Alternative Parenting – Page 25 – a hippie with a minivan

quote….

I am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special systems of education. They seem to me to be built upon the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think. Whereas if the child is left to himself, he will think more and better, if less “showily”. Let him come and go freely, let him touch real things and combine his impressions for himself… Teaching fills the mind with artificial associations that must be got rid of before the child can develop independent ideas out of actual experiences.

– Anne Sullivan, Helen Keller’s mentor and friend

Getting Published…

well… it is official…

Simon and I both gave in some texts about our experiences with breastfeeding…

me from the experience of nursing one.. then two.. and then three…

and Simon wrote about his perspective also…

We found out a while ago that they had been accepted but now everything is official and we have been invited to the book launch on Oct 5th…

it will be in book stores after that!

Pretty cool… it’s even on Amazon!

Près du Coeur

“AP" past the age of 3…

I have talked before on the blog how the “AP trend” seems to be instilled in the idea that “attachment parenting” is a list of things that you do.

Breastfeeding, co-sleeping, babywearing etc… all things that are on the “Sears List”… all things that are important in a infant and baby’s life…

But the lists that so many people seem to rely on really seem to focus on “Attached” in the almost the physical sense, providing a happy baby and not the emotional.

When you look at it in that light then “Attachment Parenting” and “Gentle Discipline” seem to work pretty well and easy with a baby and even with a young toddler… but when toddler hits that independent stage, babe starts sleeping through the night more, nursing less and wants to walk more than be carried… the physical attachment is harder to maintain and honestly it is normal!

The importance of being attached is not physical, but is emotional and is simply facilitated by the physical in the beginning especially because a baby’s needs are quite physical also.

So what happens later then?

It seems that so many people seem to think that AP just doesn’t work anymore after a certain age… there are no more lists… no more concrete methods or “how-to’s” and that is when the problems set in and then the ideas that work against attachment make their way into the relationship…

The problem that I see is that what seems to be missing is the “why” of wanting to be attached to our children.

I wrote this a while back on the blog when I talked about Attachment and the problem with Time-outs…
Attachment is important in any relationship and not only is it important but is required for a relationship to work well for everyone.

What does Attachment do?

• It arranges a hierarchy
• It renders the other person endearing
• Brings us home
• Creates a compass point
• Activates proximity
• Evokes a desire to be good

So the Attachment actually fixes things in a way that the child who is well attached is inclined to want to please us, do things for us, be with us, loves us, follow us, be good for us etc… They fall into being that “easy child” (most of the time)

Neufeld talks about 6 ways that we attach. These should be all done by the age of six within a good attachment, though it is never too late.

You can see the correlation with ages…. From infant, toddler, pre-schooler etc…

These stages are
• Senses (all of the physical ways that promote attachment)
• Sameness (wanting to do what the other is doing)
• Belonging and Loyalty (The “mine, mine” stage)
• Significance (feeling that we matter)
• Feeling (giving your heart away, falling in love)
• Being Known (wanting the other to KNOW you, telling all, sharing all)

A child then that is truly attached will do whatever they can to please the parent, will be good because they want to be good, they want to be with the parent, they love them, they want to share their secrets….

When you have their hearts, you have access to their minds, they are open to learn.

We learn from those whom are attached to. The teacher that we loved, that made the most impact on us, the one that we learned the most from is the teacher that has won our hearts. We need to be attached in order to teach, we need to be attached in order to learn.

However, this attachment also makes a child emotionally dependant and they are very vulnerable.

This can be seen as negative, but is important as they are not yet ready to be on their own emotionally until they step away by themselves (and not towards a peer, but really on their own two feet)

Attachment therefore, is not only important in the early years, it is important all the time.

So why attachment is so important in children’s lives and how it works is to guide them into adulthood is what the focus should be on.

