bongos. pork. parenting.

[dustthouart]

I ended up going to Mass by myself in the afternoon, since I was feeling better by then. I went to the neighborhood, walkable parish rather than taking the bus to our registered parish. Sometimes I feel a little guilty about not attending our geographic parish and helping it out, especially because I get the sense that the priests there are really

Comments

[ext_461687]

I have that book also, but haven't read it yet! Also, Michelle Duggar did the same thing for her 19 kids ("and counting"!) and talks about it in her book. She called it "blanket training."

[gordoom]

Am I the only one who, on hearing that Michelle Duggar does something, my initial reaction is to do the exact opposite? As a Catholic trying to live faithfully the Church's teachings on marriage and family life, my reaction to the Duggars is "get off my side, you're making my side look bad." (I know they're not Catholic, but the trouble is that the secular world thinks of the two as one and the same.)

[kisekileia]

You are absolutely NOT the only one.

[kisekileia]

EEK EEK EEK NO. I have heard about blanket training. Blanket training is when you put a baby on a blanket, and punish him or her for venturing off the blanket. It is abusive, because babies need to explore, and needs to be avoided. dustthouart, I'm not sure what the author you're reading is like, but please stay away from anything advocating "child training" or anything by Michael and Debi Pearl--those things involve emotional and physical abuse.

This making kids sit still thing...I'm not sure about it. I think it would be a real problem for an ADHD child. I worry that it would result in the child being seen as failing if s/he manifested ADHD traits by being unable to sit still. It would certainly be necessary to avoid being punitive if the child simply couldn't sit still.

[kisekileia]

Also, about the self-soothing thing. Babies NEED to be soothed by their parents. Babies who self-soothe are manifesting a pathological response to neglectful parenting. Older children self-soothing to an extent? Maybe. Not babies, and every child needs to know that they can come to their parents for love and soothing when necessary.

The last paragraph you quoted, I like. :)

[dustthouart]

Well, 18 months old is a toddler, not an infant. When she is an actual baby-baby, we are planning on doing nursing on demand/attachment parenting. As my You're a Better Parent Than You Think book puts it, it is impossible to spoil infants. Making securely attached infants is one of the best ways to make it so that when they are two, three, and four years old, they can learn to self-soothe. And self-soothing is another one of those necessary life skills without which I am doing my child a lifelong disservice.

[kisekileia]

Okay, good :). I'm happy to hear that; I was just a little worried.

[breathingbooks]

Or you could just buy the kids books/PSPs and they will whine when you're finally ready to leave. ;)

[dustthouart]

It's not that I wouldn't allow my children to read in that instance, or to use an electronic device if they had them, but everyone will eventually need to sit quietly for a while without any distraction tools of any kind. So I still think it's an important skill. Plus these things can come up short notice and there may not be a book or whatever.

Plus if my child ends up going to regular school, it will definitely be to her advantage to be able to sit quietly at her desk and at least act like she's listening, and not take after her mom in hiding a paperback book under the desk and reading it instead of paying attention. I got in trouble for that a LOT, lol.

[breathingbooks]

I get that it's an important skill, but as someone who was naturally a good, quiet child, this all seems incredibly strange to me. I can't remember my mom doing any sort of "training". She just told us what to do and why, and we mostly did it as well as we could for our age. You may not have to do anything...

[dustthouart]

Well, if she is naturally good, than the training won't be any hassle at all; she'll be totally fine sitting quietly, quickly be able to do it a half hour, and once I see that she can, I won't bother about it further.

On the other hand, when I was four and five years old, one of my favorite "games" was to hide when my mother went shopping--inside clothes racks or displays especially. And to hear my mother work herself into a panic, yelling my name and frantically searching for me, was the most fun part of the game! I sincerely hope there is no such thing as parenting karma, because if there is, I'm in for a terror...

[dustthouart]

Doubtful, unless I have multiples at some point.

The math I figure on is this.

I want to try to space my children at least 3 years apart.

I'm 25 now and having my first.

Menopause occurs around 50 but fertility usually decreases a good period before that (by late 30s in fact it's already decreased). But let's say ~20 years of fertility.

20/3 = 6.667

So, seven is about the max I see myself having without multiples, assuming financial and medical situations do not offer grave reasons for abstaining further.

Then again, who knows, in either direction. I know some couples who had a really easy time conceiving the first, but then had a really difficult time conceiving more. I'm willing to accept whatever blessings I'm given. :)