Attachment Parenting--The Start of It All

Attachment Parenting--The Start of it All
Keeping It Home, Part One
by Stefani Leto
It's dinner time. You can go to the cupboard and grab the box of instant-just-add-tuna and slap it on the table. Or, you can take the time to prepare a thoughtful meal. Parenting choices can be like food choices. Anyone can stay home with children and take care of them. Deciding to raise your children following the principles of attachment parenting elevates child rearing to an art.
What is attachment parenting? Merely a new buzzword, found selling books for and against? Or is it a way to make being a homemaker more rewarding by putting the focus on the unique gifts an attached parent gives?

Listening to your baby
Breastfeeding is an important part of attachment parenting Attachment parenting, a description popularized by Dr. William Sears and Martha Sears in The Baby Book, generally encompasses a parenting style that emphasizes listening to the cues given by babies and children. Based on bonding and attachment research, it is often called "natural parenting" or something similar.
Since babies are not verbal, watching their cues is paramount. Many attachment parents think that loving arms, not plastic "baby buckets" are the natural resting spots for babies. Other practices that maximize body contact with babies are often used. These include exclusive breastfeeding, "wearing" a baby in a sling or other body carrier, and co-sleeping. Most people who practice attachment parenting don't leave their babies with babyminders for a couple of years, figuring that babies belong with their parents.

Older children benefit from many of the same practices: sharing a bed with their parents, being held frequently, nursing until they're ready to wean. The practice gained from really paying attention to a baby's needs benefits parents of older children. Having to decide if a child is speaking from need or want, they draw on years of trust and expertise.

You are the "expert" when it comes to your child
Over the past hundred years or so, advice to parents has been gleefully handed out by "experts" of every stripe. While modern parents laugh at old-fashioned sounding phrases like "limit yourself to one kiss on the forehead nightly," the real joke may be on them. Books touting simple "child-training" methods simply fly off store shelves. Weary parents eagerly embrace notions of getting a six month old infant to sleep through the night, no matter how barbaric the method. Information abounds on how to enhance your child's independence. Why is it that advice such as "trust yourself" seems to fall on deaf ears, while rigid methods seem like the easy way?

Part of it may be that few parents today were raised by parents who followed a more instinctual way. Without a group of parents around to observe, people generally parent as they were parented. So, if you're looking for a way to navigate your family through that's not a carbon copy of your childhood, you're going to have to rethink some practices which may be hard to abandon.
Sometimes I'll hear a phrase come out of my mouth and think, "Where is my father?" Surely I couldn't have said that! Like it or not, my first impulse isn't always my best. Without some conscious effort on my part, I wouldn't have been able to think out of the box I was raised in, and neither can you.

Sacrifice? Nope, laziness!
Sleeping with your baby can be easier! But you've decided to rear your children to the best of your ability. You may have made this decision in a spirit of sacrifice, laying your own head on the altar of giving it all up for kids. But attachment parenting practitioners will tell you rather gleefully, that attachment parenting is, at least with babies, the lazy way out. Really.
Nature has designed us so that meeting a baby's needs meets a parent's needs too. Take sleeping. As the queen of exhausted new moms, I grabbed every chance for a rest I could. Sleep would have been enough of a reason to bring my daughter into bed with us. All the rest--protection from SIDS, greater bonding time, successful nursing--was bonus.
Everything about children's eating was easier, too. I had come into adulthood watching friends of mine carefully spoon-feeding their children, bemoaning the mess and extra time it took. Sometimes I think it's a wonder I had a child at all. When my daughter started wanting to eat food, well into her first year, it was different. I found out that I didn't have to do the same thing I watched my friends do. Since I'd nursed exclusively until she was ready for real food, we just had to make a place for her at the family table. She did the rest, and it wasn't as messy as the aftermath of strained peaches on a spoon.

Another boon to parents from practicing attachment parenting is that it works for "easy" and "hard" babies. Babies who are held most of the time spend less time fussing and crying. If you've got a fussy baby by nature, he or she would be even more fussy without your constant, loving arms. If a baby isn't spending time wailing, waiting for needs like holding and feeding to be met, more time is spent learning, growing, and becoming a secure member of your family.

