Use Nurturing Touch – Page 14

Does Attachment Parenting pertain to me?

Editor’s note: This post was originally published on September 15, 2008, and examines how the author has adapted Attachment Parenting International’s Eight Principles of Parenting as her children grew out of the infant/toddler years.

My kids are not babies. They sleep in their own rooms. They don’t breastfeed. If I wore them in a carrier, the sling would rip and my spine would snap. They have homework.

Does Attachment Parenting still pertain to me?

Sometimes it seems as though the API’s Eight Principles of Parenting are geared mainly toward babies and toddlers: have the family bed, use the sling, breastfeed, don’t spank your exploring toddler and it’s all good. But what happens when those babies grow up? Do the principles apply to my family?

Absolutely!

Here is how I apply the API Principles into my own life.

1.) Prepare for Parenting

Since my child-bearing years are behind me, obviously there’s no pregnancy or childbirth to prepare for! But even though my kids are older, l:

Continually educate myself about developmental stages. They’re older, but they’re still growing and changing and have specific developmental needs.
Set realistic expectations for themselves and for me. I don’t want to set my kids up for failure by expecting tasks that they are not developmentally ready to handle!
Research different educational options and find the one that best suits my kids and our family. I closely monitor their schooling experience and advocate for them.
Learn about their individual learning style, using that knowledge to help their educational experience.
Nurture their natural desire to learn by helping them develop their interests. I follow their lead and explore topics they find interesting. I don’t push my own interests on to them, but help them foster their own.

2.) Feed with Love and Respect

My kids have been weaned for quite awhile. How do I continue feeding them with respect? I:

Provide nutritious food that’s easily accessible, and educate my kids on the importance of eating healthy foods.
Am their role model for healthy eating. I don’t have a rule about “grownups can eat this, but kids can’t.” What’s healthy for one is healthy for all. I hold myself to the “5 a day” veggie rule just as the kids are held to it.
Make sure my kids have plenty of opportunities for physical activities. They don’t have to be organized sports or formal lessons: just running around the backyard is great for them, too!
Make dinnertime a formal event at my house. No TV, no books, no toys. We eat at the table, and we talk.

3.) Respond with Sensitivity

All kids — and adults — have emotional needs! How do I respond positively to my children, when they have the words and means to tell me what’s wrong? I:

Nurture a close connection and respect my child’s feelings. I can understand that instances that may have happened while I was not there — in school, for example — can impact their life at home, and is no less important.
Ask my children about their day using specific questions: What was the hardest question on the quiz? What funny thing happened today?
Respect my children when they say they need time alone. I give them time to transition from their school day to home.
Show interest in my child’s activities and participate enthusiastically! I attend all recitals, games and meets.

4.) Use Nurturing Touch

I think this is the one the stays the same all throughout the child’s life! I:

Give frequent hugs, snuggles and back rubs. My husband wrestles and tickles but only when our kids want him to. We use playfulness and games to encourage physical closeness.
Hold my kids on my lap, since I find them way too heavy to carry for any length of time! We also snuggle side by side!

5.) Ensure Safe Sleep, Emotionally and Physically

The kids have their own rooms. They sleep all night, as do I — which is glorious after those baby years! Is nighttime parenting still on the table? Yes it is! I:

Read bedtime stories to my kids and provide extra cuddles.
Have a specific routine for bedtime that never wavers, which helps calm them down for bed.
Have regular and set bedtimes during the school year. I want my kids to be well-rested, so they can learn the next day!

6.) Provide Consistent and Loving Care

Obviously since kids are in school, I can’t be in their lives as constantly as I was before. But I can still be there consistently by:

Being available, which makes kids feel safe, secure and cared for.
Avoid the “latch-key” temptation and find appropriate supervision between the time my children arrive home from school and I am home from the workday.

7.) Practice Positive Discipline

As children age, discipline also changes. Redirection no longer works! So, I:

Stay emotionally connected to my children, which creates trust and love in them for their parents, making them generally easier to discipline. Quite honestly, discipline has never been a problem in our home. Connected children are internally motivated to please their parents most of the time.
Use natural and logical consequences to teach children, which are more effective than punishment, and doesn’t instill fear.
Use active listening.
Do not use mockery, shaming or coercion.
Do not bribe or offer rewards, as I want my children to develop inner self-control.

