sleep training thing was around when my child was born. I didn't like the sound of that. I do though, fall into the category of decent maternity leave and pay demographic, if I didn't I still can't see the me of then being attracted.

My overwhelming take away from this thread is sadness. My kid is about to be a teen. Those sleepless nights of which there was quite a few, are a distant memory. Such a short period of time in the big scheme of things.

My own Mum told me at the time when I was particularly moany that I should cherish that time because it would be over soon enough and the next challenge would come, and the next, and the next. She told me I would one day wish to go back to having a wee baby in the middle of the night crying as my only overwhelming parenting hardship. She still to this day says after four kids (three under three) they are her happiest memories. Even though at the time it was ........far from ...pleasurable :lol:

I wonder what has changed over generations leading to this? This need to follow...something.

Men, that's what.

During the 1800s, male obstetricians and pediatricians became more common, and they enjoyed bloviating on the topic of childrearing and motherhood because of course they were the experts. Women were told not to think of ugly people when they were pregnant and not to raise their hands over their heads or dire things would happen to them or their babies. By the 1900s, men were writing all sorts of child-rearing books, telling women to do this or to do that ... it was all very "scientific," of course, and backed by so-called research. Then in the 1950s came Dr. Spock. Even today, men are droning endlessly (Dr. Sears, Ezzo, Dobson, etc.) on what mothers should and should not do to create the perfect child. And if a kid turns out wrong, who gets blamed? The mother. Powerful social control.

Meanwhile, women have learned to stifle their natural instincts. I think if we could just tap back into those instincts, we'd find those early years going a lot more smoothly.

ETA: I don't mean men in general. I mean those men who blew in and decided that they knew more than the collective wisdom of mothers throughout the centuries. The men who decided that carnation evap. milk was healthier for babies than human milk. The men who said that kissing babies was unhygienic and that they shouldn't be touched too often for fear of contaminating them. Etc.

[Snarkylark]

Ezzo is like the Pearls. The Pearls technically never tell people to abuse their children or beat them to death and there are plenty of parents who use their advice without killing their kids but, if their advice is taken exactly like it is written, it easily leads to child abuse and child death. Ezzo technically never says to let a child cry if hungry but his advice easily leads to babies being allowed to cry when they are hungry. The parents who seem to be successful with both the Pearl and Ezzo methods are the ones who usually aren't really following their advice. If Snarkylark had actually followed the Ezzo advice in PFP she would have let a small baby cry for up to an hour, not wanted to be flexible for growth spurts because Ezzo warned against it and only fed her newborn seven times in a 24 hour period.

From PFP:

your [newborn] baby will only need to take seven feedings in a twenty-four hour period."

And after a month or so Snarklark would have not fed her baby at night and would only feed her baby five times a day:

you should be averaging five feedings in a twenty-four hour period with the baby having dropped the middle-of-the-night feeding.

Now pretty much every single expert thinks that this advice is dangerous and that the majority of babies need to be fed more. But Ezzo, technically doesn't say "let your baby starve", his schedule just did that to many babies.

And what does Ezzo say to do in PFP if a baby is crying because it is hungry all the time? Is it start feeding the baby on a more flexible schedule? Of course not. His advice is to look and see if a milk supply problem is caused by a meddling mother in law or not getting enough sleep but then warns mothers not to feed more often because:

leaving your routine or dropping feedings below three hours will not make a mother any more milk sufficient. Such attempts are at best temporary, at worse exhausting

Yes, you aren't going to find "let a hungry baby cry" in an Ezzo book, but that doesn't mean that his teachings don't lead to hungry babies crying.

And IMO if a book or person gives out advice that can lead to children suffering and dying then it doesn't matter if they also happen to give out some good advice, I'm not going to recommend them. That is one of the reasons I never tell new mothers to go to Mothering.com. Yes, there is some good advice on there, but there is also some very, very dangerous advice.

