Attatchment Parenting, Natural Parenting

There are a large group of parents practicing a "new-fangled" parenting style called attatchment parenting. These parents believe that babies and children instintively know what they need. They hold the babies when the baby wants them too, they feed on cue. They believe that the baby knows what they need and that the parents will only spoil them by ignoring their needs.

I believe that this style of parenting has much going for it.

The act of contiuously holding and touching your infant increases their brain developement and causes them to bond strongly to you. The act of meeting their every need and desire (at least until they are toddlers) teaches them to have a trust and have faith that they will be cared for and that the world is a safe place for them. Co-sleeping ensures that they are cared for at night, and eliminates much of parent night-waking, if breastfeeding.

Really, it is much older than the now classic "cry it out parenting" where you train yourself to ignore your babies cries and smack them for evey misdeed.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

The Importance of Gentle Birth

What is the importance of gentle birth? There may be no importance, it may be the most important instance in the world. At any rate, it's easy to decide.

1. Look at the stastisics. At least one in four births will be a C-section. That would look like this: a a a A a a a A a a a A a a a A a a a A The actual number of needed Cesareans is closer to five in one hundred.
2. The level of intervention in non-gentle childbirth is HUGE. Starting with simply limiting the food and water intake of the mother and forcing her to lay on her back.
3. Babies who are born into a harsh enviroment and separated from mom have lower apgar scores, more problems establishing nursing, and higher infant mortality rates.
4. Gentle birthing is easier on the mother.
5. It increases bonding and attatchment between parent and child.
6. Parents who are able to successfully bond with their children have much lower rates of child abuse than those who maybe didn't have the optimum bonding.

And which of us couldn't use all the loving bonding with our babies? Christ tells us to "Love one another, that your joy may be full". In my experience, natural gentle childbirth just facilitates a wonderful, beautiful loving feeling toward everyone around and your baby and husband, espessially.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

Progression of Abuse

1. Abuse always starts inside the abusers head. They tell themselves things that cause them to look badly upon the child.
2. Abuse then goes into verbal mode. The abuser talks down to the abused and belittles them, degrades them. This could be yelling, or it could be anything else.
3. After this the abuser often moves into regular spanking.
4. Spankings become more violent as the child fails to respond or the adult finds new things to punish.
5. Soon it is out and out abusive, and the child is caught in a horrid mix of love-hate with thier own parent.
6. The child is murdered.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

A Story of "Christain" Parenting

I have been reading about spanking and feel compelled to share my personal story with all who may be guided here. Please, do not take this as a "pity party", as I was so often accused of having as a child. And I pray you do not take it as a manual to condem my mother as a person. Or anyone's mother or father. Our parents are people, and most of them really do love, it is usually in their own childhood that the seeds of abuse can be found. God will judge us all, Himself. Please don't take it upon yourself to do so. Mathew 7:1 says, "Judge not, lest ye be judged". That said....

When I was very young, my mom made some mistakes. I don't personally remember them, but I do remember visiting her in jail, and later going to live with her in a home for addicted mothers. In the interm, I lived with my Grandparents, who I have good memories of. At some point, I was sexually abused. I don't remember it, although I wish that I could, to put some closure on it. I wish I knew who did it, and when. I have sporadic memories, and more than one therapist has told me that I block memories as a defence mechanism.

When my brother and I finally got to go live with our mom, she was straightening her life out. She got into colledge, and had her own apartment. I can't rememeber much, but I do remember running away alot. I was later told that I started doing this even younger, like around 2 or 3. I never thought anything of it, until I got older and realized normal kids don't run away, and one foster parent told me, "kids are running from something". Everytime I ran away I got whipped with the belt. I remember being hit with a spoon because I had been bad.

My mom got together with a man who was very "christian", extemely devout, and demanding that we be "good children".

I remember being tickled by my stepdad (who I had to call "dad") to the point of exhaustion. I had been crying and crying, and only wanted for him to stop. It's the only time I remember it happening, but my brother has mentioned that he did it "all the time", and that my brother was angry because he thought I was being tickled in "wrong places". I don't remember this, but my mom also later said that she thinks he was grooming me up for sex, and SOMEBODY abused me. (However, it would be wrong to asume this man was it).

