I’ve discovered something about myself I don’t like: I get put off whole books/ideas very easily when I find out something I don’t like about them, even if it’s just one little thing. What made me realise it was reading Liberated Parents, Liberated Children. It’s the third book by Adele Faber & Elaine Mazlish I’ve read as I really like their writing and their ideas. On the way to being TCS without being self-righteous and directive (I know most TCS-following parents aren’t self-righteous and directive, but the TCS website could hardly be described as anything else!). So I liked what they wrote so much, I bought and read another book on it. I see their concepts working well in real life and think that nearly everything they say is right. And then I suddenly find my mind changing as I read that wants and nedds are different things. Ok, that bit’s fine with me. But the example they give is: “[a child] wants to sleep with his parents. He needs to be in his own bed.”. What???? I agree that wants and needs are different things, but who has the authority to decide the difference for different people (and that includes children)? The actual discussion that this example relates to is pretty sound, and I agree with it wholeheartedly (it’s about not sacrificing one’s own needs for your children as that makes you resentful and is too bit a burden for your children to carry), but I found myself being put off the whole thing by just one silly example! Then of course, I read the example of babies needing a bottle in the middle of the night! I know, I know, I know it’s based a cultural norm and will mean something to more parents (and potentially offend fewer parents) than talking about needing a breastfeed in the night. But it just adds to the bottle-feeding culture that we live in and wasn’t a necessary example to use and that just irritates me. Why oh why, though, can’t I just take what I want and leave the rest, as Hathor so brilliantly illustrates? Why do I find myself thinking “well if that’s what they believe they can keep their stinking book!”? It’s so restricting!
Me: I like eating breakfast
Flopsy: Do you?
Me: Yes
Flopsy: Do Daddy?
Me: Yes, I think so [resisting the urge to correct, even covertly as Mr HOlt says they’ll self-correct and it results in much better learning, blah blah blah]
Flopsy (a bit more hesitantly): Do Grandma?
Me: Yes, I think so
Flopsy (after a pause): Does Mopsy?
Just one of many examples of her self-correcting - she knows it sounds wrong, tries it again, then tries something else to see if it sounds right. I *love* it!
Flopsy on Christmas Day - I made that dress, would you believe it???
Mopsy playing with Sticklebricks way back in December.
Flopsy’s Christmas lights - an inspired craft present from Nana
Flopsy’s brilliant sticklebrick tower the other night
Ahhhh!!!!!!!
A snuggle and a feed after bathtime.
Flopsy has been playing the fantastic Sesame Street website for a while, then she said she wanted to play on her new Lego computer game (which mum got for her for 97p!!!). I thought she really ought to have a bit more exercise so suggested to her that she might think about running up and down the room five times before playing the game. To my surprise she went for it. After I’d counted five times, she said “I want to do it again - this time count to ten!” - madness!
I thought that Anita Roddick was all ethical-minded and such, but she’s just let L’Oreal take over The Body Shop and L’Oreal are owned by Nestle! Another thing to boycott for two reasons:
1. The baby milk issue
2. Nestle are going to take over the world at this rate (If Blair/Bush don’t get there first of course!)
Me: “H is your new best friend, isn’t she?”
Flopsy: “Yes, she’s my really beautiful girl”
Me: “Is she?”
Flopsy: “Yes, and she’s got really beautiful flowers on her jeans”
Daddy: “What did you do today?”
Flopsy: “It was G’s birthday today, and she’s 4 now, and we all sang happy birthday to her. We didn’t do any running around but we did do lots of jumping up and down with H! H is coming at our house soon.”
Am still very wary of saying that we follow TCS by the book, however, we do respect our children’s choices and find that discussion and reasoning are far nicer ways of doing things than telling and dealing with any ensuing tantrums. At a (very lovely, thanks C) birthday party attended solely by HE’ors today, we were discussing why our TCS-type-parented children seemed to feel the need to ask us if it’s ok for them to do things. For instance, Flopsy quite often says ‘Mummy, can I…?’ and it bemuses me as I rarely say ‘no’ (apart from to questions along the lines of ‘can I run across that busy road?’ obviously!). I spend my entire time trying *not* to be authoritarian so why does she see me as so? After a short discussion we decided that the reason our children do this is because they feel that we trust them to recognise their limitations and consequently (following the ‘laws’ of self-fulfilling prophecy) they *do* recognise their limitations and also recognise that we, as adults, are more likely to have a better understanding of whether a particular action or event is appropriate or not. And, because they respect the fact that we don’t impose seemingly pointless rules and regulations on them, they can feel confident that when we say something’s not a good idea, it genuinely isn’t, rather than risking us saying ‘no’ just because we don’t want them to do something (the ‘because I say so’ attitude). Therefore they are more likely than most children to ask us if something’s ok to do, because they trust us to be honest and true with them :-) It’s a compliment from them!
Ok, I’m not professing to being entirely politics-literate, so if anyone wants to set me straight on this please feel free. However this Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill reminds me very much of what good ol’ Hitler did in 1933 (if I remember my history lessons correctly!). I’ve often felt scared at the way we don’t really seem to live in a true democracy already, but this Bill is just terrifying. I think we’ll have to emigrate soon if things get much worse. Please visit this site and write to your MPs if this terrifies you as well!!!
