Stirring the controversy pot...

There have been several articles that have caused quite a buzz in social networks, at least the ones I've been witness and participated in.  There's a new recommendation by the AAP that children should ideally rear face in their car seats until the age of 2 at least.  Also, corporal punishment and CIO.  Mind you there are a number of other issues, but I'm going to concentrate on these for now.

Rear Facing


I have my daughter rear facing in her car seat still and plan to do so for a long while.  When I had my other children, it wasn't something I had heard of.  However, the logic makes sense to me.  The impact is absorbed by the seat itself in rear facing as opposed to just the strap which can cause a number of spinal, head and other injuries.  The counter arguments range from uncomfortable, irritable, screaming children all the way to the inconvenience of rear facing them and not fitting in certain vehicles.

I have a van, I've rear faced my daughter's car seat in a Nissan Altima 2-door coupe which is tiny, with my husband driving (he's 6'5") knees up against the dash but the car seat fit in the center.

To hell with comfort and broken legs, if it saves my kid's life, I'm going to do it.  One of the other things that convinced me was a ride on Space Mountain in France's Disneyland.  I tried putting my head back and it wasn't working, I was jolted a bunch and had a killer headache afterward.

A lot of transit systems have half or better number of seats rear facing.  The space shuttles have rear facing seats.  Will I judge you if you don't rear face your kids? A little.  However, it's your choice as a parent and I know that most parents won't do something to willingly hurt their kids.

Corporal Punishment


This is a sensitive subject for me because I got my ass kicked as a child.  I don't get the logic of hitting your kid and telling them not to hit.  I just can't wrap my head around it.  How about what an article states about women being hit.  That's not acceptable, but a child being hit is.  We're talking spanking here, all things being equal, if disciplining your kid allows for spanking, if there's no anger behind disciplining your wife, is that acceptable or can anger not be removed from the act of hitting an adult?

I just can't bring myself to hurt my child who looks at me as if I'm God, because to my kids for a while, I am.  Teaching by hitting only teaches not to get caught, I know from experience.  The consequence is a spanking, not the actual consequence of the action.  It removes I think, the act and what happens when the child does something unacceptable or dangerous (of course you won't let a child get hit by a car to prove a consequence, but I'm generalizing here).

How does hitting not teach a child that this is how problems get resolved?  Mom and Dad resolve problems with the child in that manner.  This is a time when everything parents do is gospel, so why is it ok for Mom and Dad to hit and not the child?

CIO


I tried to let Ava cry it out in her crib one night.  ONE night.  I was tired and I wanted to sleep and knew Ava was tired but she wouldn't sleep.  I put her in her crib and knew the crying would commence.  She cried, sobbed, reached for me and called my name.  I read one particular article on the internet while she sobbed.  To paraphrase, it stated, "A child cries and when they realize that their cries are not getting them the comfort that they need (parents) then they dissociate themselves from the parents.  The parents are not coming to their comfort in a time of sorrow or agony or fright."  How can I argue with that logic?

I can't stand to hear my child sobbing if I can make it better.  Yes it's inconvenient to have a child in bed with you.  Yes it does terrible things to your sex life, or lack thereof.  However, it only last for a small amount of time.  These are years you'll never get back.  For the most part, all things being equal I haven't heard of a 15 year old sleeping in the same bed with Mom and Dad.

The "My way" interaction among mothers


This is a huge problem that I think humanity faces.  I'm guilty of it, as are all the mothers I know.  We have a mindset of how our lives should be and in particular for mothers;

• How our birthing experience should be.
• Whether we breast feed or bottle feed (and how long).
• Cloth or disposable diapers.
• What we feed our children once they go to solids and beyond (including drinks).
• How we discipline our children.
• How we educate our children.
• How we play with our children.
• How (and where) our children sleep.
• What the parental roles are.
• What our boundaries and rules for our children are.
• How we interact with extended family.
• Circumcision.
• Ear piercing.

There are other topics, but these are the big ones I've seen over and over again.  Let me just say as a personal opinion that won't get me any fans, WOMEN (especially moms) ARE INSANE!

Throw more than 1 mother in a room together and throw out the circumcision, breast feeding or discipline topic out there and someone's going to die.

