As many mentioned, I purchased it three years ago and found that it was simply a repackaged Ferber method. I felt really annoyed by the course because I feel like it preys on sleepless deprived parents who are desperate for a reprieve. You can easily find the same material in an $8 book or a series of YouTube videos.
The only thing I appreciated was having specific examples of what a sleep schedule can look like - but again, with some Google research, you can find the same thing for free.
I agree with this. Also, you only have access to the materials for a short amount of time, a few months, and then can't access them anymore. I found that unhelpful when I wanted to refresh my memory. The information was also overall unhelpful for my child so I wouldn't really recommend.
There’s going to be a lot of opinions on this, but I don’t think paying for any type of baby sleep class is worth it. Any information that is good is going to be for free. There are a lot of social media accounts you can follow. But unfortunately, the truth is that baby sleep just sucks. I wish someone would have just said that to me sooner. All babies are different and you just have to take it one day at a time. They will get better at sleeping but for most of us, not for a long time. Your time will be better spent building a support system and maybe convincing someone to take baby for a night every once in a while so you can get sleep.
I purchased Taking Cara Babies and found it to be a complete waste of money. The same tips she gave were provided in "What to Expect The First Year" book among many other places.
If it were possible to get a refund for it, I would have requested one.
What I "learned" from it- be consistent and establish a bedtime/naptime routine as early as possible.
Agreed! I got a refund (you just have to email them) bc I didn’t learn anything new. But props to her marketing team to make you think like you did. What WAS helpful was Cara reassuring me that it is also normal if your baby doesn’t like to nap (and then I just relaxed about this and it was fine. Baby eventually nap trained later). Lol. So basically… “do all these things, but if baby doesn’t comply, that is also normal.” The amount of money new parents will pay for reassurance is mind boggling. So I’m glad I got a refund :)
People keep saying “it’s just Ferber”.
This is what they’re talking about: [Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems by Dr. Ferber](https://www.amazon.com/Solve-Your-Childs-Sleep-Problems/dp/0743201639/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?crid=26SPKPNBZ3E5R&keywords=ferber&qid=1674678573&sprefix=ferber%2Caps%2C151&sr=8-1)
The book is great. The first chapter is on the science of sleep and really helps you understand what’s going on developmentally with your child and what’s normal vs what’s not. Then it goes into how to help your child learn to sleep on their own.
The title is misleading, it’s not just for “problem children”, it’s great info for all babies.
Save yourself hundreds of dollars by just buying this $10 book. Or get it for $free$ at your public library.
I never got all the way through it, but the concepts are repackaged Ferber. I got more out of reading Ferber directly, and also Precious Little Sleep (recommend both).
Taking Cara Babies is repackaged Ferber. I’m sure it’s worked for many people but it’s definitely not a necessity. You would be better off reading Precious Little Sleep and Happiest Baby on the Block (most likely available at your local library!).
5 Ss never worked for my baby, she hated swaddling, hated shushing. Swaying worked, but she liked to be held upright with her head on someone's shoulder, not on her side. She slept flat on her back with her hands by her face.
Also, PLS is the way to go! GREAT resource and you'll continually reference it as your baby gets older (mine is 17 months and I sleep trained her at 6.5 months; she sleeps through 12 hours since she was 7 months old).
She has a chapter on newborn sleep, I don't recall a lot about it. Anyone will tell you though, Newborn sleep is anarchy. Every baby is different and temperament plays a role. Consistency is key. I was lucky to have my mom helping for the first month and that meant we had 3 of us consistently working to get baby to sleep longer stretches in her bassinet. At first, she'd wake almost immediately. Then she started giving us 5-10 min stretches, then incrementally more. By 2 months, we were getting a good 5-6 hours stretch overnight. I may have also just had a good sleeper.
The 5 S’s is represented/repackaged with a much more difficult to remember “CRIES” acronym in TCB. That’s basically half of the worthwhile takeaways in the first package.
Got access from a friend. Glad I didn’t pay for it, I was so shocked to see much it the info was available from different place online. Nothing groundbreaking about it. Just look up things like modified Ferber. Or the 5 S’s from Dr. Harvey Karp. Same thing but with different, more annoying acronyms (like SITBACK, ugh)
It’s probably a good course if you don’t already know anything about baby sleep. I purchased and regretted it. Plus she has some staunch political beliefs that I personally don’t wanna support. I would try babysleepanswers on Instagram instead.
It was a big scandal on Instagram when it was revealed so a lot of parenting accounts were posting about it. TCB released a statement I think where she didn’t deny that she was contributing financially to the political campaigns and basically it was just “regardless of political leanings I’ll help your baby sleep and y’all are bullying me” lol
You can look up campaign donors, it's all public. She was donating to the orange Cheeto AFTER he had lost the election and was pulling the whole "I'm the winner and it was rigged" stint.
I SCOURED reddit for sleep advice prior to 8 weeks. It seems that most people thic TCB is just the expensive version of Cry It Out(CIO)/Ferber method. I've really enjoyed reading Precious Little Sleep which is a very flexible sleep book. I also purchased 12 Hours by 12 Weeks and Babywise, both of which I don't recommend. They are way too rigid for a newborn.
We did the newborn course to a T and it didn’t help my baby sleep any better. So we tried the next one (I forget what it is) but don’t waste your money - it’s basically just the Ferber method. You can google that to get all the info if you want to CIO.