Yes, I will agree with you that that is not a good idea to only feed a one month old 5 times a day. And if baby is crying more often because he's hungry there may very well be supply issues that more frequent feedings may remedy. I think it's important to use many sources when parenting and use what works and throw away the rest which is clearly what I did with my babes as I already stated that my first didn't sleep through the night until about 4 months. My babies were under 7 lbs at birth so it took them a little longer to be able to sleep long stretches at night. I mostly used some of the advice as a way of trying to get some sort of a routine and structure, as much as is possible with a newborn as we all know. I didn't care so much if my baby slept through the night so much from that early of an age. I stayed home with them anyway so I didn't have a job to go to. There are some good principles in BW. The implementation of them though, clearly, is key here. I would NEVER say to a mother "only feed your baby every 3 hours, no matter what." Ever

[Firiel]

I've read this whole thread and don't have any great input about Ezzo or parenting, but I was reminded of a story my mom told me.

My older sister was a VERY difficult newborn. She was extremely colicky (turns out, it was an intolerance to the milk [formula?] she was drinking). She cried and cried and cried and cried. My poor mom was a first-time mom, went back to work after maternity leave, and was just entirely miserable and exhausted because my sister just kept crying. She was understandably frustrated (and even frustrated with my sister). Not sure if she tried CIO or not. Finally, during one of her appointments with the doctor, she mentioned being miserable and exhausted and frustrated, and the doctor just said simply, "Imagine how tired [sister] is." It reminded my mom that my sister was every bit as miserable as she was, except moreso because her poor tummy hurt like hell every time she ate. She said she felt absolutely terrible for the frustration she felt towards my sister, and was in a much better place as a parent after that.

It seems (to my inexperienced self) that Ezzo could be dangerous because it actively discourages that kind of understanding of your kid by encouraging you to place your own need for sleep over your child's (sometimes unknown) needs.

[formergothardite]

Snarkylark, do you think the good of BW outweighs the bad things that he teaches and that if his advice is taken like it is written(even in his recent editions) it can easily lead to a baby going hungry?

[Snarkylark]

I've read this whole thread and don't have any great input about Ezzo or parenting, but I was reminded of a story my mom told me.

My older sister was a VERY difficult newborn. She was extremely colicky (turns out, it was an intolerance to the milk [formula?] she was drinking). She cried and cried and cried and cried. My poor mom was a first-time mom, went back to work after maternity leave, and was just entirely miserable and exhausted because my sister just kept crying. She was understandably frustrated (and even frustrated with my sister). Not sure if she tried CIO or not. Finally, during one of her appointments with the doctor, she mentioned being miserable and exhausted and frustrated, and the doctor just said simply, "Imagine how tired [sister] is." It reminded my mom that my sister was every bit as miserable as she was, except moreso because her poor tummy hurt like hell every time she ate. She said she felt absolutely terrible for the frustration she felt towards my sister, and was in a much better place as a parent after that.

It seems (to my inexperienced self) that Ezzo could be dangerous because it actively discourages that kind of understanding of your kid by encouraging you to place your own need for sleep over your child's (sometimes unknown) needs.

I would agree with that statement. My motive was never to protect my own sleep. Lol. But I will say that some of the things I learned helped me and my littles and I don't regret helping my babies learn that it was ok to sleep without me at some point. We all do that, don't we?

[DaisyD]

The only regret I have is not getting a bassinet for next to the bed. There is no way on EARTH I was going to cosleep. My husband and his first wife lost their baby to SIDS on Christmas eve. I wasn't taking any chances there.

My big issue was that I would feed him, burp him, change him and he'd start crying again. It didn't occur to me that he wasn't hungry again, since that's all I thought babies wanted and the lack of even a little routine had me beyond frazzled. I needed to know when it was safe to nap because being woken up too soon after falling asleep is worse than not sleeping. Breastfeeding hurt a LOT for me for a long time and I didn't figure out how to do it laying down until my second baby. I wasn't trying to get 8 hours, I was trying to get enough to not wreck my car on the way to work.

I do think that if he hadn't adjusted to the schedule so easily I would have given it up pretty quickly. I didn't have the energy to fight him on it. Lol

[laPapessaGiovanna]

This thread puzzles me..

I try to sum up, so you can tell me if I grasped it.

Some people said they found Ezzo`s advice useful. Someone else said impossible and quoted terrible advice from Ezzo`s books. The previous ones said they followed ezzo`s advice so flexiby that it didn`t sound like Ezzo`s advice anymore. Everyone agree that Ezzo`s bad but that a bit of scheduling and a lot of common sense are good.

Got it right?

Btw I found this about co-sleeping/bedsharing, maybe someone can find it interesting

evolutionaryparenting.com/bedsharing-and-sids-the-whole-truth/

I haven`t checked the whole blog, only the article linked.

