Cover Image: Beyond the Checkup from Birth to Age Four

Beyond the Checkup from Birth to Age Four

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Member Reviews

Being a mother myself I found this book to be extremely helpful! Growing up my mom had a book similar to this and that become her bible whenever we were sick. I can see this book becoming the same. A quick way to consult a doctor without the appointment. I really liked the fact that it covered so many years, to many books these days are for one specific age range. This book would be helpful to families of multiple children of multiple ages.

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This book is very general and basic. With the knowledge of a pediatrician married to a pediatrician I expected a lot more in terms of practical tips and "between the lines" explanations that a 20 minute appointment every 3 months doesn't cover. I would recommend more highly another book but this would be an interesting read if you really just need the basics.

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There was so much bad advice in this book that I could not bring myself to read it past the four month old chapter. It literally made me sick to my stomach and every other bit of advice had me wanting to rant to someone.

I've been a mother for over 20 years and have 5 children. The doctor who wrote this book has two young children and has been a doctor for 13 years. He writes as if he's some wizened old doctor who's got decades of experience, but 13 years is not exactly a lifetime. I much preferred "How to Raise a Healthy Child In Spite of Your Doctor," which was written by a very old pediatrician who had many, many decades of experience (and much better advice, in my opinion).

First off, this book contains the most conventional advice you will find anywhere. Vaccinate in pregnancy, at birth, and throughout childhood, and the more vaccines the better. Circumcision is your "personal choice" and it's valid to want your baby's penis to look like his dad's (though he admits later in the book that circumcised penises are much more of "a pain" to take care and often have adhesions, smell and other complications). Put your baby in a crib near your bed at first, and then move her to her own bedroom around 2 months. Start food at 4 months, and cereal is fine (two "solid meals" a day at four months!). Don't pay attention to fads like baby led feeding. Don't worry about putting your baby in day care. Don't buy a lot of stuff (but then he lists far more stuff than you really need). You should stock your newborn medicine cabinet for the first 6 months with Tylenol, Advil, Benadryl, etc. You should worry about fevers. You should breastfeed but don't beat yourself up if you don't... All the standard stuff that every mainstream parenting magazine or book tells you.

He alternates between trying to sound really old and wise, and trying to sound funny and like he's one of us. He also doesn't give any indication at all that he enjoys babies or small children.

Granted, I'm fairly "crunchy" and quite a health conscious mom, but some of the advice he gives is stuff I consider massively unhealthy. For instance, he advises buying "the cheapest formula you can find." He says there are strict standards so they're all pretty much the same. That may be true with things like Similac versus Walmart brand, but organic formula is far healthier than the genetically modified corn syrup, soybean oil and other junk in formula. He doesn't even mention that organic formula exists. In the food section, he lists the "dirty dozen" and "clean 15" foods but says not to worry about it and gives the impression that it doesn't matter even after talking about the known health risks of pesticides.

I was not a fan of almost anything this guy wrote but I was plugging away at it for the purpose of reading it to the end and giving it a fair review, and then I got to the sleep section. Ugh. He has a text box where he explains what "Ferberizing" is and who Dr. Ferber is (if you don't know, he's a controversial psychopath whose books taught millions of parents to have their young babies "cry it out" to "sleep train" them). This doctor then talks about how to sleep train your baby, adding so many extra minutes each time as your baby screams for you, and then says that your baby (at FOUR MONTHS OLD) should then be expected to stay in her crib for the next 8 to 10 hours before feeding again each night.

Telling a mother to let her four month old baby go 8 to 10 hours between eating at night and to let him/her cry and cry in the meantime is not just cruel but dangerous. That's how so many Ferberized babies ended up in the hospital and diagnosed with Failure to Thrive. Young babies need to eat more often than that, especially breastfed babies.

I won't finish this book and I would not recommend it to anyone. I did skim farther still and saw that it was more of the same conventional advice with stuff like how to do time outs for your 2 year old and why you should still be crying it out.

There are already plenty of preachy baby books filled with bad advice out there, so I have no idea why there would be a need for this one.

I received a temporary ARC of this book for the purpose of review.

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This book was so helpful so I kinda knew what to expect and so I didn’t over react! I’m so glad I read it and I’ll be sharing it with all my family!

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Great resource for the new mom! Lots of good information. I am planning on getting it for my daughter when it comes out.

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I did not enjoy perusing this book. Most advice was standard cliched parenting tips. Cases chapter at the end might have more utility. But I did not agree with many points on sleep, in particular.

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