My son, Paul, at 8 months fell. The nanny had him in her arms, he threw himself backwards, as often happens at that age, and fell to the ground, banging his head against the front door. He fractured his skull, but was very lucky in the end because there was no intracerebral bleeding.

These results were given to us at Necker Hospital, following a CT scan and a radiological report. The doctors told us that there was nothing in particular to do, nor anything in particular to prescribe, and that the fracture would heal on its own. Paul cried almost non-stop, night and day for the next few days.

Before this fall, Paul was a very easy, very happy little baby, all smiles. He slept through the night at 3 months and was less demanding in terms of attention than his 14 month old brother.

After his fall Paul became another baby. He became wilder, more suspicious of others, indeed no one could take him in his arms, other than his mother or his father. He was crying a lot, without us knowing why. It was almost cries of distress. We couldn't go to the pediatrician, or any other doctor, without Paul going into a trance, whereas each visit to the pediatrician had always gone very well before that.

And above all, overnight, following this fall, he woke up every night, without exception, and cried, screamed, for two consecutive hours, until he finally fell asleep of exhaustion. This lasted for 15 months. From November 2005 to February 2007.

Throughout this period we have tried everything. Indeed after having done everything that traditional medicine recommended (scanner, MRI, and clinical examination), we were told that everything was fine. That said, Paul was fine on paper, and from a strictly medical point of view, but the fact is that he remained very vulnerable and above all that he woke up every night, which in our eyes was clearly a consequence of his fall. Although no one can tell us why he was waking up like this, or what to do about it, there had to be a reason for his crying and there had to be someone who could provide us with a solution. .

So I decided to look beyond traditional medicine, because our life and that of Paul were simply no longer tolerable with nights where we slept no more than five hours in the best case (from 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. and from 6.00 to 7.00).

Paul saw a pediatrician specializing in sleep disorders as well as a psychologist for sleep disorders, the results were not very conclusive. One told me to give him psychomotricity sessions twice a week and the other told me to change the layout of his room, so that his bed is directed differently and to make him do less naps because he had to sleep too much during the day…

He has seen an osteopath several times as well as a therapist who practices the Ayurvedic technique. In both cases, they recommended certain types of manipulations that I could do myself in order to relieve and reassure him. I haven't seen any results. He saw a woman who works on cellular heredity and on the body's energy through tuning forks. This doesn't seem to have solved our problems, Paul continued to wake up every night.

I had contacted another woman, who practices therapeutic massage, who told me to come and see her, because at this age the work is done through the mother. She told me that if Paul woke up at night it was to reassure me and to tell me in a roundabout way that everything was fine. She advised me to consult a psychotherapist and that should help a lot.

Then Paul saw a homeopath, it seems that this treatment did him a lot of good, in the sense that, even if Paul continued to wake up at night, he hardly cried anymore and the crying was no longer the same. Her cries had become those of a "normal" baby who couldn't get back to sleep, not those of a panicked baby. A milestone had been crossed.

That said, his attitude during the day remained the same, he always avoided the gaze of others, never wanted to be carried away by a third person, and continued to cry for an average of two hours during the day.

At the same time, I discovered the Flowers of Dr. Bach (Mimilus and Aspen) which I think also helped a lot to soothe Paul and contributed to giving him back a certain ease and to getting rid of this feeling of fear.

A few months passed and so things began to stabilize, and improve, although eventually Paul continued to wake up for 2 hours every night;

One day, when I was no longer really looking for a solution to our problem since we had come back from so far away and I had told myself that the rest would be absorbed over time, I was told about Philippe Coffin. When I was told a few examples of people he had treated, I immediately knew I had to take Paul to see him.

I met him for the first time in December 2006. The session lasted more than 2 hours. Paul did not flinch once, quite the contrary; his shoulders relaxed and relaxed and he sighed as if he were losing weight, as if all of a sudden he no longer carried the misfortune of the world on his shoulders. During the session Philipe Coffin gave him very light massages on the arch of the foot. He explained to me that this is where the intrauterine life and the birth passage are stored. He told me about different aspects of his method. During the session he didn't tell me too much or not enough, he didn't go into details. But on my side I could see that something was happening in Paul. His gaze, his eyes were not the same. I only had to look at Paul to get the answers to my questions.

When I left, I told Paul to say thank you and it was the first time he said that word, and it was the first time he repeated a word after me. Indeed, at this appointment Paul was 20 months old. He didn't speak at all (not a word, except "dad, mom, goodbye") and didn't walk either (indeed he probably fell behind due to his little worries). I was surprised to hear him repeat "thank you" after me.

I had not touched a word of the meeting with my husband, nor with my parents. That evening we were at home, Paul was on my husband's lap and my mother came to see us. Usually Paul refused to go into his grandmother's arms if one of his parents was in the room. That evening, when my mother arrived, Paul got down on his own from his father's knees, crawled up to his grandmother, and held out his arms to her, wanting her to take him in his. Everyone looked at me and asked me ironically: "Is Paul sick?!" So I told them about my appointment at Philippe Coffin.

That evening, Paul slept, as well as the 4 nights that followed. This had never happened in 13 months. Then he continued to wake up, indeed during the Christmas holidays, I heard Paul waking up, but I didn't have to go there once, he was chirping, then went back to sleep on his own.

Right after the December appointment, Paul took his first steps, and the following week he was walking.

For a month I followed Philippe Coffin's instructions, namely to give him the same little foot massages that he had taught me to do during this first session (a few minutes each foot, starting with the right foot). Paul let himself go, and was even rather demanding.

On our return in January, I saw Philippe Coffin again, the results being so convincing after the first time, that I felt that another appointment would solve our problems once and for all.

Since February, Paul never wakes up at night again, unless he has a fever of 39.

We rediscovered our smiling, mischievous and laughing Paul. He is much more open to others, he runs to his nanny when she arrives in the morning, he is happy to see his grandparents, and even complete strangers sometimes, instead of shouting and going the other way like he did it for months.

The difference in behavior is absolutely colossal and everyone who knows him has noticed it, which compels me to tell this story every time, because no one understands how such a change could have happened so suddenly.

I thank Philippe Coffin every day, he not only allowed us to sleep again, but he also made Paul feel freed from a burden. A fortiori, this released in me an anxiety and a concern that had settled since his fall.


Ghislaine M