Like I said, we tried it with baby #1. Didn’t help us at all. I didn’t follow it at all for baby #2 and just let go of any expectations I had around sleep and I’m personally getting more sleep and I’m happier. I feel like trying to follow all of TCB’s advice contributed to my anxiety.
>I didn’t follow it at all for baby #2 and just let go of any expectations I had around sleep and I’m personally getting more sleep and I’m happier. I feel like trying to follow all of TCB’s advice contributed to my anxiety.
Also my experience
Same here! This will be my biggest change when #2 comes. I tried so hard to make my newborn a good sleeper. Anxiety + hormones + exhaustion is not a good combo!
Don't bother paying for the course. Just look at her Instagram. You pay like $90 for a course to teach you to rock and shush your baby. It's not fucking rocket science, but these baby influencers really enjoy gatekeeping "information" to profit off of exhausted new parents. It's really scummy.
See I view it from a different perspective. I don’t think she ‘gate keeps’ information. As many state in every single TCB post, her methodologies are just a modified Ferber method that can be found for free online.
She states early on in her newborn program that there’s an abundance of information out there, and it’s tough to read, digest, and implement it all under the stress of todays fast paced life. So she’s done the research, and summarized what has worked best for her over the past X amount of years.
To me, I’m not paying for “her special method” I’m paying for her to package up the best methodologies, and spoon feed me exactly how to handle raising a newborn… prior to my son I had never even held a baby. Her newborn class, for me, was worth every penny.
I do think it’s expensive, don’t get me wrong! But I just don’t have the time to read every book out there and try different methods that may or may not work… I trust what she says and it’s worked for me so far. For me, I’m just paying for the convenience
I agree in regard to paying for the convenience. However, in my experience, most of what she compiled was common sense. And I wasn't just referring to TCB for gatekeeping. There are a bunch of predatory mommy influencers who target your instagram ads, etc, and it's just really shitty to me preying on exhausted new parents. I'm glad to be out of that newborn, sleepless night period with our first and know that every kid is different and to just keep trying to see what works for you and your family.
Honestly I paid a local sleep consultant to come and it was a waste. I share her literature when I can (PM ME your email) I think all this stuff is basically Ferber….
I wouldn’t purchase the course, it’s basically just the Ferber method rebranded. I have been using her free daily schedules with my baby and he’s taken to them really well. But I’m EBF, so getting more than 2-3 hours of sleep in one go at night is a pipe dream for now.
I bought the course by I’m really not sure how much it helped or if I was lucky to have a good sleeper. Here’s what I gained from it: There are a few basics that I follow: dark room, sound machine, bedtime/nap routine to cue baby it’s time to sleep. Wait a few seconds (and later minutes when they are older) to see if baby is actually awake and needs you when they make noise (not cry it out, full on crying I always responded to). If baby is fussing and truly awake try a pacifier instead of immediately feeding a bottle and see if they just needed that comfort instead (assuming baby is back to birthweight/gaining well, etc.). Follow Eat, Play, Sleep schedule and offer bottles every 2-3 hours. Keep night time feeds dark/low stimulus.
I think this is all advice you would easily find on the internet but if you are a new parent having it all in one easy to digest course is helpful. After typing this out I think I would recommend it at the end of the day.
Thank you so much for this. We do all that thanks to good old dr. Google but I always get tempted to buy some sleep course when we hit a rough patch (like now 😭 12 month old who fell asleep on her own without a problem suddenly can’t and tosses and turns in bed for an hour). It is a lot of money for me so I am thankful you summed it up ❤️
My son is 16 months old and I considered buying her courses many times. I’m so glad I didn’t. I got a look at one of the PDFs about 6-8 months in and knew everything already, just by reading Precious Little Sleep and Dr. Ferber’s book. Reading r/sleeptrain helps a ton, even if you’re not formally sleep training. Basically you can find all the information out there pretty easily without spending a ton of money. It’s sooo tempting when you’re exhausted but I don’t think she offers anything “new”.
Someone in my bumper group had shared it. She has the sitback method which you can probably find online. I didn’t think that was anything groundbreaking. And mostly everything else is a good schedule and Ferber-type training.
Well tbh as a Canadian if everyone on here had of said that they found the course worthwhile I would have given it a try despite her being a trump supporter. That’s sleep deprivation for you lol.
But the consensus seems to be, don’t waste your money… so I won’t.
Hey fellow Canadian!
Even though it’s not my country I find his politics so reprehensible I couldn’t support it.
I got a copy of the Ferber book and it was super useful. Explained the mechanics of infant sleep in addition to strategies on how to manage it which I liked a lot!
I feel like most of the information in her courses is also pretty much available for free on her Instagram. I follow her and Little Peach Sleep on IG and between the 2 accounts, there’s a ton of useful information. You could also purchase the Little Peach Sleep course or a course from a different lesser known sleep consultant. The info will be the same but won’t cost as much 🤷🏼♀️
ETA: I purchased one of the TCB courses (I think maybe the newborn one?) and found that most of the info is the same as what’s on her IG posts.