And not only does Attachment parenting work after the “Dr. Sears” list of ways to be “attached” dwindle but it becomes even more important. Maintaining emotional attachment is hard though… way harder as kids grow and I do understand that at a certain age things change… but giving up on attachment is not the answer and will lead to more problems in the end…

child-led living…

In many circles, in real life and online, I have come to see that many people seem to believe that Unschooling and child led living go hand in hand when really they can be and are quite separate. It is easy to think however that one equals the other, as it is true that many families that practice a child led learning method such as unschooling do extend the child led ideology to all aspects of life. However, it is not something that all unschoolers believe in and child led living is not at all unique to unschooling.

There are many families that are child led and use public school, as there are many unschoolers that believe that child led learning is the best way to learn but believe that family dynamics are very different.

Personally, child led living is not something that I strive for which seems to surprise many people.

I believe that in a family the parents are the leaders, we are the ones with life experience, we are our children’s guides through the beginning of their lives. We are showing them the way and teaching them the skills to love and thrive. However, it remains important to remember that as parents and guides, we are not dictators, children deserve respect, they have a voice, they have a right be listened to and though they may not have all of the control it is not taken away from them completely either…

Mutual respect, consensual living, unconditional love, non-coercive and gentle parenting are the keys…

I think that there needs to be a balance in a family and the more we are the more we have to work as a team. There are times that some may not be happy, and in those times we do our best to help through the transition and work through those feelings.

If we need to leave from the park and someone is not happy, I will not stay there and wait until they are ready, however, I will also not say that I am leaving and instil the fear of abandonment just to get my point across. There are many ways to talk to kids, to help them with the transition of going… there are some kids that are easier than others and there are some that give you a run for your money and having 3 very different children there are times that you really need to get creative and yes there are sometimes tears… but with those tears there is always support.

The thing is… kids are not always 100% right and they do need guidance… but parents are not always 100% right either and we need to remember that kids often know more about what they need than we give them credit for. As a family there are times that we all have to make sacrifices and there are times that the right thing for one is not always the right thing for the other and it is not always the child that gets their way, but it is also not always the parent… I might want my kids to sleep at a certain time so that I have some time to myself…. but if they are not tired then why should they be forced? However, that time needs to be quiet because there are others that may be sleeping and evenings are quiet time around here…

It is that fine balance that seems to be so hard… guidance but not control… letting go of arbitrary expectations and letting kids have their say without making them having total control either…

Really though….

Being a parent is hard and being a child is hard also… so my goal is to make it easiest for all of us and of course we always strive for better.

if you… you won't…

I was at the pool last night and I happened to get out at about the same time as a mom with a little girl… she couldn’t have been more than 2 1/2… she wanted to sit in the shower area while they were taking a shower and the mom started to get upset telling the little girl to get up and stand at the exact place that the mom wanted her to and to not move from that spot… at one point she mentioned she feared her slipping but didn’t mention it again…

I finished my shower and went to get dressed and could hear her start with the threats…

“If you don’t stay there, you won’t get ice cream…”

and then the little girl cried, and then she probably moved again, because then the threats got more hurtful…

“If you don’t stay here, you won’t get ice cream, I will get one and you won’t”

and it just kept on getting worse, and worse, when the spot in the shower, became a spot in the changing area.

now the mom is almost screaming “If you stay there, we are not going to get ice cream, but we are going to go home and you are going straight to bed and I am going to tell your daddy how bad you were”

I left just after that…

The threats really bother me…

I remember being a kid and having those threats uddered to me…

If my mom would have kept her word, I would have never been out in public, had any gifts, watched TV or have eaten anything I liked ever again. Did I stop in the moment? maybe… maybe not… Did I start again the next time? Probably, but I don’t think I ever knew why I wasn’t supposed to do something.

The thing is, threats don’t work.

Does that mom really think that her little girl is thinking about not moving, or is questioning why she shouldn’t move or learning not to move? or is she thinking about the ice cream, or getting hurt by her mom’s words, or about her dad not being happy with her?

She might stop moving in the moment. And threats often will get short term compliance, but in the long run, nothing real is learned besides not getting caught and that love is conditional. And at one point threats just won’t work anymore and then punishments just get worse.

The problem though, is that when you are raised in an environment that love is conditional, which most of us were raised in. Punishments, time-outs, rewards etc., then it is so hard to break the cycle…

and really so many people don’t even think about it.