Meg Zweiback

We had a pretty unfortunate experience with Meg. We came to her when our 1 year old was waking up every hour throughout the night and we had already read basically every book on sleep for babies and tried several different attempts of sleep training without any success. We were really encouraged by our first in-​person meeting with Meg as we thought she had keen observations of our child, and she seemed to really understand what we had tried and what our values were (we didn’t want to cry-​it-​out without having a parent in the room). When she gave us the «plan» to just follow our regular routine as usual and then just let him cry with us in the room until he fell asleep, we were a little skeptical because this didn’t seem like much of a plan to us. Nevertheless, we tried. The first night, our sweet baby screamed for 3.5 hours and then DIDN’T fall asleep, and the second night for 2.5 hours and didn’t fall asleep. It was heartbreaking for us, of course, and even Meg admitted that it wasn’t the right «plan» for our baby. However, after much back and forth with her and detailed sharing of our sleep patterns, she seemed unable to provide us with any concrete plan going forward — her only advice was another version of the same original plan. It was incredibly frustrating and we felt as though she was completely unable to respond to the specifics of our baby and our family. We spent a ton of money and basically never even got the services that the money was contracted to provide.
In the end, we went back to following our intuition. We gradually changed our bedtime routine to have Dad put baby to sleep with his hands on the baby (no patting or massaging, just clear and still touch), and we had a friend come over for 3 nights in a row to be with our little one for all his wake ups so that he was able to lose the association of being rocked by dad or nursed by mom to fall asleep. During those times he had stretches of a few minutes to an hour of crying (but nothing longer), but was able to fall asleep with gentle contact. Within a week, he started sleeping for 10 – 11 hour stretches, and putting himself back to sleep without contact if he did wake up. It was a slower process to train him, but we never left him alone and he learned without intense crying (though some crying was healthy and necessary).

Meg helped us when we originally sleep trained our son and again when he went through a regression at around 10 months. She was patient and comprehensive, listening to us describe the situation and asking pointed questions along the way. While I’m sure I could have learned some of the tips through a book, there were other, more situation-​specific tactics that we wouldn’t have known without Meg’s help, which really made the difference. In both cases our son learned to sleep through the night on his own, within just a few nights. Meg’s services have had an immeasurable impact on the quality of our lives.

I am trying to be very objective about this review.
I think, in short, sleep training consultants work if your infant is by-​the-​book. Ours isn’t (which is why we sought support). And while Meg claims she creates a custom program for your child, in 3.5 weeks and after $ 1200, I did not experience that. The only «custom» program we received was a Word doc of a daily schedule that was clearly someone else’s with our child’s name replaced. I know this because the doc used the incorrect pronoun throughout.
Also, bedside manner. There is an air of condescension that feels a bit much considering she was hired to help coach through something stressful AND you pay $ 600 a cycle.
Last, it takes too long. For working parents, I actually think it was harder on everyone to go through this for nearly 4 weeks. I have taken it over and am using Ferber. Is working great. We are all happier.
And the Ferber book costs $ 19.
She is very smart. And very experienced. But it didn’t work for us, and the process wasn’t that pleasant or tailored.

Our 5 year old daughter had wetting accidents pretty much ever since she was toilet trained, she just didn’t seem to know when she needed to go. I had suspected constipation and had spent three years trying to convince various doctors that I would like to get that checked out.
Most of the doctors somewhat agreed that that might be the issue, but all were resigned to say she would «grow out of it».
At the end of my ropes and not sure what to do, I found Meg on the internet. The research I did seemed to suggest she was a good choice to get another opinion, even if it was at a distance.
She listened to the symptoms and guided me through an approach that led to my daughter being finally diagnosed with constipation that had blocked her up. Once diagnosed, my family doctor took notice and we are well on our way to recovery.
Meg was very professional and understanding. She listened to my comments, but also asked pertinent questions that I may not have thought of. She was also available anytime for follow up questions.
I am so happy we decided to contact her.