I was homeschooled from second grade on to eighth. I think homeschooling is awsome, and plan to do it with my own children. But I had to do a certain number of pages a day, if I didn't finish, I didn't eat. If I got caught drawing on my pages I got whipped. I love to draw, so I began Drawing underneath y matteress (this was eventually discovered and led to more beatings). If my brother and I talked at all during "school hours", we got beat. I had alot of chores, and we got up at 6 every morning to begin our routine. I washed dishes every day, three times a day. If one dish had a speck, I had to rewash the entire load. I swept the floor until nary a speck came up. If my room wasn't clean, my mom would go through the entire thing, and anything not "put away" was immediatly thrown out.

These are just a small sampling of practices. My mom would tell the offending party to "go to the room". I would get sick immeadiatly and begin crying. She would leave me back there until I calmed down, at least externally. Then she would come back and tell me to get undressed, and "lay down" on the bed. I was whipped with a belt or with this white rod that I remember was very thin and caused my skin to welt and bleed. If I jumped or cried, I got whipped more, usually 10 swats per move. I was routinly beaten until I no longer made any noise. Eventually in the course of a through whipping, you no longer feel any pain. You are just tired, and sore. Then I was allowed to get up and go back to the kitchen to finish my studies. I couldn't sit right, but I had to, otherwise I was bound for another round. Meanwhile, it was my brother's turn. Now the punishment really began. I could hear each swat, each scream. My own freshly beaten skin was aching, and if it went the other way, with him first? Then my already tender skin cried out and my stomache was tied in knots thinking about what was to come. Baths were excrutiating, and half the time I wasn't fed because I didn't do everything perfectly.

All of the things I have read about what Dobson and others like him endorse is exactly what I endured as a child. Ridicule, shame, and the assumption that if you are not perfect, you're nothing, has followed me to this day. The beatings, everything.

I acted out in many ways. I tortured my siblings. I beat the dogs into submission, my brother chased me with knives and we both ran away repeatedly. I was anti social, and am still panicky in social situations. Being tickled makes me angry and I want to kill. My stepdad's name makes me literally naseated, and authority figures make me want to roll over and piddle my pants. I rebell against cleaning, and spent three years in therapy for a packrat tendency, literally crying over the loss of a scrap of paper. I used drugs and have sought unhealthy relasionships. I have an all-or-nothing mentality, and I suffer from periodic deppression and constant PTSD. I have irritable bowels and for along time I acted out against the Lord because of my stepdad's relijious affiliation. I thought God was like that.

I gave up my daughter for a variety of reasons, one of them being that I was afraid someday I would abuse her and there would be no one to stop me. I didn't want the same thing for her.

Now I still suffer from the abuse, but am older and have decided to make my own decisions, not allow my past to rule me. My husband (who comes from a very neglectful/abused childhood) and I have a plan that if either one notices unsafe behavior, they will take the children and leave the offending partner until help is gotten and therapy is used to address whatever issue it is. WE have agreed to believe our children over eachother, as it is the only way to protect a child from an abusive parent. WE have agreed that we will have a nonviolent home and a safe discipline plan for our babies.

I have shared this story with you not because I need sympathy, For I am on the road to healing.
Not because I think my abusers wanted to hurt me, For I think they were trying to follow the "christian" authors and give me a good life
Nor yet because I am angry and want to punish my mom, I think I am beyond that now.

I wrote this to spread the word that these parenting techniques are bogus. They will hurt your babies for life. Please, spare your children.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

Resources

Here are a few of the internet sites that I have been particularily blessed to find...for your own enjoyment!

1. Forever Families
2. Gentle Christian Mothers
3. Stop the Rod
4. Parenting in Jesus Footsteps

There are more sites, but these are the best, so far. Please, Please read them, but in particular scour the last one, it is by far the most important of the three.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

Handling Stressful Situations

There are times we will be put into stressful situations. Sometimes our children will be present, other times they will not. How do you respond when these things happen? How we react can mean all the difference in how people respond to you.
If you get angry and throw a temper tantrum, you will only put everyone else on the defensive and scare them. Your children will be scared and lose a littl trust in you every time it happens.
You could get emotional and start blubbering all over the place. Your waterworks (whether intended or not) are more likely to cause disrespect and even embarrassment on everyone's part. Your child will worry and not know what to do, and may even try to parent and comfort you.
Some people shut down, some people Put up a wall of immobility.

