I love the Dr Seuss book “Oh! The Places You’ll Go”! I love it because it’s written for adults in the same playful language as his children’s books AND because it has such a wonderful message. Someone gave me this book as a high school graduation gift (this is a fairly common tradition, right?), but I never knew it existed before then. I, however, plan to read this book to Dylan starting now and continue to remind him of it as he grows up.
I’ve been thinking about my job as Dylan’s mom. I feel like so many parents put all their time and energy into their role as body guard against people, objects, germs, and bacteria and forget about their job as teacher. I think the body guard role is important and has it’s place and time, but I do think it’s overemphasized.
Your child will not die if he/she is exposed to a few germs and/or bacteria. In fact, you’ll strengthen their immune system by NOT sanitizing the world! I’m not sure if everyone knows this, but when you use hand sanitizer and other bacteria eliminating products, you are killing the good bacteria with the bad bacteria which leaves your body defenseless. Obviously, that does not mean I think people should live in filth… I just think there’s a middle ground which is often overlooked.
The same goes for protecting children from hurting themselves. Dylan is in the beginning stages of crawling right now (ie: he scoots). He pretty much ALWAYS sees something under the coffee table he MUST have and that usually results in him hitting his head. I try to protect him from hurting himself, but, at the same time, I think it’s good for him to bump his head every once in a while. If he never hurts himself at all, how will he learn to be aware of his surroundings?
Before Dylan was six months old, I also had a hard time imagining myself letting him CIO (cry it out) in regards to falling asleep on his own. I changed my mind around four months when I realized he was using crying to get what he wanted. I also realized recently that if I leave him alone when he wakes up at night, he cries for ten minutes and then goes back to sleep, but, if I go in there, he is up for longer which means: he loses more sleep. I think the advice I received from the midwife when Dylan was born was right: just do whatever works until he’s six months old. I believe that is the point when my job as instructor began.
My parents told me a long time ago that the job God gave them, when he trusted them with my sister’s and my care, was to guide us into adulthood. I also remember watching a commercial a few years ago which showed a boy on the subway picturing something his father had taught him before every action he took. It was an anti-drug commercial, but the point was: if you never tell your child not to do drugs, how will he/she know? The same thing goes for when your child bumps into someone. If you shoot that adult a dirty look and scoot your child away, your child will never learn how to be polite.
I am a first time mom and I know I still have so much to learn, but I’ve already learned that stressing out about making my child’s life perfect is silly, not just because it’s impossible, but because it’s unnecessary! My number one concern in raising my children is to prevent them from being spoiled because when they are adults, I want to have the piece of mind that I TAUGHT them how to be strong and responsible adults!
Yep – I agree. Our job is to be a teacher *and* protector. But everyone does it differently – the joys of being a mom are that you can raise your child to be Godly through the methods you think are best. I don’t plan on shielding Bella from everything – like you said, that’s an impossible task, but I do plan on shielding her from what is within my power to at this age. It’s like the debate of homeschooling – when is it time to let your child be independent and responsible since keeping them at home at times just protects them from those experiences? It’s good for a kid to bump their head in the real world too. All good things to think about as they grow up.
That is true that everyone does it differently and I think every parent knows their own child and what that child needs. I just think there are a lot of over protected, irresponsible, spoiled adults out there and it’s important to me that Dylan isn’t one of them. I’m still going to protect Dylan from what I can too… I think you found the emphasis on the wrong point. My point WAS NOT that parents shouldn’t protect their children from bumping their heads and make sure they have a clean, safe place to live. It was: that’s not a parent’s only or most important responsibility (in my opinion).
As for the homeschooling debate, I disagree. The whole point of that guest post was to point out that homeschooling isn’t necessarily shielding your kids from anything. To be honest, I think a student sent to school in an area, surrounded by kids who are pretty much from the same background, is not being exposed to more than a home schooled child who’s involved in lots of extra curricular activities and world traveled. Also, as I said in that post, I’m not sure I’m going to home school, I was just pointing out that it has some advantages. Ideally, I’d like to send Dylan to a language school where he’ll become fluent in another language because that’s something I can’t really help him with, but, if we don’t have the money for that, I might be home schooling and using Rosetta Stone and travel since SCHOOL is really about EDUCATION. So, I don’t like your comparison… I wouldn’t home school to shield, I would home school to expose. Plus, again, there are always sports and clubs for the socialization aspect (which seems really silly to even think about because, honestly, Dylan’s going to get plenty of socialization here in our apartment complex in a major US city).
Thank you for your opinion, or advice, or comeback… I appreciate the comment, but it seemed a little defensive
It is impossible to be perfect, so don’t fret the little stuff. You are at the beginning of a wonderful adventure. Funny how I went from an antibacterial obsession with my first child to ..pick it up off the ground and hand the pacifier back with my 3rd. I guess you realize after awhile..they are going to eat dirt and the occasional raw cookie dough and they will survive. I think the best gifts you can give your child is, of course, unconditional love (even if they threw your favorite shoe in the toilet) and a chance to experience different things (sports, drawing, computers) so they can explore their interests and discover who they are.