The best way to raise an independent child
Interpersonal security seems to be on the most-wanted list for people today. Well, take heart. If you keep your child nearby for the first couple of years, research suggests that in four or five, you'll be looking around wondering where they are. Independence grows out of that sense of security. So when people ask you, "Isn't your child sleeping alone yet?" you can smile and think about the coming years when you'll reap the benefits of the good start you gave them.

Making a conscious decision to pursue a kind of parenting that is different from the norm can be scary. Talk to supportive people, read books and email groups that espouse attachment parenting, and take heart. When you turn your heart and mind toward keeping home a priority, new opportunities for joy and growth surely follow.

Contributing Editor Stefani Leto writes and parents in the Bay Area. Mother of an almost-five year old and an infant, she says nothing challenges her mind like parenting. Her work also appears at http://www.windowbox.com and http://www.folksonline.com/folks/ts/1998/pph.html.

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Homeschooling for the Whole Family

Keeping It Home, Part Two
by Stefani Leto
Monday: Family
It's happening more and more around my house these days. The kindly lady at the furniture store asks my daughter how old she is. "I'll be four in two days," she answers. "Oh, well, then you'll be going to kindergarten soon. Won't that be fun?" Random adults engage in advertising for the public school system. Everyone assumes that she can't wait to get out there in the "real world." Usually, my daughter doesn't answer. Sometimes she'll shake her head. It doesn't sound fun to her, and quite frankly, it doesn't sound fun to me.
So what will Sarafina be doing when she's five? She'll probably be doing many of the same things she's doing now: learning about what interests her with our assistance; exploring the world around her at her pace and from her unique perspective; and not thinking of knowledge as discrete bits of disconnected information. By choosing to homeschool, we think that she'll keep the joyous spirit she brings to learning for the rest of her life.

Children experimenting
Pure interest fuels study. Without grades, without tests, your children can learn amazing amounts of information.
The perfect class size
But why should simply not sending her to school have all these positive results? Well, we've got a great learner to resource person ratio. Small class sizes are often seen as a good thing in schools and we've got that. Also, since I don't have to attend to the different learning needs of up to thirty other children, I can respond quickly to her cues. I don't believe in curriculae, as all of human knowledge seems interrelated to me.
If Sarafina wants to study dragonflies, to take a recent example, she will also learn about pond ecology, predator/prey relationships, and biological life cycles. Ballet leads to music which is inseparable from mathematics, and so on. If I were to say, "That's enough thinking about why Pooh Bear lives under the name of Sanders, we have to count objects now," it would seem like a crazy way to talk to a child. Yet life is artificially broken up into "subjects" during a school day.

You probably know from your own experience that what you want to learn comes easily. I don't remember much of any history class I took in school, but I can discuss King George III of England in detail. Pure interest fueled that study. Without grades, without tests, your children can learn amazing amounts of information.
Alfie Kohn inventories the perils of the carrot and stick method of teaching in Punished by Rewards. Any parent whose school district uses pizza coupons or gold stars might want to give it a look. Most children begin school eager to find out about the world. In a few short years, those same children sigh with boredom while sitting in rows at their desks. Something about schooling makes the change.

I firmly believe, as though it's an article of faith, that my child will find her way through all of human wisdom and discover that which resonates for her. She's already got many of the basics, with reading and simple computation on their way. No one can learn all there is to know, and I defy anyone to make a watertight case that some corners of information are inherently more important than others.
Free rein in the world's riches is among the greatest gifts you can give a child. Young people will discover meaning and richness without being told what to learn or how to learn it. It's simply faith that they will which helps create that protected space so they don't have to lose their love of learning. Perhaps insisting that students become well-rounded, with a helping of each branch of learning, that leads to such alienation. Instead, how about encouraging passionate pursuit of interests? There is no human endeavor which exists in a vacuum. A learner can not only learn about one thing. No matter what the idea, it is linked to all others.