[formergothardite]

This thread puzzles me..

I try to sum up, so you can tell me if I grasped it.

Some people said they found Ezzo`s advice useful. Someone else said impossible and quoted terrible advice from Ezzo`s books. The previous ones said they followed ezzo`s advice so flexiby that it didn`t sound like Ezzo`s advice anymore. Everyone agree that Ezzo`s bad but that a bit of scheduling and a lot of common sense are good.

Got it right?

Pretty much except that some people are still saying Ezzo gives good advice(even though they didn't actually follow his advice).

[mango_fandango]

I always found "couch time" and the "father ignores the children when coming home from work" some of the weirdest Ezzo advice. And since his own kids grew up to disown him I'm guessing he probably used a lot of his own advice and did not end up with a happy home.

Scheduling a time to sit and talk with a spouse isn't weird. Scheduling a time to sit and talk to a spouse while purposely ignoring a baby/child is weird. We would have missed so many great conversations with my oldest daughter if we had taken this advice. My husband and I would sit and talk while our daughter played and often she would pipe up to ask questions or give her opinion. If we had followed Ezzo she would have never felt comfortable doing this because she would have been raised from a baby to just sit quietly and watch us while not interrupting.

I just thought of something. Isn't this what Kelly Bates said Zach really struggled with when he was little? "Lately when Daddy comes home, you hold yourself back like a little gentleman, as hard as it is, and you say, 'Mommy first, Daddy,' then wait patiently for your turn of hugs and kisses." Although, on second thoughts, it might be something different. Did the Duggars/Bateses use Ezzo or something similar???

[formergothardite]

I just thought of something. Isn't this what Kelly Bates said Zach really struggled with when he was little? "Lately when Daddy comes home, you hold yourself back like a little gentleman, as hard as it is, and you say, 'Mommy first, Daddy,' then wait patiently for your turn of hugs and kisses." Although, on second thoughts, it might be something different. Did the Duggars/Bateses use Ezzo or something similar???

Kelly is a huge fan of Ezzo so I wouldn't be surprised if she told a story like that. She even uses his advice for older kids that says that parents shouldn't really tell their kids about sex until right before marriage.

[DaisyD]

It's funny. I have no memory of the stuff about when dad comes home. If it was there, I promptly forgot it and handed the boy off to go pee and check the mail without much more than a hi.

Now, I love watching my daughter tackle him when he comes through the door. It's so genuine.

[formergothardite]

It's funny. I have no memory of the stuff about when dad comes home. If it was there, I promptly forgot it and handed the boy off to go pee and check the mail without much more than a hi.

Now, I love watching my daughter tackle him when he comes through the door. It's so genuine.

That was in the Preparation for Parenting series that Snarkylark used. PFP was the "Christian" version that Ezzo started out with. He then realized that he could make money marketing it in a secular way so he took out the Christian stuff and some of the extreme things like fathers ignoring their children when they came home and sold it as Babywise.

ETA: Ezzo has a whole series of books on how to raise children. One of them is Babywise II where he tells parents that when they are introducing solid foods they should punish their babies for touching the food and then touching their head. Ezzo is very much into harsh, controlling parenting.

[DaisyD]

How exactly do you punish a 4-6 month old? :shock:

[formergothardite]

How exactly do you punish a 4-6 month old? :shock:

Squeezing, swatting or isolating them in their crib.

Here are some quotes. He thinks making sure a baby doesn't touch their hair with messing hands is a moral battle.

The moral self-control that keeps a child sitting in a highchair without fighting with mom is the same self-control that will later keep him at a desk with a book in his hand. The battle for right highchair manners is moral

common highchair violations are: flipping the plate; dropping and throwing food; playing with food; placing messy hands in the hair; banging on the tray; standing in the highchair; arching the back; spitting 'raspberries'; screaming

First, correct the child verbally. Next, provide an attention- getting squeeze or swat to the hand, if necessary. Finally, isolate him or her in the crib.... If the child persists in the behavior (and some will), mealtime may be over and naptime might begin

[imokit]

Squeezing, swatting or isolating them in their crib.

Here are some quotes. He thinks making sure a baby doesn't touch their hair with messing hands is a moral battle.