Meg changed our lives.
Nearly two decades ago my former partner and I consulted with Meg as we tried to work through custody issues involving our daughter. I (the mother) had raised her solo since she was born, with occasional visits from her dad.
When she was around three years old, my former partner suddenly decided that he wanted shared custody, an idea that horrified me. My daughter was very resistant to spending the night at his house, and I was very resistant to having her away from me, under the care of someone whom I did not particularly trust.
I was very much hoping that Meg would take my side and recommend that my ex back off for at least a decade or maybe two.
Although I could feel her compassion and understanding, Meg didn’t agree with me. And she was dead right.
When she spoke with both of us together she was always very non-​partisan and calm, even when I felt outrage at my ex’s requests. But despite the fact that Meg did not take my side, I could feel how fiercely she cared about my daughter, and I couldn’t help but begin to trust her, although I was still extremely resistant to the idea of sharing custody.
After several weeks of stalemate, after one particularly intense and confusing session, Meg pulled me aside and said something to the effect of «I know this is very hard for you, but in my experience it is far, far better for a child to know BOTH of his or her parents, no matter what kind of people those parents are. Otherwise the child will develop a fantasy about the missing parent, and that is much worse than any reality.»
The truth of this statement struck me and melted me. I suddenly saw the big picture and realized that my resistance to sharing custody was damaging my child’s relationship with her father, and that although it was terrifying for me, I needed to do everything in my power to let that relationship develop and even to nurture it.
And so I did.
Now my daughter is 21 and delightful beyond all measure. We were talking recently about her dad, and her relationship with him, and I told her what Meg had said, and how it changed me. And she absolutely, 100% agreed.
I think that whatever your temporary child-​raising problem might be, Meg’s wisdom, compassion and years of experience will help you see the big picture and navigate toward the light at the end of the tunnel, which is having a close and happy relationship with a well-​loved, well-​raised, wonderful adult child.

I am grateful for Meg’s help with our difficult sleeper. There are no professional standards (that I know of) for sleep consultants, and I trusted the fact that she is a professionally trained pediatric nurse (and thus when she offered us nutrition advice, I felt I could trust it). She listened to us carefully, we followed her suggestions, and my six month old’s sleep patterns improved greatly. She outlines her terms clearly and I felt that she held up her end of the contract well. We have no complaints and only praise.

The compassion of a mother. The knowledge of a nurse (she’s an RN). The personalized approach and constant contact of a consultant. Meg is someone we plan to turn to throughout our daughter’s life because she is warm, knowledgeable and responsive. She not only creates custom programs but helps parents stick to it with compassion and advice. We emailed back and forth every day and had a few calls with her in addition to the initial visit. She was always there for us.
We went to Meg because we knew our 3.5 month old baby needed to sleep more during both the night and day to be healthy and happy — and so we could be better rested and more energetic parents!
Meg created a custom program for us that was not just about sleeping but also feeding (which helped with the sleeping). Yes there was crying — but not for more than 20 –30 minutes intermittently. More importantly, our daughter learned to self soothe and to fall asleep in her bassinet. She went from getting up 2 –3 times a night to just one time (she still needs 1 feed still during the night and Meg is very clear that you don’t let a baby cry when they are hungry — only when tired).
A lot of the training is about establishing routines, learning cues and understanding babies sleep cycles. It is also about getting the emotional support you need to let your baby learn how to go back to sleep by themselves when they stir at night (if they are not hungry of course).
Some reviewers suggested you could read a book instead of see Meg. I don’t think reading a book when you’re sleep deprived is so easy. Nor is any book customized to your specific baby. And I doubt you can email the author daily.
Thanks to Meg, our baby is getting more sleep and so are we! We feel much more confident about understanding her cues.

We hired Meg to help our infant daughter sleep.
When we called her, I felt desperate for help. Our daughter was waking more and more often as time went on. I wasn’t getting any sleep and was turning into a zombie.
We were very impressed with Meg at first. She seemed very warm, present, and experienced.
But ultimately, for us, Meg’s solution was worse than the original problem.
She told us what to do each night. Basically, it was a slightly harsher version of the Ferber method.
We followed her instructions, and it failed miserably in our view.
After 6 days, our daughter was screaming/​crying every night for up to 50 minutes before falling asleep, though she was only waking up once at night.
The process was extremely stressful for me, so much that I was sleeping even less than before.
Meg said she considered it a success, though, even with the continued crying. She said the crying may continue for a long time, but she would still consider it a success.
After a week of this she said, «Now do the same for naps.»
At that point it all felt totally wrong, and we decided to have our daughter sleep in bed with us. We are all sleeping much better now. It’s not a perfect solution, but I feel very connected to my daughter and we all seem to be getting enough sleep.
My suggestion is: instead of hiring Meg for help with sleep, first read the Ferber book (It’s called «Solve your Child’s Sleep Problems») and decide if you want to do it. If you do, just follow the book.
And if you want to pay someone $ 500 to support you while you do it, then Meg might be a good person for that.
Of course, there are lots of other books about baby sleep out there, many of which advocate more gentle methods. I would recommend «Good Night, Sleep Tight» by Kim West, Dr. Sears book on sleep, and, if you have a younger infant, reading the chapter on sleep in the book «Bringing up Bebe».
We thought Meg would be able to give us special insight into our situation, and give us answers that weren’t in the popular books. We didn’t find that to be the case. She took us through a method that is commonly used, and it didn’t work for us.