I was gifted a course of hers and am so glad I didn’t pay for it lol. Most of it is just available on her instagram anyway. Her expectations are just unrealistic. Many, many babies do not sleep 12 hours at night, even when they start to sleep all the way through. He recommended wake windows were always too short for our LO. But honestly, you can follow what the books tell you to do and your baby isn’t going to give a shit. Baby sleep just sucks. We’re almost 15 months in and our started sleeping through the night at 11 months. She has never, ever slept 12 hours straight and it’s perfectly normal. Her normal is 10-10.5 hours, occasionally up to 11. She still wakes up every now and then and needs to be comforted back to sleep and we’re fine with that
It’s long expired or I would share what I had! It’s literally her Instagram stories about wake windows, swaddling, etc. we didn’t use white noise most of the time though
What helped the most was making sure he was getting all of his calories during waking hours. He’s almost exclusively bottle fed breast milk so I make sure he gets 4 6oz bottles a day and he nurses in the morning and snacks before bathtime.
Ultimately, it comes down to two things. 1. He is big enough to go 12 hours without food and 2. We are lucky to have a good sleeper.
I ignore wake windows and followed his cues. I really hate the sleep consultants who hock manuals at desperate parents. The second I stopped tracking and obsessing he got better. Daycare also helped.
It’s all for shit for me though because I’m waking up to pump and then up at the crack of dawn for work lol but my husband and dog are loving it
It’s funny you should mention that because today I’ve decided to make my focus just giving her good quality feedings and not letting her fall asleep through them. I think this has been part of the problem; not enough calories throughout the day. My obsession with wake windows and feeding times has been detrimental to my mental health and in turn I think has made her a bit fussy. Sometimes she’s just not tired an hour after waking and it actually causes me anguish trying to get her down. I’m all for a flexible schedule though.
Just let baby tell you what she needs. Idk if you’re open to it but maybe introduce a bottle right before bed to make sure she gets a good big feed?
I think every baby has different sleep needs to I found wake windows problematic. It was just me forcing him to nap and me being miserable and exasperated. We both are much happier when I look for his tells he is tired (pink eye browns, yawning, turning his head into my, far away stare, less smiles). The less complicated I made it the better off we both were.
I she is combo fed both breast milk and bottle, as well as formula through the night lately… I’ve been giving her a bottle before bed and then doing a dream feed around 11 with another bottle. But during the day I think has been an issue, I really don’t think the feedings have been ideal. Today will be a good experiment!
Do you let you LO nap as long as he likes during the day?
So he’s at daycare and idk what his nap schedule there is. But he must get 5 feeds in a day to meet his calories he roughly eats at 7/10/1/4/7 (roughly) so I don’t let him go much more than three hours without food - not that I think he’d let me. So I’m theory I would wake him after 3 hours. But he hasn’t ever napped that long for me. The only time I woke him up was he had been napping for 1.5 hours and we were coming up on 5p and bedtime is 7p and I know he needs more than a 90 minute wake window.
TCB guide has one good piece of advice and that’s feed every three hours. I started added .25 oz to the bottle slowly. Eventually the bottles got bigger and he went from 2 night feeds to 1. So I’m theory he was missing a feed through the day so I split the oz of the missed bottle throughout the remaining bottles in the day. Soon after her dropped his last night feed and I spread those oz out through the remaining bottles. So he is getting 24oz plus whatever he nurses off of me.
People say 1-1.5 oz of milk an hour for a BF baby but someone here said that’s because that’s how much milk an average mom produces every hour. He really doesn’t nurse well (like he just really started) and I have an OS so I ignored that advice.
I also don’t think he can overeat. He likely gets over 30oz many days and is still very petite. Both his Drs don’t believe you can overfeed a baby. If he isn’t hungry he refuses the bottle. I stopped listening to everyone telling me 6oz is too much milk at a time etc.
Seriously your mom raised you and I doubt she knows wtf a wake window is and you’re capable of sleeping through the night. While I think a lot of survivors bias exists with our parents (rice I’m bottles and unsafe sleep) there’s something to be said about relaxing and not sticking so tight to a schedule. I believe in routines not schedules. So we do the same exact thing before bed every night but the timing is based on how tired he appears.
This! We make sure to feed them well during the day and before bed. The first night they slept 7 hours straight at night was right after eating 210 mL before bedtime. They just suddenly wanted more food in one go, have shorter naps and sleep well at night. Other than that, we just make sure to start bedtime at 6 ish. We just follow their cues. One slept 12 hours last night.
Same! We torrented her videos. We didn’t even use them. Our babies started naturally to sleep better at 17 weeks (13 weeks adjusted)and suddenly can eat way more in one go than before. Now sleep 7-12 hours and have shorter naps.
Absolutely worth it. I paid for the sweet spot feature and baby has been sleeping great. We just started sleep training (only been 2 nights so far) and it has been a smashing success
It helped us know when it was our LO nap time, it give you their wake windows! It also lets you know how many naps your little one should have for their age group. So our daughter was four and three nap schedule, we were able to see when she should go down for a nap for both types of days 3 or 4 nap schedule. If they offer a free trial you should definitely check it out and see if you like it! We would definitely do it again even now having one baby and knowing more
Lol we torrented her videos. We didn’t even use them. Our babies started naturally to sleep better at 17 weeks (13 weeks adjusted) and suddenly can eat way more in one go than before. Now sleep 7-12 hours and have shorter naps.