[countingapples graphic]
With you to answer questions, point to resource for things you don't know, and listen with attention and love to your child's discoveries, you're doing what no school in the world can.
The "S" word
The most typical response to our family's plans is "But what about socialization?" When I'm in a good mood, I calmly tell people that there is only one other system in our country where people are rigidly grouped by age and set under a single authority figure. That's the military. It's not a model I want to follow for my children. If I'm in a crabby mood, they'll get some version of "Tell me what you think she'll miss out on: peer pressure or violence? I'll make sure she gets some of each, thanks."

But seriously, to consider a person socialized in our world means one of two things. Either we mean that they know how to play the games modern life requires. They can stand in line at the bank, they can take turns at the gas pump. Or else it means that they can get along in social situations. Generally, if someone talks easily to all ages and stations of people and can conduct themselves in different social situations, we consider them well socialized.
I fail to see how classrooms promote good social interaction. Most talk is between teacher and student, not between peers. In addition, the peer interaction taking place is often highly negative. Competition, sorting out a pecking order, bullying -- who among us doesn't remember this from school? It doesn't take thirteen years of sitting in rows to realize that when you check out at a store, you wait your turn. It doesn't take repeated insistence that there is only one right answer and talking out of turn is punishable to make someone a contributing member of society.

Rather, a loving family is a model socialization laboratory. Parents teach respectful listening by practicing it. With adult help, children learn about conflict resolution. Younger siblings or friends help bring life to the idea that making way for the weaker is a part of being human. No one has to hear taunts about their looks or family status. And, if mean words are hurled, a loving adult helps the combatants make sense of the feelings that prompted them and that result from them. You don't get this kind of socialization anywhere else.

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger--OK, but in grade school?
We have a friend who admitted that school was hellish for him. But he claimed that it was going through all that pain that made him the strong individual he is today. Perhaps this is true.
Why draw the line at school, though? Why not seek out difficult and possibly harmful situations and put our kids in them? Surely they'd be even stronger for it. Except that people don't work that way. Secure, happy children have the inner strength which comes from being loved.
I grow vegetable seedlings indoors. They don't go from sitting under lights into cold weather in the garden all at once. They gain strength from gradual acclimatization. In the same way, children gather strength from loving families. When they are ready, the nastiness of the world won't be so devastating for them.

The other funny thing about socialization is that we don't stay home. Possibly because many people homeschool for religious reasons, it's assumed that we huddle around our table, hidden away from sinful influences. Rather, my child at four interacts more in her community than many adults. Because our schedule is our own, we can volunteer at the local food co-op. Within the limitations of her age, she does actual work. Picking out bruised produce may not change the world, but she's getting a taste of what grown-ups do. We also give some time at the local library. When she's old enough to do these things on her own, the habit will already be there. I honestly think it doesn't occur to her that she's supposed to only play with children her age. She's interested in people, from infants to my ninety-two year old grandmother.

To unschool, or follow child-directed interests is not to set a young, inexperienced person adrift with no guidance. But if you want to strengthen family ties, if you choose to make a home by not working outside of the home, consider offering your child the chance to learn at home. With you to answer questions, point to resource for things you don't know, and listen with attention and love to your child's discoveries, you're doing what no school in the world can.

Contributing Editor Stefani Leto writes and parents in the Bay Area. Mother of an almost-five year old and an infant, she says nothing challenges her mind like parenting. Her work also appears at http://www.windowbox.com and http://www.folksonline.com/folks/ts/1998/pph.html.

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Home-Based Businesses

Home-Based Businesses
Keeping It Home, Part Three
by Stefani Leto

When people say "It takes a village" to raise children, they forget to add that the villagers all worked where they lived.
Sometimes, I just gotta laugh when I hear folks debate the effects of parents working outside the home. It's not that the debate isn't serious, or that the stakes aren't high, it's just that the terms seem all wrong.

In the scope of human history, neither parent regularly left the family. Even in hunter-gatherer societies, men went off on hunts which lasted a few days, intermittently. Mostly, mom and dad hung around, doing their thing. The kids did kid stuff, within easy distance of the parents. When people say "It takes a village" to raise children, they forget to add that the village all worked where they lived.

