Reviewed by Rosie

Introduction:
For
every parent, somewhere between the delivery room and arriving home,
reality sets in. We have a baby! And rarely are these unique little
creatures exactly what their parents expected.
Tracy Hogg has seen
it all. With over 20 years experience tending some 5000 babies, she has
successfully taught parents how to understand what their babies are
trying to tell them.
In Secrets of the Baby Whisperer she- Reveals
the Know-Your-Baby quiz which will help parents determine what their
baby needs. Shows parents how to teach babies to sleep. Advises on
feeding, bathing, changing, child-proofing, toy buying, and choosing
and training a carer.’

Good points about the book/parts you found helpful:
The
section on understanding your baby’s body language and reading their
cues is absolutely excellent. I think every parent should read this
section. I bought the book at a time when Hope was transitioning from
being able to fall asleep anywhere, anytime- to needing help to get to
sleep, and frankly this section saved my life! I had no idea what was
going on with her, and when I read this section I realised that what I
had been interpreting as boredom (and so waving more toys at her) was
actually over stimulation and over tiredness. Being able to watch her
and understand what the little mannerisms and noises meant was so
liberating, it took a lot of the stress out of things. Perhaps other
mothers are more in tune than I was, but for me this was a real eye
opener.

Bad points, inaccuracies:
The first
thing that strikes me about this book is that a huge amount of it is
just Tracy Hogg’s personal opinions on things. She writes as if
imparting some amazing wisdom upon the reader, and it is very easy for
a new mum to get carried away by her utter conviction in herself, but
in actual fact a lot of it is inaccurate. Her views on breastfeeding
are frankly not worth the time it takes to read them. Her comments that
‘While I agree that human milk is undoubtedly good for babies, we
mustn’t go overboard’ and ‘Formula today is more refined and chock full
of nutrients than ever’ really sum up her attitude on the subject. She
seems almost to be trying to encourage mothers to formula feed rather
than breastfeed.

The next thing I noticed is that the book
contradicts itself in a lot of ways. Tracy Hogg progresses from
preaching about learning to understand what your baby needs, and
following their cues, to then advising putting your baby on a
prescribed routine where they feed every 3 hours and have their sleep,
feeding and activity time in a specific order. Although she says that
her routine is not a rigid schedule, and that it is sensitive to the
needs of the baby, in practise that is far from the truth. She states
that demand feeding just creates a ‘demanding baby’ and that by feeding
your baby 3 hourly you will make them much happier and they will soon
sleep through the night.

I am confused as to how she can claim
to believe in following a baby’s cues, and then in the next breath say
that a baby should not be fed on demand. Surely if you are following
her philosophy of reading cues then you will feed your baby when they
ask for it? This is just one of the contradictions in this book.

One
part of the book that actually made me really angry is where the Baby
Whisperer recommends putting a 3 day old baby on a 2.5 hour feeding
schedule. A newborn baby has just come from an environment where food
is constantly on tap, they have never had to wait for food before and
have never experienced hunger, their tummies are absolutely tiny and
can only hold a few millilitres of food at a time. Little and often is
how they’re meant to feed, asking them to wait 2 and a half hours is
just not fair. The idea that somebody who claims to know so much about
babies could advise something so totally unnatural is just bizarre.

Comments and other opinions:
‘Secrets of the Baby Whisperer’ promises to be the answer to all your
troubles, and as a vulnerable first time mum this is exactly what you
need to hear. The danger is that a lot of the advice in the book is
unrealistic and can just leave parents feeling even more frustrated
than before. The assertion that if you follow her routines your baby
can sleep through the night by 8 weeks or so is, in my opinion,
misleading and guaranteed to create false expectations. While some
babies may fall naturally into the routines described in this book, the
truth is that the majority won’t, and the end result will be frustrated
and disillusioned parents, or babies forced to go without food until
the prescribed 3 hours is up. The Baby Whisperer’s advice can seriously
jeopardise the success of breastfeeding and despite it’s claims to
teach you to follow your baby’s cues, may end up having the opposite
affect.

All in all ‘Secrets of the Baby Whisperer’ strikes me as
being a huge ego trip for Tracy Hogg. It’s full of self-congratulation
and ‘success stories’ designed to illustrate her brilliance. What it
lacks is any true understanding of the individuality of each baby, and
each family. It gives you a box, and methods of cramming yourself and
your baby into that box, but it never entertains the prospect that you
might not fit, or that the box might not actually be the best place for
you both.