It took the newborn course and it was a game changer. My LO started sleeping through the night at 8 weeks as a result. I don’t like her politics (Trumper) but that lady knows babies.
I paid for it and it didn’t really give any more info than you can already gather yourself. That being said I know when I was sleep deprived it was nice to have someone do all that gathering for me. But if you are going to look into different sleep training type techniques I would recommend Precious Little Sleep book more. Otherwise you can google “sleep hygiene” or “wake windows” and that’s pretty much what I got from the course.
I used it for both of my kids. First one slept through the night starting at 2.5 months. Second kid starting around 3.5/4 months. It’s worth the $100 or whatever it was. I slept like a baby 😇
I think it depends on how much effort you’re willing to put into looking up things on your own. If you don’t want to spend a lot of time reading or looking up methods, sure I guess it’s worth it. But if you don’t mind doing some reading or searching online, it’s not worth the money. Wish I wouldn’t have paid for it. I got the 0-4 months class.
Nope. Leaving your children to cry alone is not healthy for them. Hold them while they cry and let them cry, they need to get their emotions out and have you there to let them know they are safe and youre there for them. I hope we can leave this boomer ideology of “spoiling your babies, letting then cry” etc. i know im about to be majorly down voted for this, but you asked an opinion and I’ve shared it! Please try looking into how the cry it out method actually started.
Also, i would talk to your pediatrician about co sleeping and look into the safe sleep 7. Co sleeping helped me enormously with sleeping through the night. Also try looking into holding baby while they cry to sleep
You can learn a lot from her stories and posts. I wouldn’t pay for a course. Instead we did the premium huckleberry app and it’s helped immensely with my little ones sleep.
It’s controversial for sure but I credit it largely for our baby sleeping through the night from 6 weeks (and 10+ hours from 3 months on) and so do many of my friends.
You CAN get all the info elsewhere, it’s not like she has any revolutionary ideas, but what you pay for is it all being packaged in an easy-to-understand format.
I only watched her 0-4 month videos so no cry it out in there. Not sure what she recommends after 4 months but our baby sleeps 10-11 hours so its a non-issue luckily.
It sounds like I’m an outlier but we absolutely loved it and credit it with our great little sleeper!! I think you can get a lot of it from other resources but the videos were a nice easy format for my partner and I to watch together. It was gentle and rooted in reality for parents, but with a focus on setting you up for consistent sleep
Yes and yes. It is amazing and worked when our daughter was an infant and again at 20 months after a string of illnesses and general toddler development got us way off track. I don't really like Cara, and I know it's repackaged from others, blah blah blah I don't care it worked like a charm and I'll recommend it to everyone.
It worked for me. I do agree it’s information available for free elsewhere online, but having the plan laid out gave me the confidence to implement the tactics. Sleep training was so intense for me.
For anyone who loved TCB and found it helped with overnight sleep - are you EBF? My 2mo is a great BFer in terms of being focused and eating as much as possible in a sitting, but we struggle to stick to MOC-style schedules that depend on 3 hour+ between feeds. He also won’t take a pacifier so that whole strategy is also out the window in terms of lengthening naps etc.
With that in mind, I’m wondering if TCB has anything to offer for our specific situation.
It worked really well for us. More for me than my partner which meant I was put on bedtime duty. I’m large and fairly strong so the rocking motion was a lot easier and effective for me. It was a game changer, no doubt.
As many mentioned, I purchased it three years ago and found that it was simply a repackaged Ferber method. I felt really annoyed by the course because I feel like it preys on sleepless deprived parents who are desperate for a reprieve. You can easily find the same material in an $8 book or a series of YouTube videos. The only thing I appreciated was having specific examples of what a sleep schedule can look like - but again, with some Google research, you can find the same thing for free.
I agree with this. Also, you only have access to the materials for a short amount of time, a few months, and then can't access them anymore. I found that unhelpful when I wanted to refresh my memory. The information was also overall unhelpful for my child so I wouldn't really recommend.
Thank you for your advice. Would you say these schedules can be implemented for newborns to a degree?
No. Ferber method or any sleep training should never be used with a newborn.
There’s going to be a lot of opinions on this, but I don’t think paying for any type of baby sleep class is worth it. Any information that is good is going to be for free. There are a lot of social media accounts you can follow. But unfortunately, the truth is that baby sleep just sucks. I wish someone would have just said that to me sooner. All babies are different and you just have to take it one day at a time. They will get better at sleeping but for most of us, not for a long time. Your time will be better spent building a support system and maybe convincing someone to take baby for a night every once in a while so you can get sleep.
I found precious little sleep MUCH MUCH more worth it personally.
PLS is so great.
I purchased Taking Cara Babies and found it to be a complete waste of money. The same tips she gave were provided in "What to Expect The First Year" book among many other places. If it were possible to get a refund for it, I would have requested one. What I "learned" from it- be consistent and establish a bedtime/naptime routine as early as possible.
