My parenting journey
posted in Life, Parenting |For some reason the concept of “attachment parenting” has gotten a bad reputation and I truly don’t understand why. But, my suspicion is that it’s because many people make “attachment parenting” out to be a checklist of things that you MUST do in order to attach with your children - and that is simply NOT the case. But, I believe that those people who ignore the concept of attachment to their children are really missing the mark in their parenting journey. (More on this in future blog entries.)
Before I had my son, I was absolutely inundated with books from friends that were “must read” books. Many of them were “recipes” for succesful parenting and promised things like my children would sleep through the night by a certain age or that if I rocked them to sleep, they would be “too attached” to me at bedtime. “Too attached”? Is that POSSIBLE? I mean, we ARE talking about an INFANT here and not an 18 year old that should be ready to start the venture out on their own. But I really struggled with all of the advice and books and parenting classes. How can it be THIS hard I thought?
Well, my son was born and for the first week or so, we just loved him and enjoyed the time. We held him as often as we wanted to and didn’t worry about it. And then my friends crept in with their advice (mind you these are friends with VERY small children - no adult children) that I needed to stop rocking my child to sleep. And I thought - are these people for REAL? I’ve waited a VERY long time to have children and for CENTURIES we have been rocking our babies to sleep. Heck, for CENTURIES we’ve been SLEEPING with our children simply because people didn’t HAVE cribs or “other” rooms to place children in. Not to mention that fact that we didn’t have central heat so the ONLY way to keep a child warm was to have them sleep with their parents.
But, my husband and I “worried” about things for the first couple of weeks. And then around 4 weeks of age, my son started to “wake up” and that period of time with him was difficult. Suddenly it seemed impossible to get him to sleep. I had tried the “cry it out” advice and it just seemed unnatural to me (besides the fact that it just didn’t work with our son). I mean, is this REALLY what God intended for us to do with our children? Make them cry themselves to sleep at such a tender age? MAKE them become independent at such a young age? And if that was God’s purpose, to make children “cry it out”, why on EARTH did he make women’s breasts leak every time they hear a baby cry? Had God somehow “messed up” on the design on breasts? I hardly think so.
And then my older sister came to visit me when my son was about 5 weeks old. And what a blessing that was. She was on the “other” side of her parenting journey with children in their 20’s and 30’s. She is what I consider a “Titus 2″ woman - a Godly woman that I look up to and admire. She was the kind of Mother that I wanted to become. And I base that not only on how she raised her children, but on the relationship that she and her husband now have with their adult children - and it’s a marvelous relationship - one that I truly hope to have with my children when they are adults. They are truly friends and confidants now and they simply enjoy the pleasures of spending time together.
So, with all of that in mind, I knew that I had a lot that I could learn from my sister. And simply watching her for those few days helped me change my mind immensely in all of the parenting “information” out there. I watched as she cuddled him and rocked him and assessed his needs. And she reminded me that the amount of time that we actually get to rock our babies to sleep is VERY short. I spent so much time asking her how she had raised her girls. Remembering that she is 21 years old is a reminder that truly she’s in a different generation - a generation that didn’t have the Internet and didn’t have a lot of books. But, she DID have other women from the family around to help her parent.
My questions to her over those days must have seemed rather silly because I asked things like, “How long did you rock your children to sleep? Did you worry about them becoming “dependent” on you? Did you worry about nursing them to sleep (she nursed her second daughter for a long time)? Did you make them cry it out?” And during that time, I remember reflecting with her - I was around when her youngest child was born - I was 9 years old. And, I very much remember all of the love that was given to that child at bedtime and how my sister and mother would take turns rocking that baby to sleep. And then we talked about all of the cousins in the family (there were about 7-8 other cousins very close in age to my sister). And they all raised their children the same - they simply met their children’s needs and loved them - and built relationships with them. They didn’t worry about fixing perceived “problems” - they worried more about the relationship they were building with the child. And as I sit here now on the other end of their parenting journeys and look around me, I see some TRULY wonderful people who are AWESOME adults that I enjoy spending time with. They all have a relationship with God, and FABULOUS relationships with their parents and with the whole family. Every single one of them - and they are all between the ages of 22 and 41.
But the funny thing is that she had no answer for my “detailed” questions. The questions were ones that she completely could not relate to on any level. And neither can any of the cousins that are her age who all have adult children. They loved their children, they worked on their relationships and they worked on keeping family traditions and more importantly keeping God in their daily lives. Noone has ever served time in prison, almost all have gone to college, all of them attend church, and all of them have great relationships with their parents. I have a lot of Titus 2 women around me, wouldn’t you say?
So, now as I’m a few years into my parenting journey, my focus is so much more different. And, now, I’m kind of the “nut” in some aspects amongst my friends because I don’t really follow ANY parenting “book” or “theory”. Don’t get me wrong - I DO read and I read LOTS of books. But there is no one “book” that I subscribe to. I concentrate more on theories of parenting and relationships more than “recipe books” because I don’t believe the “if you do this, this is exactly what will happen”.
And, my selection of authors has changed rather drastically. I no longer look for the “popular books” or the “Super Nanny” books. If a book is about child psychology or parenting, then the author must have either a doctoral degree in something related to children or psychology or something along those lines. If a book is written by someone who truly is more of a parent, then my question becomes “Do they have adult children? What is their relationship with those children?” I certainly don’t want to emulate the parenting of someone who is completely disconnected from their own adult children - that’s not the advice I plan to follow. And isn’t that the overall goal anyway? To produce children who are honest, who love God, and whom I can continue to have a relationship with? I do believe that is God’s design that we come full circle at the end of our lives.
And, I have other qualifications for parenting “advice”. For example, if someone is going to give me parenting “advice” that is something that they insist “MUST” be done in order to be successful in my parenting journey, then that advice must transcend culture and time. And THAT is a topic for a future blog entry!