A GOOD SLEEPING GUIDE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 951, 1 November 1957, Page 11

A GOOD SLEEPING GUIDE

Sir.-In The Listener of September 27 there appeared the text of a radio talk by Dr Turbott, "A Good Sleeping Guide," The title prompts a question? Good for whom? Good for what? When will we learn that it is not slick, watereddown advice that parents need so much as chances to discuss and work out for themselves the issues they face? And what of the advice Dr Turbott offers? Where did he obtain his data? How can he be sure? As it happens, I think we have done all the things he said a parent .shouldn’t. And we can say frankly to any parents who are worried over their children’s sleep that we can recall no difficulties over sleep with our three children, Why is Dr Turbott so concerned about "hullabaloos" with children? Why is he concerned about "bad customs’’? Why is he repeating the theme of a "rod for the parents’ own backs’? Are these factors relevant to "A Good Sleeping Guide," or do they belong more properly to a way of thinking that is worn out, weary and threadbare? There is another feature about Dr Turbott’s "guide" that I cannot understand. How can "sleep" be discussed or even mentioned without reference to thé child who is sleeping? This omission of the person seems: to me to be an important, underlying element in Dr Turbott’s talkthe omission of the relationship between mother and child; father, mother and child. Perhaps during waking ‘hours something can be done to form a relationship that will stand by us when

children awaken at night. Perhaps it would be wiser not to advocate that bedtime should be the same time each night. Perhaps there is a place for flexibility among fellow human beings. But how can we preserve such fellow feeling if we have to abide by the advice, "when the right time arrives don’t give in to any pleas for extension of time, or after the wash or bath"? We have found that our children slept when they needed sleep. Children need sleep and if they can’t sleep they need something else. How can we find out what they need by isolating, refusing to attend to them? Dr Turbott seems aware that there are some reasons for attending to children. Why does he need to qualify the times he would give attention? He suggests almost that sleep can be a struggle between children and adults. We have found, on the contrary, that where we have a good relationship with our children, they enjoy conforming. When they rebel,- we can enjoy that. We have suspected that they need their parents to help them both to conform and when they rebel. My wife and I have found that this kind of advice or "guide" that Dr Turbott has given ig good in intention only. We have found our greatest strength in our observation powers and the warmth of relation with our children, We believe in putting our love of our children before our good intentions for bringing them up. We have found the writings of Dr James L. Hymes, Jnr., Understanding Your Child, and Dr D. W. Winnicott, The Child and the Family, more challenging to us than the "guide" reproduced in The Listener.

A.

GREY

(Papatoetoe).

(Abridged ~Ed.)