8.) Strive for Balance in Personal and Family Life

It can be so tempting to sign my kids up for music lessons, sports teams, and playdates, and to send them to every single birthday party to which they are invited. It’s hard to maintain balance with older kids! We:

Don’t overdo extra-curricular activities. I refuse to schedule activities during dinner, and weekend extra-curriculars are very rare. Weekends are family time for us.
Eat dinner together, everyday.
Participate in our own family traditions and discuss them with the kids.
Take the kids out on dates with one parent or the other. A movie or lunch out with just one kid and one parent is a lot of fun and increases bonding.
After the kids are in bed, my husband and I watch movies or talk. Admittedly, my husband and I don’t go out much by ourselves very often. This could probably be improved for us.

As my children have grown and changed, my parenting has grown and changed. Attachment Parenting is different for us now than it was when my first was a baby.

How has it changed for you?

No Quick Fix

By Barbara Nicholson, cofounder of Attachment Parenting International and coauthor of Attached at the Heart

If there was ever a true maxim in parenting, this is one to remember: There is no such thing as a quick fix!

Now, that may sound sad or daunting to parents who want some simple tools to raise their children, but it’s important to step back and look at the big picture when we find ourselves opting for quick fixes. If our goal is to raise healthy, happy, compassionate, loving human beings who are responsible citizens of the community, this could be compared to creating a masterpiece in music, art or even some business endeavor.

Can we expect to create a musical masterpiece by ignoring our need to put hours into practicing our instrument, learning theory and listening to other virtuosos in developing our craft?

Each stage of our parenting journey has equal amounts of relief and new challenges. Just when we rejoice that our toddler is out of diapers, he decides to draw us a picture with permanent markers on the newly painted kitchen wall. Just when our teenager gets his driver’s license and we have him run a few errands, he gets in a fender bender in the parking lot of the grocery store.

The parents who look at the big picture can keep their cool: “Remember, this is a teachable moment. What can we all learn from this?” The quick fix answer would be to simply put the toddler in the corner or ground the teenager from driving, but how will that accomplish our long-term goal of a healthy, responsible human being?

Yes, it takes so much more time to get out the cleaning supplies and ask the toddler to help clean the walls, then set up an art corner in the kitchen with appropriate supplies for painting a picture. It also takes more time to give the teenager more instruction in parallel parking and possible restrictions on his driving until he’s more mature. But what incredible opportunities for connection, understanding and empathy!

Once, when my oldest son was a toddler, we had the experience I just described: He found some markers and joyfully created a beautiful mural all over the walls in the freshly painted main hallway of our house. Being a new mom, I was shocked at how strongly I reacted to this.

I was so angry, yet he was so proud and happy. Seeing my reaction, he dissolved into tears and I lacked the maturity and parenting skills to know what to do! I actually left him crying while I called a friend who had older children and whose parenting skills I admired. She wisely told me to get out the cleaning supplies and have him help me, thus beginning my journey into seeing these episodes as teachable moments.

Parents may fear that this is taking away their power, that if they don’t harshly chastise their children, they will not learn a lesson and will then repeat the behavior. But going back to the musical metaphor, what if you were spanked or yelled at every time you made a mistake playing your instrument? Who can learn anything by this kind of treatment?

However, if our instructor — or parent — can patiently demonstrate the correct way to play the song, or clean the wall, or drive the car, then the lesson is deeply understood, often not repeated, and everyone’s dignity remains intact. How can a quick fix compare to that?

Holding Space for Letdown

“All I want for my birthday is to go away with Daddy.”

It was months before my daughter’s sixth birthday. Although she had been on many vacations, she never traveled with her dad. My happiness at his agreement to take her away shifted into heartbreak when he decided to plan a trip without her. My only solace in his decision was that his trip overlapped with a vacation I was taking her on.