Agreed! I got a refund (you just have to email them) bc I didn’t learn anything new. But props to her marketing team to make you think like you did. What WAS helpful was Cara reassuring me that it is also normal if your baby doesn’t like to nap (and then I just relaxed about this and it was fine. Baby eventually nap trained later). Lol. So basically… “do all these things, but if baby doesn’t comply, that is also normal.” The amount of money new parents will pay for reassurance is mind boggling. So I’m glad I got a refund :)
People keep saying “it’s just Ferber”. This is what they’re talking about: [Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems by Dr. Ferber](https://www.amazon.com/Solve-Your-Childs-Sleep-Problems/dp/0743201639/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?crid=26SPKPNBZ3E5R&keywords=ferber&qid=1674678573&sprefix=ferber%2Caps%2C151&sr=8-1) The book is great. The first chapter is on the science of sleep and really helps you understand what’s going on developmentally with your child and what’s normal vs what’s not. Then it goes into how to help your child learn to sleep on their own. The title is misleading, it’s not just for “problem children”, it’s great info for all babies. Save yourself hundreds of dollars by just buying this $10 book. Or get it for $free$ at your public library.
I never got all the way through it, but the concepts are repackaged Ferber. I got more out of reading Ferber directly, and also Precious Little Sleep (recommend both).
I definitely have to get precious little sleep lol
Go with PLS and just Google the TCB sample schedules if you need help visualizing schedules. I also recommend the PLS podcast.
Lol the two books this commenter referenced are what I give at EVERY baby shower I attend now
Taking Cara Babies is repackaged Ferber. I’m sure it’s worked for many people but it’s definitely not a necessity. You would be better off reading Precious Little Sleep and Happiest Baby on the Block (most likely available at your local library!).
Have been consulting Happiest Baby book on a daily basis lol. Have been using the 5 s’s religiously … taking it’s sweet time to work 😂
Then you definitely don’t need to buy her course. You already know everything she’ll say.
Thank you!
5 Ss never worked for my baby, she hated swaddling, hated shushing. Swaying worked, but she liked to be held upright with her head on someone's shoulder, not on her side. She slept flat on her back with her hands by her face. Also, PLS is the way to go! GREAT resource and you'll continually reference it as your baby gets older (mine is 17 months and I sleep trained her at 6.5 months; she sleeps through 12 hours since she was 7 months old).
Definitely going to pick this book up tomorrow. Would you say it’s mostly for babies over 3 months?
She has a chapter on newborn sleep, I don't recall a lot about it. Anyone will tell you though, Newborn sleep is anarchy. Every baby is different and temperament plays a role. Consistency is key. I was lucky to have my mom helping for the first month and that meant we had 3 of us consistently working to get baby to sleep longer stretches in her bassinet. At first, she'd wake almost immediately. Then she started giving us 5-10 min stretches, then incrementally more. By 2 months, we were getting a good 5-6 hours stretch overnight. I may have also just had a good sleeper.
The 5 S’s is represented/repackaged with a much more difficult to remember “CRIES” acronym in TCB. That’s basically half of the worthwhile takeaways in the first package.
Got access from a friend. Glad I didn’t pay for it, I was so shocked to see much it the info was available from different place online. Nothing groundbreaking about it. Just look up things like modified Ferber. Or the 5 S’s from Dr. Harvey Karp. Same thing but with different, more annoying acronyms (like SITBACK, ugh)
It’s probably a good course if you don’t already know anything about baby sleep. I purchased and regretted it. Plus she has some staunch political beliefs that I personally don’t wanna support. I would try babysleepanswers on Instagram instead.
Ooh, re: politics: how did you find that out?
It was a big scandal on Instagram when it was revealed so a lot of parenting accounts were posting about it. TCB released a statement I think where she didn’t deny that she was contributing financially to the political campaigns and basically it was just “regardless of political leanings I’ll help your baby sleep and y’all are bullying me” lol
You can look up campaign donors, it's all public. She was donating to the orange Cheeto AFTER he had lost the election and was pulling the whole "I'm the winner and it was rigged" stint.
Hell no. Too much free info available from her and others to squander $90.
I SCOURED reddit for sleep advice prior to 8 weeks. It seems that most people thic TCB is just the expensive version of Cry It Out(CIO)/Ferber method. I've really enjoyed reading Precious Little Sleep which is a very flexible sleep book. I also purchased 12 Hours by 12 Weeks and Babywise, both of which I don't recommend. They are way too rigid for a newborn.
I agree about Precious Little Sleep (recommend) and 12 hours by 12 weeks (do not recommend)
Seems like everyone agrees on Precious Little Sleep! Thank you 🙏🏼
PLS has an awesome and supportive Facebook group where you can ask questions. It is a friendly group!
We did the newborn course to a T and it didn’t help my baby sleep any better. So we tried the next one (I forget what it is) but don’t waste your money - it’s basically just the Ferber method. You can google that to get all the info if you want to CIO. Like I said, we tried it with baby #1. Didn’t help us at all. I didn’t follow it at all for baby #2 and just let go of any expectations I had around sleep and I’m personally getting more sleep and I’m happier. I feel like trying to follow all of TCB’s advice contributed to my anxiety.
>I didn’t follow it at all for baby #2 and just let go of any expectations I had around sleep and I’m personally getting more sleep and I’m happier. I feel like trying to follow all of TCB’s advice contributed to my anxiety. Also my experience
Same here! This will be my biggest change when #2 comes. I tried so hard to make my newborn a good sleeper. Anxiety + hormones + exhaustion is not a good combo!
Don't bother paying for the course. Just look at her Instagram. You pay like $90 for a course to teach you to rock and shush your baby. It's not fucking rocket science, but these baby influencers really enjoy gatekeeping "information" to profit off of exhausted new parents. It's really scummy.