We went from our 2 year old waking up 4 – 5 times every night to sleeping from 7:30/8 until 5:30/6:30 in under 2 weeks with minimal crying. (There WAS crying, it WAS hard, it never went over 20 min, and that was waxing and waning tears with periods of silence.) Our daughter moved with astoundingly little fuss from sleeping in an open-​sided crib in our room and crawling into bed with us to sleeping in a fully closed crib in her own room. No cry-​it-​out. She LOVES her crib and asks to get in. We all sleep better than we have since she was born. Meg was there via email every morning, listening to the previous night’s adventures and responding with tweaks. She’s great. I’d say our success was equal parts our fabulous child, Meg’s expertise and skill (could not have done this without Meg) … and … perhaps our commitment to doing this.

Please note: You are taking a risk working with a sleep consultant. Depending on your child’s disposition, the boilerplate techniques may or may not work. Unfortunately, we paid the $ 500, did everything we were instructed to do by Meg with complete precision and diligence, and the process still failed us. We still have a restless kid who wakes up several times each night and throws a massive tantrum every night when we put her in the crib. When we asked Meg after night 5 when our child would stop crying, she snapped at us because she didn’t have an answer. Basically, Meg uses the Ferber Method. This method is summarized succinctly here at Wikipedia. You can learn the method yourself and attempt to execute it:
Here is a good article warning of the impacts of Ferberizing:
Meg’s methods work for many, but not all clients. She has a very detailed plan and asks you to very deliberately and precisely execute the plan. We did just that. It still did not work. Sad for us. :(Great kid… sleeping nightmare.

We hired Meg to help us with our three-​year-​old when she was getting out of bed several times at bedtime, and calling out to us intermittently in the middle of the night.
This had happened after we had moved her into her «big girl bed» and we didn’t know how to break the pattern. We tried everything our pediatrician suggested with no success. We bought night lights embedded in stuffed animals that she could turn on herself in the night. We tried sticker charts and simply pleading with her. I even posted some questions on parenting sites looking for advice from other parents. Nothing we tried worked. We’d never had this problem with our older child. And our bad-​sleeper preschooler had always slept extremely well as a baby.
Meg was recommended to me by a friend. She came to our house to meet with my husband and I, then she met with our daughter. She was incredibly friendly and down to earth. She listened carefully to our description of the situation and asked thoughtful questions.
When she met with our daughter she made an easy friendly connection with her too.
Meg made several suggestions for how we could get our child to sleep through the night that were based on our child’s age and her specific concerns. She talked directly to our daughter about these things, as well as to us.
She did something totally different than any other advice we’d gotten, essentially by enlisting our child as the person who had the power to help us (her parents) get a good night’s sleep. Suddenly our kiddo wasn’t the bad guy we were fighting against, but part of the solution.
I was admittedly a bit leery. But at that point nothing else had worked, so I was generally jaded on this front. But Meg’s tactic worked like a charm. The first night our daughter called out only once – versus some nights when it was 4 – 5 times. The second night, not at all. It was amazing.
A few days in she back-​lapsed a bit (as Meg suggested she might), and Meg was friendly and available on the phone for additional advice. She gave us a couple more tips that we followed to a T and they worked again like a charm.
We were thrilled! We only regretted not having enlisted Meg’s help earlier on in the process. At first her rate seemed a bit high to us, but it was WORTH EVERY CENT.
Thank you, thank you, Meg! You were a life saver!
I highly recommend Meg to anyone else who is having sleep issues with their child. The quality of our lives has been improved immensely!

