I Have Something To Say To Parenting Critics

Today, I am feeling vindicated. It's been a long time coming and a tough road to get here.

This is a post for the parenting critics, the family and friends, neighbors and acquaintances, who judged and disapproved, either publicly or silently. It's for everyone who looked at me and my children when we were in the trenches of raising and growing, and scowled or gossiped or criticized. It's for people who made snide comments or called my children names. For everyone who thought I was ruining my children.

Raising kids is hard. It is inherently difficult to just get through the long days, keeping everyone alive and fed and the house standing. It wears on the body through exhaustion and the mind through constant stress. There is already a high level of self-doubt that goes hand-in-hand with being a mother. No one wants to raise a serial killer or a lazy freeloader or someone who orders a well-done filet mignon at a nice restaurant. Because the stakes are so high and we love our children so much, it's easy to freak out and overstress. It's a miracle if we get to the end of this parenting gig without an ulcer. I'm losing my hair.

There are already enough "parenting experts" out there to offer advice and judgement for everything a parent does in raising their children, but when I chose the road less traveled, to veer from the mass-American parenting herd, to do my own research and think for myself, the critics came out of the woodwork like swarms of bugs.

So this post is for whoever called the Department of Social Services after my son's home birth with accusations of neglect and endangerment.

It is for the family members who openly criticized my nursing toddlers and my decision to let my young children take the lead in the weaning process. For everyone who thought I was making my children too dependant, who believed they would never be able to function without Mama.

For the critics who thought that sharing sleep with my school-aged children would make them sissies, who thought my children would never learn to be independent.

It is for the people who questioned our decision to homeschool, thinking we couldn't challenge them intellectually and that they wouldn't gain the social skills they would need to function in the real world. It is for my children's "friends" who told them repeatedly that homeschool kids weren't as smart as kids who went to "real" school.

It is for the neighborhood ladies who fussed about my barefooted children running up and down the street, waving sticks and being loud. For the ones who thought it better if children were kept indoors and made to walk in orderly lines, rather than allowed to roam free and play outside.

It's for the family friend at Thanksgiving dinner who suggested I beat my child because he was "being mean" to hers.

This is for everyone who viewed us in the midst of the process and jumped to conclusions about how my children would turn out.

You were wrong.

I know that you saw a  whining toddler, tired and frustrated, who was comforted only by nursing. It was easy for you to think he should be less dependant. It was easy to blame the unusual practice of child-led weaning on his apparent over-attachment to his mother.

I know that you saw an eight year-old child who couldn't fall asleep without his mother's presence and you thought I was babying him, stunting his emotional development. It was unusual to see young children, at least in our country, who aren't forced to bed in dark rooms by themselves each night, forbidden to enter the comforting presence of their parents after 9 PM.

I know that you saw my children struggling with reading and multiplication tables. You saw me slowly move at their pace and you wondered why I didn't push them more, wondered how they would ever keep up with their peers.

I know that you saw my children running free and making noise and being wild and you wondered why I didn't tame them. You wondered how they would ever learn manners or civility.

But you see, I wasn't looking at my children as they were in the moment. Because I wasn't raising children. I was raising people. I was raising adults. How they needed to be in the moment at age two or eight or eleven didn't matter all that much to me. I was making decisions in my parenting approach that I believed with deep conviction would help produce mature, emotionally healthy, well-rounded, intelligent men and women.

And here we are. Just look at them.

My oldest just turned twenty. He's a well-informed freethinker and a registered voter. He's a second degree blackbelt in karate. He's held down a steady job since he turned seventeen. He pays his own bills, owns his own vehicle, and has a generous chunk of money saved. He has joined the US Army (which has been a goal of his forever) and leaves for basic training in under three weeks. He is thoughtful, confident, independent, intelligent, and polite. He isn't who you thought he would be at all.

His sister is 17. While she isn't quite considered an adult by Society's standards, she is definitely not awkward or stunted. After being homeschooled until 9th grade, she is now top of her class at an alternative early college program where she completely and independently keeps up with her own schedule. She has an active social life and a large group of friends. She has a job and pays her own bills. And she recently participated in a scholarship competition which included an individual interview by a panel of judges, speaking on stage to a crowded auditorium, a talent performance, and a scholastic overview. She won! Not bad for an awkward sissy homeschooler, huh?

And I have two more fabulous children coming behind them. Just wait to see what they accomplish. Just wait to see the people they are becoming. I assure you it isn't awkward, or unmotivated, or shy, or dependent.

So listen up, anyone who ever thought I was ruining my children. Listen up, everyone who said mean things or thought mean thoughts about the way I was raising them. I have something very important to tell you.

In.

Your.

Face!