“Are you kidding me?” It was days before our vacation, and I could feel my eyes burn. As it turned out, his trip would begin when we returned home — he was going to miss her birthday.

***

“Am I going to see Daddy when we get home?” Our trip was coming to an end, and it seemed I couldn’t hold out any longer. I sat down to prepare for her reaction and told her the truth.

“It just doesn’t make sense!” Over the next 15 minutes, I could feel a stabbing pain in my chest as her yells slowly became quiet sobs, and she at last settled into my lap. “It just doesn’t make sense. All I wanted for my birthday was to go away with him, and he’s going away without me.” Her voice was practically a whimper.

I pushed back the tiny hairs stuck to her mucus-streaked face. “It doesn’t, my love.” I slowly circled my palm on her back, imagining the bright sun shining on us. “It doesn’t make sense.”

I wiped the tears from my eyes before she could see.

A few days after her birthday, we went for a walk in the neighborhood.

“Does my daddy only think about himself?” she asked, completely unaware of how wise she seemed.

As the pride swelled in my chest, I knew I had to stay calm. I paused, looking up at the sun, letting the warm rays wash over my face. Up until that point, I had assumed it would be years of missed birthdays before she thought his behavior could signify anything other than something fundamentally wrong with her. I felt years of concern slide off my shoulders, confident she was better armed to deal with her father than I ever was.

I considered my options. If I said “yes” I would be disparaging her father — something I was not suppose to do, something I didn’t want to do. But if I said “no,” I would belittle her discovery. I wanted to encourage her to question her father, but I also wanted to honor their relationship and my daughter’s need to navigate it for herself.

“Well,” I said. “I cannot say exactly what goes on in his mind because only he knows for sure.”

I leaned down and look her in the eyes. “But when I look at his actions and the decisions he makes, its the most logical conclusion I can think of.”

“Okay.” She smiled happily and skipped off singing, recovering from the conversation in a way only a 6 year old can.

Time passed, and she was going to her father’s house. Before leaving, she cried to me that she didn’t want to go. I wanted to encourage her to stay. I wanted to keep her from him, but I knew that it wasn’t my place. As her mother, it is not my job to keep her from her father. Its my job to give her what she needs to heal and let go. I told her I would miss her, too.

“Daddy! Daddy!” Her eyes glazed over, and she smiled with joy at their reunion. He greeted her with a loving embrace. She grabbed his hand tight, clinging to the connection she desperately wanted. I followed behind them for a moment, smiling.

Then I said goodbye and began to prepare the space within me that my daughter would need for her next letdown.

Attachment Parenting and School Age Children

Last week the second of my two children, my son, turned 6. I can hardly believe it, to be honest. Six! He’s not a baby anymore, or a toddler, or a preschooler. He’s not even a kindergartner. He’s looking forward to starting first grade in a couple of weeks. His big sister will be starting fourth grade at the same time.

I was just looking back over some of the other posts I’ve written here at APtly Said, which date back to 2009. Over the past five years, my parenting style has shifted as my children have grown. Their needs have changed, so the way I relate to them has also changed. However, one thing that hasn’t changed is my commitment to maintaining a secure attachment. The way I go about it may be a little bit different these days, but the reasons are much the same.

I want my kids to know that I am here for them, no matter what. Because we have created and nurtured a strong bond, they know that I am in their corner, and they always have a safe space to return to after their adventures in the world. Today I have happy, independent, resilient kids. Is it all due to our Attachment Parenting practices? I have no way of knowing for sure, but this parenting approach has worked well for our family. And when my kids bowl me over with their awesomeness, it’s like payback for the time I invested in them when they were younger.

