Teaching

First, Time published the photo for their cover and every forum, blog, and talk show blew up with criticism of long term breastfeeding and the counter arguments.  Now that the actual article has been released attachment parenting is receiving the same treatment.  I read yesterday one man's gem Babies are Assholes, lovely no?

So I started thinking, removing the awful language, does this man have a point?  Am I raising namby pamby kids who will be welfare dependant adults because they just cant function?

This argument seems to center around what and when we teach our children.

Sleep.  When we are born we know how to sleep.  Its one of the first things we do.  I have never made any effort to teach my child to sleep and yet they all do.  And after babyhood they all do it in their own bed and all night.  So when people say "you have to teach that baby to sleep" OR "that baby will never sleep"  what they really mean is "if you don't take action soon to make that infant conform to your schedule it will be much more difficult later".  If you have to be up at 4am for work or if you have real sleep issues yourself, or if you simply honestly believe that letting a child go with their natural schedule is allowing them some powerful and manipulative position in your family structure, fine.  My family is not your family and I am not telling you what to do.  But please be more honest in your wording, no one needs to learn to sleep, and two years old is not synonymous with never.

Eat.  I didn't really have to teach my children to eat.  I simply offered them breast milk then when they showed signs of readiness food.  It may have taken lots of messes but they all know how to eat now.  I did not write down the the exact ounces and times they ate unless we had an allergy suspect.  It isn't really a skill we are born knowing, but its the kind of thing that takes practice not lessons.

There are jerks in the world.  Do I really need to teach my children that there are mean and awful people out there that will make fun of them, disappoint them, promise them something and then break that promise, not be around when you need them?  I believe my children will learn that sooner than I wish no matter how I try to protect them.  For now I will concentrate on teaching my children that I am not one of those people, they can count on me.

They wont get everything they want.  This one is a bit more complicated.  I do think I need to teach this one, when is what I disagree about. When my child reaches an age where what she wants is ten hours of Dora, french fries every time she sees a yellow M, her friends' and siblings' toys, and to stay up all night, then yes I will teach this lesson.  But while what she wants is food, drink, sleep, comfort, and occasionally pain relief then yeah she can have everything she wants.

They are the most important person to me.  Well they are the most important thing to me and no my TV show, my adult conversation, my ability to go out for cocktails are not more important.  They grow up so unbelievably quickly, I do not consider myself a martyr if I put some of me on hold while they are babies.  They believe they are intelligent enough to comprehend that they are most important to me but not most important in the world.  They must share their place in the family with their siblings, they will learn to share their place in the world with their peers.

What about actual skills?  If everyone is so worried about how productive they will be as adults why don't we worry about what we teach them a few years later?  Instead of worrying about where a six month old sleeps lets worry about who a sixteen year old sleeps with.  Are we teaching that there are consequences to their actions?  Do they know how to balance a checkbook?  Have you taught your seventeen year old the many many ways the credit system can ruin their next thirty years if they get a credit card now? Have you discussed with your twelve year old the difference between believing everything they see on TV/hear in a classroom vs analyzing what they are taught, researching and deciding for themselves?  Will your fifteen year old vote for the prettiest presidential candidate?  Do they have any idea how our political system even works?

Does anyone really believe how long you breastfed is what is causing someone to be lost in the adult world? Or do we just not want to talk about how we (society wide) are dropping them at the door of the school at age five and hoping they just figure it out from there.