Parenting the Fussy Baby and the High-Need Child: Everything You Need to Know-From Birth to Age Five

by William Sears, Martha Sears

Describes the characteristics of a "high-need" baby, suggests ways to soothe a fussy child, and discusses nutrition, discipline, and communication

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction

237 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1996

About the author

Dr. Sears, or Dr. Bill as his "little patients" call him, is the father of eight children as well as the author of over 30 books on childcare. Dr. Bill is an Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine. Dr. Bill received his pediatric training at Harvard Medical School's Children's Hospital in Boston and The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto -- the largest children’s hospital in the world, where he served as associate ward chief of the newborn nursery and associate professor of pediatrics. Dr. Sears is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and a fellow of the Royal College of Pediatricians (RCP).Dr. Bill is also a medical and parenting consultant for BabyTalk and Parenting magazines and the pediatrician on the website Parenting.com.

Reviews

[Jaclyn Harrison · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wish I had known about this book and this "classification" of babies a year ago. My youngest is the textbook description of a high need baby.

Pros: This book was great for tips on how to handle high needs babies and dealing with mother burnout and gives you a little hope for their future and what type of adults they will grow up to be. (Disclaimer - I did not read the earlier chapters on newborns, because my child was a year old when I discovered this book.)

Cons: I wish there had been more on siblings, e.g. how does a parent meet the needs of her other children when the high need child is taking up all of her energy?

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is everything for me as I'm raising my daughter. EVERYTHING!! Doctors and websites keep telling you that your child should be doing this or doing that by a certain deadline, and what if they aren't?? But what if something isn't wrong with your child either?? Could there be a different schedule?? Because my daughter is now almost 11 months old, and hasn't slept through the night yet, this book has helped me realize that maybe I should just relax and let her just develop on her own instead of trying to force something that will eventually happen anyway. And as a first time parent, I don't need this added stress...I already stress about everything. Extremely helpful!

[Chloe Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

My saving grace in the early days!

[Natalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started this as a library book. Then in the 2nd chapter I told Dan that next time he needed to fill out an Amazon order I wanted this book :-) It's got a new title now, The Fussy Baby Book but it still goes through age 5, which is what interested me the most.

Reading the first chapter, where Dr. Sears and his wife talk about their daughter, Hayden, honestly had me in tears. He could have been writing about Sam.

Now my persistent, highly intelligent, amazingly sensitive baby is a preschooler and we butt heads way more than I would like. I'm working on techniques to help her learn how to get some control over this huge personality that she has.

Reading this book has taught me that I'm apparently a little on the high needs side too... :-)

Oh - one other thought - this is great for any crying baby. There are tips to soothe and there are also tips to help you try to figure out if it's a painful sort of problem, like colic, or if your baby is high needs. Samma is high needs. Tommy might fall on the spectrum, considering he doesn't sleep well without a warm body with him, but he has never had the hours and hours of crying that she used to have. It's possible she was colicky too and we missed it :-(

[Holly · Rating 5 out of 5]

It fits us to a "T" and makes me feel a lot better about what we're doing as parents and the challenges we're facing. It's not that we're horrible parents, it's just that he's harder than most kids. At least that's what Dr. Sears says...And it's so good to hear from people that understand for a change.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good stuff inside. Much of the same information as The Baby Book by the same author, but expanded.

[Scarlett harring · Rating 1 out of 5]

Useless