Remembering The Family Bed

I'm a featherweight when it comes to sleeping.  The tiniest of noises will wake me from the deepest slumber.  Noisy neighbors, passing cars, ants breathing...all interrupt my sleep cycle.  I sleep with a fan blowing even in the coldest months just in hopes that the white noise will help muffle the sighs of this hundred year-old house...it works occasionally.

I blame it on my children.  Years of sleeping with one ear open, listening for the early rustlings of a hungry baby in an attempt to preempt the full wake of a squalling hungry child...to feed them or comfort them before they even realized they needed something.  Because with four small children, one awake child, meant four awake children.

Flashback to our family bed.

To lessen the mommy response time, we adopted a family bed.  Keeping squirming children at close easily-accessible range definitely has it's bonuses, not the least of which is more sleep for everybody.  But it also has it's disadvantages.  Acrobatically sleeping children who put their knees and elbows and chins and toes in awkward and uncomfortable places being the easiest to imagine.

The criticism of family and friends however was far more annoying than the frequent 2 AM kick to the kidneys.  Grandparents and aunts and family friends were all certain we were creating sissy dependent maladjusted human beings who would probably leech off of the government and their parents for all of eternity...and they would never get married or have any other meaningful social interactions without the supervision of their overly-protective mommy. In fact, they would probably never leave their parents' bed if they weren't forced out and completely and strictly prohibited amid traumatic tears and desperate pleas for mercy.

Here we are, many years later.  I haven't had even a random visit from a nightmare stricken child in several years.  All four children sleep each night in their own beds.  They chose, mostly on their own, but with some loving encouragement from their "overly-protective mommy", to leave the family bed in search of their own independence.  Sometimes the younger children transitioned to a sibling bed before actually seeking their own, but across the board we accomplished independent sleep without traumatic tears or whimpers of fear and isolation.

I remember telling the more vocal critics of our family bed that I was certain that when they turned eighteen they wouldn't still be sleeping with their parents.  Of course, I was right.  And it didn't even take them that long.

As for leeching off the government, etc.... I suppose it's yet to be seen.  But the oldest just turned eighteen (and is ready to graduate from high school) and he manages to pay his own cell phone bill every month.  The youngest manages over-night girly sleepovers with no apprehension or midnight phone calls home.  The fifteen year-old has a boyfriend and otherwise budding social life.  And the younger boy is confident in his own right and will most likely be testing for his junior black belt in karate sometime this year.  They are pretty confident and independent kids, in spite of having spent their early years sleeping with their parents and having their night time needs immediately met.

And while I sleep much better since they all left my bed, I do sometimes miss them.  Just last night I woke due to some chirping cricket or buzzing mosquito and felt very lonely.  I found myself fondly remembering their quiet breathing and sleeping snuggles.  I wanted desperately to hold a tiny toddler hand and stroke wispy baby hair.  I even (almost) missed the random toes in my kidneys.

Perhaps I was being a little reminiscent because I had recently heard a young mother lament her toddler's constant need for attention, especially at night.  She spoke of how her daughter clung to her neck at bedtime and how she was constantly followed, how she couldn't get anything done without her little one wrapped around her legs.  She had plans for preschool and dance class and swimming and karate to help foster a spirit of independence in her daughter.

But small children aren't supposed to be independent.  We as humans are wired for survival to depend on our mothers for protection until we are able to take care of ourselves.  If we lived in a more primitive world, toddlers who wandered off independently from their mothers would end up eaten by saber-toothed tigers.  Babies left to sleep alone at night, would fall prey to all sorts of monstrous predators.  We are not so removed from our ancestors biologically.  It has not been enough generations for our biological needs to change.  Our infants and toddlers do not realize that they live in a world of indoor climate control and high tech security systems.  Their biology is still wired for the saber-toothed tiger stalking the jungle.  They want and need their mothers to feel safe and secure.

I remember the clingy needy stage all too well.  It is hard... hard beyond belief.  Children are incredibly exhausting and draining and wearing with their constant need for love and attention...   I feel your pain, mothers of young children... I sincerely do.  I know it is emotionally draining and physically exhausting.  But take it from a mother who has walked through the fire of raising young children and emerged on the other side...Independence can not be forced onto the very young.

Confidence (and the resulting independence) develops gradually over time.  Toddlers should not be expected to be independent in the same way they shouldn't be expected to cook their own meals and drive the family car.  They just aren't physically, intellectually, or emotionally ready for it.

But I promise that they will not be clinging to your legs forever.  There will come a time when they don't want to even be seen with you.  And that is hard in an entirely different way.  But it is a normal part of developing into an independent adult.  And that's what we really want as parents... to raise independent productive adult members of society.

Don't rush them too much.  As hard as it is to imagine...you WILL miss them being small and vulnerable and needy.  But you will be proud of their independence at the same time.