And yet others are just gifted (or have done their homework) and have the spirit of trainability. They sit or stand, open, eyebrows up just enough, and have the look of total attention. They indicate a willingness to learn more and demonstrate a sense of equality and even, common footing by looking others in the eye and standing tall and straight.

I am not one of those people, but there is hope for you and I. We can work on this thing together. we can beat it. Our children are looking up to us. Our reputations are at stake.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

Gentle Parenting

I have stuggled with the whole Parenting issue. I never had much of what you would call "positive role modeling" and so when it comes to so many things to do with children, I feel at a loss as to what needs to happen. I have read some "Christian" parenting books that ascribe to the thought that your child is manipulative and out to get away with things, and that it's bad, right from the beginning. This makes me slightly ill. I think that children are inherently selfish. They have to be. It is right and good for them to be this way. If they aren't taken care of, they will die. I think that when a parent denies their child the very basic human stuff of life, like food, it can cause some serious issues. I also believe that babies are naturally highly intelligent. A child's brain is 75% developed by the ripe old age of two. So when someone tells me that a baby doesn't know why it's crying, or even where the sound is coming from, I want to shake them. The only thing a baby doesn't know is how to verbalize and communicate other than by crying.

I have found that's it's relatively easy to teach a child not to cry unless something is wrong. You hold them as newborns. You rock them and feed them and you stay with them all the time and answer their every cry. Before they cry, even. Pretty soon, they learn that they can trust you. You're not going to run away and you are going to care for them. soon, they don't cry anymore. they learn nicer noises, grunts and whines and coos that tell you what is going on. I have found this to be true with both of my children, and they have just about opposite personalities.

I think that the way to successful parenting is in the example. If you want to have violent children, you hit them,let others hit them anach them hit back. You don't teach them to control their wild outbursts. If you want loving, kind children who always see the good, you handle them gently but firmly, you don't allow anyone to hurt them, and you teach them (by example) to give of themselves, expecting no reward.

As one nice little sign I have says:

If a child lives with critsism, He learns to condemn
If a child lives with hostility, he learns to fight
If a child lives with ridicule, he learns to be shy
If a child lives with shame, he learns to feel guilty
If a child lives with tolerance, he learns to be patient
If a child lives with encouragement, he learns confidance
If a child lives with praise, he learns to appreciate
If a child lives with fairness, he learns justice
If a child lives with security, he learns to have faith
If a child lives with approval, he learns to like himself
If a child lives with acceptance and freindship, he learns to find love in the world.

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said,
“and I will make you fishers of men.”

A Bit About Me

Hi there! My name is Shara and I am writing a little bog about my parenting. I was born the first child of a young girl, and was soon followed by many more. Between my two parents there are nine children, with my mom having seven of those. My childhood was pretty crazy, and I longed for a "normal" life. Now, however, I am not sorry as much, because I know that God will use my past to carve out a better future.

As of these reacent times, I gave birth to my first child, Rebecca, when I was seventeen. As a foster child myself, immediatly a case was opened on her, as well, although she stayed in my care. I breastfed and practiced attatchment parenting with her for 17 1/2 months, when due to alot of things I still don't really understand, she was removed from my care and taken across the state. Instead of pulling my head out and getting her back, I was thrown into a deep depression and began to use drugs. I convinced myself that she would be in danger with me, due to my own childhood, and when I saw her and she called her foster parents "Mama" and all that, I decided that it would be wrong of me to take her from another family. I signed my rights to her over under the condition that she stay where she was and be adopted by them.

I have now been clean for 13 months and live everyday with the choice I made to let her go. Maybe it is better for her. But I ache. I have also had a little boy. He is now 10 months old, to his sister's 3 1/2. I have found the Lord and now live to correct my life and overcome my hurts, habits, and hangups that could drag me down and give others the wrong idea about Christ.