When we think of Attachment Parenting, we often think of practices like cosleeping, breastfeeding and babywearing. With a 9 year old and a 6 year old, I don’t do any of those things. So what does Attachment Parenting look like at this stage? Here’s how I incorporate Attachment Parenting International’s Eight Principles of Parenting into my daily parenting:

Feed with Love and Respect — For my kids, this means offering a variety of healthy foods, and then respecting their choices. Of course we have the occasional treat, but because I know that they generally choose from food that I am comfortable with, I don’t sweat that too much. At this point, my kids are also preparing more of their own snacks, so they are taking even more charge over what they eat, choosing from the foods I offer. They especially love to use the toaster.
Respond with Sensitivity — Today I give my kids more space to work through their own emotions and solve some of their own problems. I let them know that I’m available if they need help or comfort, but I offer a hug rather than just scooping them up. Sometimes when my kids are upset, they don’t want me around and that’s okay. Almost always, they will come to me and share their anger or sadness — or their happiness, for that matter — when they’re ready. When that happens, I do my best to be available and offer them both support and guidance.
Use Nurturing Touch — While I don’t babywear anymore, and I respect my children’s wishes around physical contact, we do spend a lot of time cuddling and playing together. My son likes to play a game he calls “huggy mommy” in which I lavish him with hugs and kisses and he tries to get away, laughing all the while. My daughter periodically comes to me and says she just needs a hug. This physical connection seems to help ground my kids and let them know I’m there.
Ensure Safe Sleep, Physically and Emotionally — There are a number of steps I take to help my kids feel safe and secure at night. My son has a night light and special blanket, and both of my children have favorite stuffed animals. We have bedtime routines with stories and lullabies to help prepare them for sleep. My kids also know that if they need me at night, they can come to me for a snuggle. Sometimes I will tuck them back in their own beds; other times — if they’re really upset by a bad dream, for instance — I’ll bring them into bed with me for a while or for the rest of the night.
Provide Consistent and Loving Care — These days, time away from me is mostly spent at school. This works well for our family. I love our neighborhood school, and my kids enjoy it as well. I realize that school is much more than childcare, but for many working parents it serves that purpose, and it’s pretty fantastic. If the neighborhood school hadn’t been a good fit for my kids, I would have considered alternatives. Many of my friends chose alternative paths within the public school system, or opted for private school or homeschool. I think you’ve got to choose what works for your family, whether it’s daycare or school, so that both parents and kids feel secure in the choice. In my case, I chose the PreK-12 Independent School in Raleigh because I figured it was the right for me and my kids.
Practice Positive Discipline — With school-age children, a lot of our discipline is really problem-solving. I do my best to listen to my children, validate their emotions and meet their needs. Then we work together to come up with positive solutions to problems. When there are issues at school, I make sure I understand exactly what happened from the teacher, and as adults, we craft a basic approach so that my kids are getting consistent messages and they understand what is expected of them. It’s hard to follow the rules if you don’t understand them or the reasoning behind them.
Strive for Balance in Your Personal and Family Life — With school-age children, I have much more free time than I did when I had babies and toddlers. While my kids still require adult supervision, they can be trusted to take care of their own basic needs and I even give them a bit of freedom to play at the park across from our house. Also, the time spent in school is time I can use for other tasks outside of parenting. This freedom has allowed me to do things like go back to school myself.

How do you practice Attachment Parenting with your school age children?

Cloth

As I carefully held you, my little parcel, I remember wishing the cloth away, wishing that there was nothing between us. You see, we had been linked your whole life. I had felt every hiccup and every stretch.

As soon as I had the strength to sit up, I threaded you gently in between the lines attached to my IV sites and pressed you against my chest. But the clean crisp cloth felt like thick cold walls between us.

As the weeks went on, I wrapped you in cloths of many different colours and custom ties. You were fashionable, cute and cuddly. You were pink, blue and green. Yet amid the colours and patterns, I saw only your eyes, the soft sweep of your brow and the curl of first smiles.

Then we found stretchy cloth and it seemed never-ending. It took a hundred times of wrapping and unwrapping, tightening and loosening, before one day, I caught a glimpse of us in the mirror and realised that I hadn’t even noticed completing our cloth origami. And that is where you stayed. Snuggled into me and listening to my pulse, just as you had from your very first heartbeat.

In time, I could wrap you against me with my eyes closed…with both of our eyes closed.

We would face the winter like this, snuggled together, cosy and warm.

We would breeze through outings, walks and errands in exactly this position. You, me and our cloth.