The moral self-control that keeps a child sitting in a highchair without fighting with mom is the same self-control that will later keep him at a desk with a book in his hand. The battle for right highchair manners is moral

common highchair violations are: flipping the plate; dropping and throwing food; playing with food; placing messy hands in the hair; banging on the tray; standing in the highchair; arching the back; spitting 'raspberries'; screaming

First, correct the child verbally. Next, provide an attention- getting squeeze or swat to the hand, if necessary. Finally, isolate him or her in the crib.... If the child persists in the behavior (and some will), mealtime may be over and naptime might begin

ARGHH More of the punishing children for normal childhood development stuff... :angry-banghead:

Its one thing to be a stupidly strict inflexible parent punishing your kids for every little thing. But when your punishing for key devlopmental milestones that's a different league. Those high chair behaviours are important for your child, playing with food, spitting, flipping plates etc, that's your child learning about how things feel, how things taste and cause and effect.

All of Pearl's Ezzo stuff p###es me off, but the blanket training and this, the punishing for key stages of development strikes me as extra abusive (on top of their normal abuse). Not allowing children to have normal development has to have long term consequences above and beyond the normal consequences for growing up in a harsh abusive environment from the other things.

[OkToBeTakei]

I had no interest in experiencing the new motherhood that my mother did. I grew up in a house without seam rippers after my mom was frightened by the thoughts she was having while trying to sew. I suspect the want to do better than our parents did is one reason for seeking outside advice.

Online mommy wars indeed. I was telling my husband how vindicated I feel having an intelligent conversation about this instead being shouted down and called names simply for agreeing with any little part of it. I don't yo to mommy boards anymore. The pride of lioness waiting to pounce just gives women a bad name.

Yes I'm terribly glad I missed the whole Mommy boards. Yet another example of how women just love to tear each other down.

I think very few generations follow or bring up their kids the exact same way their parents did it. Wether it be like you a bad experience or me just different time, circumstances.

On the 'my baby did not sleep until four months' comment up thread. It's this type of thing I stayed WELL away from. One.......it's unrealistic, just as adults have different sleep patterns so do babies, so imposing some kind of benchmark is ridiculousness. Same with hunger. I would also most definitely side eye the supply advice. Every woman's body is also not the same ...shocker eh?

This is why I find advice books or schedules distasteful. They leave no room for individuality and turn parenting into a set of goals.

I found friends who used schedules to be the least flexible and the most uptight back in the day. Kind of defeated the purpose. Always worrying about the next feed or the next nap or the 'routine.' Stripped back what should have been a lovely period to a task orientated operation. I failed to see the supposed 'happy' in that. Mother or child.

[mango_fandango]

The more I hear about Babywise via this thread, the more I realise how it all fits in with Erika Shupe. In a sidebar on her blog, she recommends not only PFP, but a whole load of other shitty books. This includes "Creative Correction", which advocates blindfolding a child for an hour if they roll their eyes and pouring HOT SAUCE onto a child's TONGUE among other things.

Erika is disgusting.

[polecat]

It's funny. I have no memory of the stuff about when dad comes home. If it was there, I promptly forgot it and handed the boy off to go pee and check the mail without much more than a hi.

Now, I love watching my daughter tackle him when he comes through the door. It's so genuine.

My kids are older, and they still love tackling dad when he walks through the door. It's one of my favorite times of the day. Can you imagine mentally (or physically, with some of these people) beating that joy out of them? Not only would they be missing out, so would we.

Which brings me to another thought: I really don't think fundies get any pleasure out of parenting. Maybe this is why. They see their kids as manipulative little sinners instead of vibrant little personalities.

[DaisyD]

Parenting is the boot camp for God's soldiers. Having been through actual boot camp, these people make my RDCs look like teddy bears...

[twinmama]

If you don't want to get your baby on a schedule then fine. Don't do it. Establishing a routine is not the same as child neglect or abuse like blanket training is.

I haven't read all of this thread yet, but my twins were in the NICU for 2 months and ate every 3 hours there. Once they get toward full term they NICU lets babies go adlib but before that, every 3 hours only. So my kids came home from the NICU on a 3 hour schedule and honestly, with twins, I would have scheduled them and synced their feeds anyway.

BUT when one got hungry before 3 hours were up and before his brother was hungry, I did small 1 ounce bottles to tide him over and keep on schedule. Schedule = survival for multiples. I have no regrets and two happy healthy preschoolers.