So yes, it is a new thing to have children raised by only two adults (the "village" argument). It's also new to have one or both of those adults out of the home earning a living. Children don't run in a village group. They're either at home with one parent for the bulk of their days, or in a group setting, cared for by paid workers.

But historical perspectives don't help much if you're one of those people either working outside the home or keeping home while the only other adult in your household goes off to work in the salt mines. What might help is a clear articulation that this isn't an optimal situation for children or adults. Chopping our lives up into "work" and "not-work" imposes a structure made for industry, not families.

The ideal and the (current) reality
Ideally, we'd all move seamlessly from paid and unpaid work. We'd have things to do which filled our needs for creativity, use to others, and economic survival, without conflict between them. Most of us don't live that way now. Not every person staying home rearing a family wants or needs paid work. For those who want both to work at something and be there for their families, the times are against them.

Making a stand that making a home matters as much as paid work starts the process of change. For many women and men, working and being intimately involved with their family would be the best approach.
A truly family-friendly society, where people found a mixture of in and out of the house work which suited them, isn't an easy goal. But we can start making these changes in little ways, simply by how we live and how we think about the issues surrounding work and family.


Declaring that making a home matters as much as paid work starts the process of change
Families would have to start thinking in such a way that it makes sense for parents to both work and parent. For some, that means both partners having part-time work. For others, it means restructuring their out of home work to include some time at home. The rise of flex-time work and job sharing (although still in a minor number of jobs) indicates that this kind of thinking is getting more popular.
Businesses would also have to make some conceptual changes. How many employees must physically be at their job site? Those who interact face to face with customers or clients must, as well as those who physically create or alter things. Others don't. Or at least they don't have to be there all the time.

For employees who think that they can perform their work duties as well from home as from the cubicle, it's important to focus on the benefits of this move. What will the employer gain from "letting you go"? A family's increased happiness is nice, but unless it impacts the bottom line, most companies will only give that lip service.

Cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit
Other friends have found a way to work at home by taking talents they used to use outside and making them pay on their own. This is not a pitch for any of those "Make thousands stuffing envelopes" businesses. Overwhelmingly, they're scams. No, what I'm talking about is the kind of entrepreneurial spirit which sees a gap and fills it. From helping people with their dissertation research to renting breast pumps, if it can be done, someone will pay for it.

Unfortunately, self-employed people pay more than those in other's employ. Taxes and social security all favor employees. So if you're going to go this route, and plan to make enough to matter, get as much sound financial advice as you can.

Revolutionary social choices don't come easily. Since the financial health of your family should be a high priority, I'd be remiss to encourage people to "drop out" and reject work which takes them away from their families. Rather, what I'd like to promote is a rethinking of our job/family dichotomy. The way this dichotomy resolves for each family will differ.

If you want or need to work while you're at home, the standard advice is to evaluate the talents and experience you have and find some work which draws on those. This is great if you were a medical transcriptionist or computer programmer before beginning a family and deciding to stay at home with children. If your talents are more diffuse, more digging is in order. Sometimes, talking to friends in the same situation promotes creative thinking.

Some of the things I've seen adults do to work at home include computer programming; web page design; garden layout consulting; freelance writing, editing, and copyediting; and providing in-home care for children of adults who work. Sometimes this work requires making some arrangements for childcare, often having someone come into the home or choosing to work when the children are asleep or the other adult looks after them.

Whatever route you and perhaps your partner choose to explore, rest assured that having adults around working benefits children in many ways. Not only can they have their needs for parental attention met, but they get to see adult work up close. I'm in the camp that believes children are curious about adult lives and work, and want to find their own places in the world. By working out of the home, parents can give their children the best of both worlds.

Contributing Editor Stefani Leto writes and parents in the Bay Area. Mother of an almost-five year old and an infant, she says nothing challenges her mind like parenting. Her work also appears at http://www.windowbox.com and http://www.folksonline.com/folks/ts/1998/pph.html.

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