As you grew, the stretch seemed to shrink and new cotton was bought. This cloth was bright and strong…more supportive for a sleepy head to rest in. This was the first cloth that you asked for, that you spoke about and that you wrapped around your teddies.

What was once a barrier, cold and unknown, has become a link between us. It is handlebars for our journey, a shawl for warmth. It is easy. It is fun. It joins us as one, even though we are now separate, little one.

When you were born, they wrapped you in cloth, but you’ll be wrapped in my love forever.

Staying attached with more than one

As my husband and I prepare for the arrival of our second child (a boy!) this summer, I find myself thinking about how different it will be compared to when our daughter was born.

With my daughter, we came across Attachment Parenting (AP) as we started exploring different ideas around giving birth and caring for newborns. Many of the AP practices were things we already planned on doing — such as natural birth and extended breastfeeding — and others evolved naturally once we became parents, including cosleeping, babywearing and gentle discipline. This time around, we plan on doing things similarly albeit with much more confidence in our decisions after seeing how well it worked last time.

However, I can’t help but wonder how it will work with more than one.

I think it’s extremely important for the initial bonding that we are physically attached to the baby. This part, I’m not worried about. I practically lived in my wrap with my daughter and don’t expect this time to be any different. I am also a stay-at-home mom, which gives me the freedom to feed on demand and hold off on any set schedule.

The part that I worry about is staying attached with my daughter. I think it’s equally important that our daughter not feel slighted by this new little addition. I want her to continue to feel attached to both mommy and daddy. She will have had almost 2 ½ years of undivided attention and will now be sharing the spotlight, so to speak. We have been prepping her for his arrival for a while now and she seems genuinely excited about being a big sister. She can rattle off a list of things she will be in charge of as the big sister – getting diapers and wipes, singing to him, helping with bath.

What I don’t think she is prepared for is sharing my time. She has always been a pretty independent kid but I wonder if that will change when she is not the only one anymore. How will she react to me breastfeeding the baby all the time? If I’m wearing the baby, will she want to be carried?

I know these concerns are not limited to AP parents, I imagine every parent has similar thoughts before welcoming another child into the family. My hope is that AP gives my husband and I the guidance needed to foster a connected and close family, no matter how large it grows.

There’s a Pause Button, Just in Case

“It’s green. Really green,” said my midwife just after my water broke. The amniotic fluid was meconium-stained, and my mind went to the worst.

“So he’ll end up with some in his lungs?” I asked.

She threw out a percentage of babies who aspirate meconium, and I don’t recall the exact figure, but it was in the 20s. And she said of those, not all babies have problems from meconium aspiration.

That was enough to keep me from worrying. After all, I had work to do.

My midwife told me that she would have the neonatal team at the ready, just in case. Of course, I wasn’t focusing on much of anything at that point, except getting the baby earthside.

When my sweet boy was born, there was no cry. Nobody in the room smiled. Instead, there was a mix of hesitation and silent commotion. Everyone faced the warming table, where the neonatal team was hard at work trying to stabilize him.

The nurse came over to tell me that I could hold him briefly, but that he would need to go to the NICU right away. When she handed him to me, I held him for just a moment, gave him a kiss and willingly handed him back. He was struggling, and I didn’t want to waste another second. I wanted him to go wherever he needed to go to get better.

We later found out that my baby had a collapsed lung and had to stay in the isolette under oxygen therapy. I couldn’t hold him for three days and I couldn’t nurse him for four.

I worried that the separation would tamper with our biological bonding mechanisms. I wondered whether he felt secure and comforted. I wondered how this would affect my hormones and my milk supply. I worried that he felt abandoned.

I wondered if it hurt to have a hole in your lung.

For my baby’s first few days, I would sit near his isolette, occasionally reaching in to trace his little fingers with mine.

On the third day, the nurse told me that the doctor thought that kangaroo care (holding the baby skin-to-skin) would help him make some strides toward recovery. I tried hard to keep it cool, but I failed hard – I burst into tears right then and there. I had waited so long to hold my baby boy.

When the nurse handed him to me for the first time, I felt that rush of love you hear about – that same surge of emotion that I felt right after the birth of my first two babies when the nurses handed them to me.