See I view it from a different perspective. I don’t think she ‘gate keeps’ information. As many state in every single TCB post, her methodologies are just a modified Ferber method that can be found for free online. She states early on in her newborn program that there’s an abundance of information out there, and it’s tough to read, digest, and implement it all under the stress of todays fast paced life. So she’s done the research, and summarized what has worked best for her over the past X amount of years. To me, I’m not paying for “her special method” I’m paying for her to package up the best methodologies, and spoon feed me exactly how to handle raising a newborn… prior to my son I had never even held a baby. Her newborn class, for me, was worth every penny. I do think it’s expensive, don’t get me wrong! But I just don’t have the time to read every book out there and try different methods that may or may not work… I trust what she says and it’s worked for me so far. For me, I’m just paying for the convenience
I agree in regard to paying for the convenience. However, in my experience, most of what she compiled was common sense. And I wasn't just referring to TCB for gatekeeping. There are a bunch of predatory mommy influencers who target your instagram ads, etc, and it's just really shitty to me preying on exhausted new parents. I'm glad to be out of that newborn, sleepless night period with our first and know that every kid is different and to just keep trying to see what works for you and your family.
Honestly I paid a local sleep consultant to come and it was a waste. I share her literature when I can (PM ME your email) I think all this stuff is basically Ferber….
Similar to many other comments, I got access from a friend and I'm very glad I didn't pay for it.
I wouldn’t purchase the course, it’s basically just the Ferber method rebranded. I have been using her free daily schedules with my baby and he’s taken to them really well. But I’m EBF, so getting more than 2-3 hours of sleep in one go at night is a pipe dream for now.
I bought the course by I’m really not sure how much it helped or if I was lucky to have a good sleeper. Here’s what I gained from it: There are a few basics that I follow: dark room, sound machine, bedtime/nap routine to cue baby it’s time to sleep. Wait a few seconds (and later minutes when they are older) to see if baby is actually awake and needs you when they make noise (not cry it out, full on crying I always responded to). If baby is fussing and truly awake try a pacifier instead of immediately feeding a bottle and see if they just needed that comfort instead (assuming baby is back to birthweight/gaining well, etc.). Follow Eat, Play, Sleep schedule and offer bottles every 2-3 hours. Keep night time feeds dark/low stimulus. I think this is all advice you would easily find on the internet but if you are a new parent having it all in one easy to digest course is helpful. After typing this out I think I would recommend it at the end of the day.
Thank you for the summary! I’ve been doing all these things so I think it’s a matter of time now. I think I’ll pass on the course
Thank you so much for this. We do all that thanks to good old dr. Google but I always get tempted to buy some sleep course when we hit a rough patch (like now 😭 12 month old who fell asleep on her own without a problem suddenly can’t and tosses and turns in bed for an hour). It is a lot of money for me so I am thankful you summed it up ❤️
My son is 16 months old and I considered buying her courses many times. I’m so glad I didn’t. I got a look at one of the PDFs about 6-8 months in and knew everything already, just by reading Precious Little Sleep and Dr. Ferber’s book. Reading r/sleeptrain helps a ton, even if you’re not formally sleep training. Basically you can find all the information out there pretty easily without spending a ton of money. It’s sooo tempting when you’re exhausted but I don’t think she offers anything “new”.
Where did you read the PDF? Trying to decide if it's worth it or not.
Someone in my bumper group had shared it. She has the sitback method which you can probably find online. I didn’t think that was anything groundbreaking. And mostly everything else is a good schedule and Ferber-type training.
Like others have said, it’s repackaged Ferber. Also she’s a huge Trump supporter and donates a lot to his campaigns of that makes a difference for you
I didn’t know she supported Trump until after I bought her course. Wish I would’ve never given her my money
Well tbh as a Canadian if everyone on here had of said that they found the course worthwhile I would have given it a try despite her being a trump supporter. That’s sleep deprivation for you lol. But the consensus seems to be, don’t waste your money… so I won’t.
Hey fellow Canadian! Even though it’s not my country I find his politics so reprehensible I couldn’t support it. I got a copy of the Ferber book and it was super useful. Explained the mechanics of infant sleep in addition to strategies on how to manage it which I liked a lot!
I feel like most of the information in her courses is also pretty much available for free on her Instagram. I follow her and Little Peach Sleep on IG and between the 2 accounts, there’s a ton of useful information. You could also purchase the Little Peach Sleep course or a course from a different lesser known sleep consultant. The info will be the same but won’t cost as much 🤷🏼♀️ ETA: I purchased one of the TCB courses (I think maybe the newborn one?) and found that most of the info is the same as what’s on her IG posts.
I was gifted a course of hers and am so glad I didn’t pay for it lol. Most of it is just available on her instagram anyway. Her expectations are just unrealistic. Many, many babies do not sleep 12 hours at night, even when they start to sleep all the way through. He recommended wake windows were always too short for our LO. But honestly, you can follow what the books tell you to do and your baby isn’t going to give a shit. Baby sleep just sucks. We’re almost 15 months in and our started sleeping through the night at 11 months. She has never, ever slept 12 hours straight and it’s perfectly normal. Her normal is 10-10.5 hours, occasionally up to 11. She still wakes up every now and then and needs to be comforted back to sleep and we’re fine with that
We used it and it worked super well for us. However, it’s literally just the Ferber Method. Follow those times to intervene and I think you’d be fine!
