A blog post by Adriana Bachmann
Here's something worth thinking about: baby advice has been passed down for thousands of years. Long before the internet, before pediatricians, before parenting books, mothers were sharing what worked with other mothers.
Some of that knowledge was genuine wisdom, tested across generations. And some of it was a guess that worked once, got repeated, and eventually became "truth" — not because anyone proved it, but because nobody stopped to question it.
Chapter Nine of Bitches, I've Arrived is the myth chapter. And it's one of my favorites to write, because the gap between what parents are told and what actually works is, in some cases, almost comical.
Almost. Because when the wrong advice is keeping your baby uncomfortable and keeping you awake at 3am, it stops being funny fast.
The "Witching Hour" Is Not What You Think It Is
You've heard of it. Maybe you've lived it. That stretch of evening — anywhere from late afternoon to midnight — when your baby becomes inexplicably inconsolable. Crying that won't stop, fussiness that nothing fixes, and a mother who's been awake since dawn wondering what she's doing wrong.
The parenting world has a name for this: the Witching Hour. It's treated as an unfortunate developmental reality — something babies just go through, something you simply have to endure.
Here is what I've observed across thousands of babies over twenty-plus years: the Witching Hour is not a mysterious developmental phase. It has a cause. And that cause is identifiable, addressable, and largely preventable when you know what you're dealing with.
In Chapter Nine, I explain exactly what's actually happening during these evening hours, why it tends to peak when it does, and why babies following the Jaja Method consistently don't experience it. The answer will make complete sense once you read it — and you'll wonder why nobody explained it to you before.
You've Been Burping Your Baby Wrong
Almost every parent does this. The instinct is universal, it looks helpful, and it's been passed down so many times that nobody questions it anymore.
But the most common burping technique used by parents around the world is not actually what gets the burp out. It can soothe a crying baby. It can serve as a distraction. But the mechanics of why burps happen — and what actually helps your baby release trapped gas — work differently than most people assume.
Chapter Nine breaks down the truth about burping: what works, what doesn't, and the specific role that positioning plays versus the tapping most parents reach for automatically. Once you understand what's actually happening in your baby's body, the right approach makes immediate sense. And the results are immediate too.
The Sleep Crutches That Are Quietly Wrecking Your Nights
There are several things parents do — with the best intentions, often on the advice of others — that create the exact sleep problems they're trying to solve.
White noise machines are one. Rocking and bouncing are another. Chapter Nine takes both on directly, explaining not just that they create dependency, but how and why — what happens in your baby's brain when sleep becomes associated with these external conditions, and what that means for every single nap and bedtime going forward.
This isn't about being rigid or withholding comfort from your baby. It's about understanding the difference between soothing a baby in the moment and building a habit that will define how they sleep for months. Those are two very different things, and most parents don't realize they've crossed the line until they're trapped in a cycle they can't figure out how to exit.
Chapter Nine tells you how to avoid it entirely — and what to do if you're already in it.
Sleep Regressions Don't Have to Happen
The four-month sleep regression. The six-month sleep regression. You've heard about them, possibly dreaded them, possibly already survived one.
Here's what the parenting world generally doesn't tell you: these regressions are largely the result of the habits your baby has already built, not some unavoidable developmental wall that every baby hits. When a baby's sleep cycles shift toward more adult-like patterns at four months, what happens next depends almost entirely on whether they've already learned to fall back asleep on their own — or whether they need someone to come and do it for them.
The babies I work with don't regress. Or if they do, it's mild and short-lived. That's not luck. It's the predictable result of building the right foundation early enough that a developmental shift doesn't destabilize everything.
Chapter Nine explains what's really driving these regressions, why they feel inevitable when they're often not, and what to do if you're reading this after a regression has already arrived in your house.
Teething Isn't the Sleep Villain Everyone Says It Is
"She's teething" has become the universal explanation for every sleep disruption in a baby's first year. Rough night? Teething. Skipped nap? Teething. General fussiness? Definitely teething.
Here's a more accurate picture: teething can cause discomfort, and that discomfort can affect sleep. But the disruption is typically far shorter than most parents expect — and far shorter than most parents experience. When teething is followed by weeks of broken nights and a complete unraveling of the sleep schedule, teething is usually not the real culprit.
In Chapter Nine, I explain what's actually going on in those situations, why the teething explanation is so easy to reach for (and why it so often lets the real issue go unaddressed), and how to handle disruptions during teething without dismantling everything you've built.
The difference between a baby who has two difficult nights per tooth and a baby who doesn't sleep well for six weeks is almost always the same thing — and it has nothing to do with the tooth.
The Pattern Behind All of These Myths
Every myth in Chapter Nine has something in common: they persist not because they work, but because they're repeated. By parents to other parents, by family members who mean well, by influencers who have an audience but not necessarily experience. Sometimes by the industry, which profits from your uncertainty. Sometimes just by tradition — this is what we've always done, so this is what we do.
The Jaja Method is built on what I've actually seen work, with thousands of babies, in real homes, over more than two decades. Not on folklore. Not on what sounds reassuring. Not on what's easiest to sell.
What works is almost always simpler than what gets recommended. And Chapter Nine is where a lot of those unnecessary complications get cleared away — so you can stop second-guessing everything and start trusting a method that actually delivers.
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