All this time, I thought I had missed my window. But it was there, waiting for our little reunion.

There was no doubt that that feeling was our bonding hormones at work. I knew because it was familiar. I had felt that before with my first two babies and it is an indescribable feeling that cannot be replicated. As for more concrete evidence that the hormones were in working order, I had been pumping 0.2 or 0.3 mL of colostrum at a time (drops!) and after I held my boy I filled a full 3 mL.

The next day, the doctor suggested I try to nurse him. I expected a learning curve, as he had gone days without learning to breastfeed instead of initiating within minutes of birth. But I was wrong. The little champ latched like a pro right away.

My sweet boy is now off of the growth charts, strong as a bull and he’s the happiest and most loving baby I have ever seen. All you have to do is make eye contact with him and he’ll give you a big cheeky toothless smile that just puts you deeper under his spell. And I have every reason to believe that we have established a secure attachment that we will build upon for a lifetime.

I hope I’m not diminishing the importance of bonding immediately after birth. Mother and baby are primed for bonding during this time and should make the most of those short minutes and hours if they can. Just know that if you have to wait a few hours or days to begin getting to know each other, it will be okay.

The Hard Heart of Parenting

My body tenses. Teeth clench. Heart hardens.

I don’t hurt him. I don’t yell. Yet, my heart hardens with frustration.

My agenda to clothe my two-year-old collides with his interest in remaining naked. He wants to play with his trucks on the bedroom floor; I have a morning adventure planned. After several attempts to wrestle him into some clothes, he runs out of the room crying “No!”

My son says “Stop!” and “No!” frequently these days. He even asserts his will while mimicking favored construction trucks.

“Beep, beep, beep!” he says. Usually he does this while putting his hands on my legs and pushing me backward.

This morning I miss his “Beep, beep, beep!” which always makes me smile. I imagine it would translate to something like: “Back up Mom. Give me some space. Who needs clothes? Can’t you see I’m really enjoying this moment of being naked? I have no interest in your morning agenda. Let’s play trucks!”

This morning, instead of construction sounds, he shouts and cries. I feel my body tense. I feel my frustration. I remember to breathe. I remember my intention to soften into empathy.

I walk into the front room where my little naked boy cries in anger. My heart’s hardness melts as soon as I kneel down to connect at eye level. His face is blotchy, his eyes red, his nose runny. He is bawling. He is angry. Yet, I stay present. I sit on the floor.

“You are mad at mommy right now. That’s OK. I love you. I’ll be here when you want a hug.”

He yells again and runs into the kitchen.

“Take a deep breath,” I tell myself as tears filled my eyes.

Grief resides in the dark waters of the hardened heart. As I make room for my sadness, a gentle space of compassion opens. This space is wide enough to include all of the feelings swirling around, and through, both of us.

I sit on the floor and patiently remain present for him. I watch strong emotions move through his two-year-old self.

Yes, he will feel angry. He will feel sad. This is part of life’s flow. How do I respond to the energy of his anger and sadness? Will I try to make him laugh and distract him? Will I respond with my own anger? Do I take it personally? Can I breathe and gently hold space for his pain?

I can choose to soften around these hard edges. I can choose to breathe in gentleness. In this choice, I feel the freedom that comes from releasing the patterns of generations.

For certainly, the hard heart is passed on, inherited. Years before I decided to become a mother, I was committed to transform the negative aspects of my childhood. It took a great deal of therapy, meditation, dance, yoga, and travel to soften the scared and angry parts of my heart. Motherhood takes this process to entirely new levels. May I be grateful for this extraordinary opportunity to put into practice all that I’ve worked hard to uncover about the truth of love.

A minute or two pass. My son comes back to me. He reaches for me. I hold him. I feel the tension within — and between — both of us release. He looks at me and I wipe tears from his face.

“Outside?” He points to the door. Can we go outside?

I smile. “Yes, we can go outside. Let’s get dressed and go for a walk.” He nods and hugs me again.

I release my morning agenda as he welcomes my help in getting dressed. I take a deep breath. A few minutes later, we walk hand in hand into the sunlight.