We consulted with Meg when our son was almost 2 years old. We had been somewhat successful using the ‘Ferber Method’ when he was about 10 months, but he never napped well at daycare, and more recently, nighttime was becoming unbearable, waking 4 – 5 times a night for one thing or another. I had read books, been on websites, etc, and thought we were doing the right thing, but it just wasn’t working.
We were finally at our wits’ end, and ready to throw in the towel. I did a quick search online and found a recommendation for Meg on a Berkeley parents’ forum. I contacted her immediately and made an appointment for a consultation. When we arrived, it turns out there was some mis-​communication, and we were not supposed to bring our son to the consultation. Nevertheless, we were over an hour from home, and Meg made accommodations so that he could be there.
During the consultation, Meg was generally positive about the attempts we had made, but provided a few ‘tweaks’ to our routine and additional ‘behavioral’ methods that she thought would make a difference. She even sent us away with a couple of out-​of-​print books that she wrote about potty training and raising a two-​year old (which we will return when we finish reading them).
The first night was AWFUL! My son cried for 4 hours straight. We knew we weren’t supposed to pick him up, but after 4 hours, we had to do something. We finally went in, soothed him, and he was quiet the rest of the night. When I spoke with Meg the next day, she assured me that we had done the right thing, and made a few suggestions to try that night. The next night he cried for only 40 minutes. The third night less, and the fourth night, he didn’t make a peep all night. It was a MIRACLE! I kept turning on the monitor to make sure he was alright. :)
Throughout the process, I kept in touch with Meg via phone and email (whichever was most convenient on a particular day). Even though she was out of town for a few of those days, she kept in touch via email and was always quick to respond (which is important when you need to know what to do next).
We are now 5 months after our first visit with Meg, and the change is 180 degrees! He sleeps all night (10 – 11 hours) (almost) every night, and is more flexible when it comes to vacations & alternate sleeping arrangements. He sleeps consistently at daycare, and comes home boasting that he slept «two hours!» at daycare. I think he is actually healthier (not getting sick as often) and not as cranky because he is getting enough sleep. As parents, it has been so wonderful to have uninterrupted sleep. We are more patient and attentive, and actually have time to ourselves at night.
Meg gave us the advice and skills that we needed to make this change. Some of the information she gave us, we can use beyond just sleeping, but also to help with behavioral problems. Although I think the price was a bit expensive, ultimately, it was well worth the money to have the sleep that we so desperately needed! Thank you Meg!

We hired Meg when our son was 3 months old. Our son was eating two times each night and our goal was for him to sleep through the night before my wife returned to work.
The results were great. Within 2 days of talking to Meg, we were down to one feeding every night — and, then, it took a few weeks to eliminate the final feeding. Happily, our son who is now 5 months old loves to go to bed at night in his own crib (around 7pm) and is sleeping 12 hours every night. (Fingers crossed!!)
We also really liked working with Meg.
1. As most parents will notice, there are a lot of extreme views on all aspects of parenting. Additionally, parenting books are often inconsistent and it’s hard to know what to believe /​trust. Meg came across as moderate, very well informed and data driven. On a couple topics re: to breastfeeding, Meg did research and came back and told us what she found in the latest literature. Also, her website is fantastic. She addresses a lot of common parenting questions.
2. Meg also tailored the approach to our family. A lot of sleep consultants have their protocol and stick to it regardless of each family’s situation. We felt like Meg gave us customized approach that fit well.
3. With our son, Meg encouraged us to feed him more during the day with the hope that he would not be hungry at night. I’m not sure why we didn’t think of this because it makes a lot of sense. One thing to note is that my wife and I were OK with the cry-​it-​out approach but Meg encouraged us to take a more gradual approach in weaning him off his night-​time feeding. Her logic was that he needs to learn to eat more during the day. The good news is that our son knows the drill now and he eats a lot during the day.
4. We found communicating with her to be easy — after 1 in-​person meeting and 1 — 2 phone calls, we communicated via email which is what we prefer. My wife would write her an email every morning & Meg would reply.
5. I suppose the final point is that we had peace of mind with Meg. The books are confusing & inconsistent. Meg is smart and knows what she is talking about. She was a helpful sounding board. It is sometimes hard to modify your baby’s behavior but, with Meg, we had confidence that we were helping and not harming him.

Let me start by saying that I would probably pay any price for a good night of sleep. I need it, I love it, I must have it! So after having a baby I called Meg Zweiback and decided to spring for her sleep consulting package in an attempt to get our baby to go to sleep on her own and sleep through the night.
At the time this felt like an impossible dream and we were so tired and desperate we would have done anything for our little cream puff to go to sleep and give us a much needed rest. Meg got the whole story and all the details before writing up her customized sleep plan. Our job was just to follow her plan every night and report back every morning. It felt like forever but on the 12^th night our daughter closed her eyes and went to sleep on her own! Not only that but she now sleeps 12 HOURS STRAIGHT!!!
Our results have been so incredible that my friends with babies call me weekly for tips and advice. Folks, I am no expert but Meg truly is and I would recommend her services without hesitation.
Little update: We are now on our second baby and still consult with Meg on everything from potty training to sibling rivalry and discipline of our two year old. Meg asks all the right questions and gives us the support and the concrete tools that we need. She is truly an expert at what she does and we feel grateful to have her in our corner!

Meg is a sleep magician! We were referred to Meg by friends and our pediatrician because our baby had never slept more than a few hours straight. We kept thinking that it would get easier, but it never did. After 6 months of being up several times a night we called Meg, and it changed our lives. Within days our baby was sleeping well, and by the end of the week she was sleeping all night. Meg helped us understand so much better what our baby needed and what she was telling us by her cues. She was completely supportive of what we wanted to do, and we never felt pressured to follow a set program. We talked to her every day, sometimes twice. She is great! She also helps parents with older kids, so we’re saving her number just in case.