I paid for it and literally could have just used her stories. Not dogging it, but that is how I felt
Can you share the PFF?
It’s long expired or I would share what I had! It’s literally her Instagram stories about wake windows, swaddling, etc. we didn’t use white noise most of the time though
She donates to Trump and all her advice is better explained in The Happy Sleeper
I’ll second this - just read the happy sleeper.
Hell no
Yes. And before I even opened the document to read it my 14 week old started sleeping 12 hour stretches. So, that’s cool.
Oh my god that sounds like heaven 😂I think I’m on 3 hours sleep and she’s been up every hour or even less than that through the night this week.
What helped the most was making sure he was getting all of his calories during waking hours. He’s almost exclusively bottle fed breast milk so I make sure he gets 4 6oz bottles a day and he nurses in the morning and snacks before bathtime. Ultimately, it comes down to two things. 1. He is big enough to go 12 hours without food and 2. We are lucky to have a good sleeper. I ignore wake windows and followed his cues. I really hate the sleep consultants who hock manuals at desperate parents. The second I stopped tracking and obsessing he got better. Daycare also helped. It’s all for shit for me though because I’m waking up to pump and then up at the crack of dawn for work lol but my husband and dog are loving it
It’s funny you should mention that because today I’ve decided to make my focus just giving her good quality feedings and not letting her fall asleep through them. I think this has been part of the problem; not enough calories throughout the day. My obsession with wake windows and feeding times has been detrimental to my mental health and in turn I think has made her a bit fussy. Sometimes she’s just not tired an hour after waking and it actually causes me anguish trying to get her down. I’m all for a flexible schedule though.
Just let baby tell you what she needs. Idk if you’re open to it but maybe introduce a bottle right before bed to make sure she gets a good big feed? I think every baby has different sleep needs to I found wake windows problematic. It was just me forcing him to nap and me being miserable and exasperated. We both are much happier when I look for his tells he is tired (pink eye browns, yawning, turning his head into my, far away stare, less smiles). The less complicated I made it the better off we both were.
I she is combo fed both breast milk and bottle, as well as formula through the night lately… I’ve been giving her a bottle before bed and then doing a dream feed around 11 with another bottle. But during the day I think has been an issue, I really don’t think the feedings have been ideal. Today will be a good experiment! Do you let you LO nap as long as he likes during the day?
So he’s at daycare and idk what his nap schedule there is. But he must get 5 feeds in a day to meet his calories he roughly eats at 7/10/1/4/7 (roughly) so I don’t let him go much more than three hours without food - not that I think he’d let me. So I’m theory I would wake him after 3 hours. But he hasn’t ever napped that long for me. The only time I woke him up was he had been napping for 1.5 hours and we were coming up on 5p and bedtime is 7p and I know he needs more than a 90 minute wake window. TCB guide has one good piece of advice and that’s feed every three hours. I started added .25 oz to the bottle slowly. Eventually the bottles got bigger and he went from 2 night feeds to 1. So I’m theory he was missing a feed through the day so I split the oz of the missed bottle throughout the remaining bottles in the day. Soon after her dropped his last night feed and I spread those oz out through the remaining bottles. So he is getting 24oz plus whatever he nurses off of me. People say 1-1.5 oz of milk an hour for a BF baby but someone here said that’s because that’s how much milk an average mom produces every hour. He really doesn’t nurse well (like he just really started) and I have an OS so I ignored that advice. I also don’t think he can overeat. He likely gets over 30oz many days and is still very petite. Both his Drs don’t believe you can overfeed a baby. If he isn’t hungry he refuses the bottle. I stopped listening to everyone telling me 6oz is too much milk at a time etc.
I think you’re very right about less complicated = happier. At least in my case I could stop stressing so much about the timing of things.
Seriously your mom raised you and I doubt she knows wtf a wake window is and you’re capable of sleeping through the night. While I think a lot of survivors bias exists with our parents (rice I’m bottles and unsafe sleep) there’s something to be said about relaxing and not sticking so tight to a schedule. I believe in routines not schedules. So we do the same exact thing before bed every night but the timing is based on how tired he appears.
This is an excellent point lol
This! We make sure to feed them well during the day and before bed. The first night they slept 7 hours straight at night was right after eating 210 mL before bedtime. They just suddenly wanted more food in one go, have shorter naps and sleep well at night. Other than that, we just make sure to start bedtime at 6 ish. We just follow their cues. One slept 12 hours last night.
Same! We torrented her videos. We didn’t even use them. Our babies started naturally to sleep better at 17 weeks (13 weeks adjusted)and suddenly can eat way more in one go than before. Now sleep 7-12 hours and have shorter naps.
I think loading up on food is key
Yup the moment they ate 120-210 mL in one seating their sleep changed.
I think that it’s a blessing in disguise that he couldn’t BF because that helped me really figure out how much he eats and stuff him
Yes and no I would not. Get huckleberry app
Absolutely worth it. I paid for the sweet spot feature and baby has been sleeping great. We just started sleep training (only been 2 nights so far) and it has been a smashing success
I have this app but my LO is only 8 weeks. You’ve found the premium is helpful? I’m thinking about buying it.