For a lot of us, our kids become our identities.  They are who WE are.  We are parents.  The behavior and ultimately who our children become reflects who we are, how we loved and taught our children and our wisdom as parents, for better or for worse.

For people like me, my first marriage ended in divorce.  There was a void there that parenthood filled.  For someone to tell me that I am doing something wrong as a parent is immediately interpreted as an attack on my ego and my identity.  Kids don't come with instruction manuals and no article in the world is going to be able to tell me that I'm parenting my child incorrectly.

Why is that?  Because I LOVE my kids.  My kids are the center of my universe.  I do what I think is best for them based on my experience, input from others and research.  What works for me, will not work for other parents and it is not my right to tell anyone that they're wrong (abuse aside of course and "abuse" is a very tricky definition).

Because a child is left to CIO for example, does not mean they will become hellions.  Because a child is spanked does not mean they will become delinquents.  There needs to be a perfect storm.  Different children raised in the same family the exact same way will grow to be completely different adults.  There are too many factors for someone to make an all-encompassing assessment that if you "don't do this" or if you "do that" you're doing it incorrectly, you need to be taught how to do it correctly and immediately must be instructed because otherwise all of these other factors can and will occur.

I have to come to the conclusion that every one of these articles, judgements, fights all come from fear.  The fears are;

• Destroying your child's future
• Creating a delinquent
• Affecting your child's mental, physical and emotional health negatively
• Affecting your child's development negatively
• Being a neglectful or abusive parent
• The discovery that you have "scarred" or "ruined" your child's life

Most of us do the best we can with what we've got.  Laziness is something that affects all of us in one form or another.  This can be propping a bottle while the baby's in the car seat so that we can get things done, nursing while laying in bed because we're exhausted with a newborn, placing a child rear facing for an extended period of time because it sucks to have a toddler heel kicking you with thick shoes, flailing, screaming and throwing themselves as you attempt to buckle them safely while you're contorted into a Cracker Jack box-sized vehicle, feeding your kid Ramen because you've had a tough day and something is better than nothing.  These are just a few examples.  I've been through all of them and done a lot of them.  However, not once have I had any evil intent.  We all make mistakes and we learn from them.  Unfortunately for parents some of those mistakes can be fatal.  You can do everything right and still have a tragedy occur.

Our children are the only thing we have complete responsibility for.  Even when it comes to ourselves, we can turn our behavior into a result of our past history.  We are shaping our children's lives from the ground up.  It is absolutely TERRIFYING to have someone tell us that we may be doing something wrong with our children that may harm/kill/maim them or make them serial killers, drug users, etc.

No one has a right to vocalize any type of judgement against another parent (with the exception of "abuse" see above).  Humans judge, it's natural, we can't do anything about it.  It's not the emotion, it's how we choose to express it.

Articles will continue to be posted.  Awareness will still continue to be raised.  What we're missing here, at least in the groups I belong to is that (and I like to believe this applies to ALL of us) we're looking out for each other's children.  We're not posting articles to flaunt how much of a better parent the other is.  We're concerned for each other's feelings, well being and general happiness.  It's an amazing thing, but it takes one miscommunicated word for all of that to disappear and anger to take hold.

Everyone wants to do what's best for their kids and if they don't, they need to have their head checked.  No one knows what the "best thing for their kids" but the parents themselves.  Our lives are formed by our very personal experiences.  No one else can determine what those are unless they are part of that family and even then, it's limited.

Take what you see in the form of articles, advice or news and learn what you can from it, apply it if you'd like or don't.  Be INFORMED.  Read the entire article or nothing at all and get MANY sources, not just one and definitely not one paragraph.

Agree to disagree.  No one really believes you don't love your children.  Take advice at face value, an attempt to help what someone else sees as a problem for THEIR particular ways.  They're just looking out for you.  Sometimes it's welcome, a lot of times it's not.

Finally, for the love of all that is holy, if you don't like what someone else is saying, do not listen.  There's enough hate, war and negativity in life to allow this to affect you and alienate yourself from a group of individuals that are going through the same experiences with child rearing that you are.  We're all in this together.  Open your mind, listen with your heart.