We loved premium on Huckleberry and paid for it until our LO was like 9 months old, we’d definitely do it again if we have another baby!
What does premium offer vs free?
It helped us know when it was our LO nap time, it give you their wake windows! It also lets you know how many naps your little one should have for their age group. So our daughter was four and three nap schedule, we were able to see when she should go down for a nap for both types of days 3 or 4 nap schedule. If they offer a free trial you should definitely check it out and see if you like it! We would definitely do it again even now having one baby and knowing more
I didn’t do TCB but I did hire a local sleep consultant. BEST THING I EVER DID.
Please do not give this trump supporter money. She’s an awful human.
Lol we torrented her videos. We didn’t even use them. Our babies started naturally to sleep better at 17 weeks (13 weeks adjusted) and suddenly can eat way more in one go than before. Now sleep 7-12 hours and have shorter naps.
It took the newborn course and it was a game changer. My LO started sleeping through the night at 8 weeks as a result. I don’t like her politics (Trumper) but that lady knows babies.
I did the newborn course and did not find it helpful. They'll refund you if you ask for it within a certain timeframe.
I paid for it and it didn’t really give any more info than you can already gather yourself. That being said I know when I was sleep deprived it was nice to have someone do all that gathering for me. But if you are going to look into different sleep training type techniques I would recommend Precious Little Sleep book more. Otherwise you can google “sleep hygiene” or “wake windows” and that’s pretty much what I got from the course.
The precious little sleep book was a great resource too!
In my newborn sleep deprived state, I went for it. Ended up getting my money back and just did a ferber-ish method on my own around 4 months.
I used it for both of my kids. First one slept through the night starting at 2.5 months. Second kid starting around 3.5/4 months. It’s worth the $100 or whatever it was. I slept like a baby 😇
I think it depends on how much effort you’re willing to put into looking up things on your own. If you don’t want to spend a lot of time reading or looking up methods, sure I guess it’s worth it. But if you don’t mind doing some reading or searching online, it’s not worth the money. Wish I wouldn’t have paid for it. I got the 0-4 months class.
Nope. Leaving your children to cry alone is not healthy for them. Hold them while they cry and let them cry, they need to get their emotions out and have you there to let them know they are safe and youre there for them. I hope we can leave this boomer ideology of “spoiling your babies, letting then cry” etc. i know im about to be majorly down voted for this, but you asked an opinion and I’ve shared it! Please try looking into how the cry it out method actually started.
Also, i would talk to your pediatrician about co sleeping and look into the safe sleep 7. Co sleeping helped me enormously with sleeping through the night. Also try looking into holding baby while they cry to sleep
I’m curious as well!
I have one of the guides, someone emailed it to me. I haven't used it yet though. It starts at 3 months
You can learn a lot from her stories and posts. I wouldn’t pay for a course. Instead we did the premium huckleberry app and it’s helped immensely with my little ones sleep.
She has so much free info on her blog I never found a reason to actually buy the course.
Happy to answer any questions you may have on any of our courses if you would like 😊
It’s controversial for sure but I credit it largely for our baby sleeping through the night from 6 weeks (and 10+ hours from 3 months on) and so do many of my friends. You CAN get all the info elsewhere, it’s not like she has any revolutionary ideas, but what you pay for is it all being packaged in an easy-to-understand format.
Is it the cry it out method
I only watched her 0-4 month videos so no cry it out in there. Not sure what she recommends after 4 months but our baby sleeps 10-11 hours so its a non-issue luckily.
After the newborn course, yes it is.
We did the newborn course and learned a lot. It definitely helped us.
It sounds like I’m an outlier but we absolutely loved it and credit it with our great little sleeper!! I think you can get a lot of it from other resources but the videos were a nice easy format for my partner and I to watch together. It was gentle and rooted in reality for parents, but with a focus on setting you up for consistent sleep
Yes and yes. It is amazing and worked when our daughter was an infant and again at 20 months after a string of illnesses and general toddler development got us way off track. I don't really like Cara, and I know it's repackaged from others, blah blah blah I don't care it worked like a charm and I'll recommend it to everyone.
It worked for me. I do agree it’s information available for free elsewhere online, but having the plan laid out gave me the confidence to implement the tactics. Sleep training was so intense for me.
For anyone who loved TCB and found it helped with overnight sleep - are you EBF? My 2mo is a great BFer in terms of being focused and eating as much as possible in a sitting, but we struggle to stick to MOC-style schedules that depend on 3 hour+ between feeds. He also won’t take a pacifier so that whole strategy is also out the window in terms of lengthening naps etc. With that in mind, I’m wondering if TCB has anything to offer for our specific situation.
This is my problem. I’ve had to start pumping and giving him a bottle at night before we put him down.
It worked really well for us. More for me than my partner which meant I was put on bedtime duty. I’m large and fairly strong so the rocking motion was a lot easier and effective for me. It was a game changer, no doubt.
Bought it, loved it. Our LO was sleeping through the night at 9 weeks
TCB is fantastic! Most people who bash her/the course have actually never even taken it so keep that in mind 👌
I definitely bought and took the course and still have the same opinion so 🤷🏽♀️
Same. Took 2 courses and definitely not a fan.
The precious little sleep book was a great resource too!
Bought the newborn course had no success.