Our son Benjamin is 1 month away from being 1 year old...I can hardly believe it. I can also hardly believe how quickly he is learning and maturing. Things I thought 2 months ago were an impossibility, are a breeze for him now. (He is now crawling and saying 'Dada'! He has been saying 'Mama' for over 2 months now). And while I embrace his rate of learning new things, I have to remind myself that he is still a baby and to try and teach him too quickly or to expect to much of him too soon could be overwhelming and detrimental.
It is thought (because there is no empirical way to prove it) that a child's personality is pretty much formed by age 3, and near cemented at age 5. Their basic temperament is something they are born with and their character is shaped by their experiences in life with the particular personality God gave them.
My husband and I believe that God gives parents wisdom well beyond what any expert can provide for the parents of each individual child. And there is the soverign plan of God to ponder. And, if parents are up to the task of good stewardship and are receptive to the wisdom that God provides, they have at their disposal all they need in order to raise that child in the manner which he or she needs to be raised. Of course we have a choice and not all parents raise their children properly and there is abuse and neglect that happens. However, there is something to be said for the intuition God gives parents and the close insight that can be gained from being properly bonded to your child.
I believe also that parents can glean a great deal about children and development in general from people who have studied child development and the way children learn and grow. Not only that, they can use certain principles of behavior, shaping, and the like, to help their children grow to be well adjusted and autonomous. I was a psychology major with an emphasis in child psychology in college. I learned the theories, learned about development, conditioning, abnormalities, and behavior. I even headed up a study designed for graduate students to complete their masters' thesis with...as a freshman. However, I did not have all the tools I needed for mothering until I actually became a mother. I still believe in the basic theories of development and I know they are helpful for me to learn generally about how children develop, but when it comes time to make a decision about how to raise my chidren, including the values I will pass onto them as well as how to discipline, I rely on truths as I understand them from scripture, I employ principles of learning and behavior so as long they don't contradict the Word of God, and I rely on my God-given discernement as a parent. And of course, learning and making mistakes along the journey is par for the course, for I am, after all....human.
Intuition and Conditioning- A Balance
In an episode of the 90’s tv sitcom “Mad About You”, the main characters, Jamie and Paul Buchman, are trying to get their infant daughter to go to and stay asleep. The whole episode, one of the more clever ones on tv I might add, is one continuous shot, 22 minutes of these parents sitting outside their baby’s room as baby cries herself to sleep. As they sit at door’s edge bored and torn between going in to comfort their baby, and timing to see how long the baby can go before a behavioral “intervention” is needed, they manage to find an old piece of candy, ponder life’s deeper meanings, and argue over trivial (although hilarious) matters. The thing that struck me most about this episode once I became a mother myself was how hard Jamie fought against her mother’s intuition to go in and comfort her baby. She toiled painfully against doing what came naturally to do for her baby, all for the reward of having a peaceful night’s (or life’s) sleep. In the end, their particular type of behavior management wins out and exhausted, they celebrate their victory together. I still ponder that episode and wonder if the writers were commenting on the parenting trends of that day.
I can really identify with the desperation in the characters of that show. Some babies come into the world with a temperament that is easy going and flexible. That is not our baby. On the morning of July 5¸2007, Benjamin Aviel, who was still breech, kicked me and my water broke. Six weeks early! From the start, he seemed to be screaming, “World, ready or not, here I come!” That being said, it’s not that he is always boisterous and outgoing. In fact, he is carefully observant of people. But he is a very determined individual. He had to be (and in fact, while he was still in the womb I prayed he would be so!). Turns out this trait was necessary in order to survive his first 2 weeks and 2 days in a hard ICU box, with health officials poking him with needles and forcing tubes down his throat, rather than cuddling on Mommy and Daddy’s warm chest where newborns belong. And having a high needs baby has meant that I often don’t get enough sleep, or even get enough time to talk on the phone or to take a shower! So I know that parenting is the single most difficult challenge anyone could ever face. And I know I have my share of mistakes to make in the future.
But something tells me that if I am responding in a nurturing way to my baby and my baby were in distress, I think I would side with my gut feeling, despite what the "steps" were for whatever the particular goal was for modifying a child's behavior. These are the things I think about these days as Benjamin is learnig new skills and abilities. But I have to remember that these new skills are still in their aquisition phase of learning...he has not mastered them yet. And there is still a vast amount of growing his brain has to do to in order to master what he has learned and fully understand. This is a humbling prospect, especially since something that I so desire, such as a good night's sleep, must be put off for the time being.
Sure, I could put Benjamin on a sleep training schedule tomorrow and go through the 2 weeks the experts say it would take to have him sleep through the night. But at what cost? I consider that he is teething and needs extra comforting during the night, for he might be in pain. Teething wreaks havoc on many other parts of baby than just their gums. If I were to let him cry it out for a few nights all in the name of getting him to be able to sleep like an adult, I run the risk of him becoming mistrustful for not having his mommy whom he really needs during this important developmental phase.
No, for the meantime, we do the proactive things we can do knowing that we can create a nightime routine that relaxes him and sets him up for sleep: activities such as a bath, a story, and nursing time. We know he will sleep peacefully if healthy attitudes toward sleep and trust toward his parents has been fostered. As for the trial of finding the elusive full night's sleep: This too shall pass.
Some sleep trainers, however, have tried to tell my via their teachings, that to not get my child on a schedule NOW, we will run the risk of having an overdependant child and a child who will wake up needing mommy until he's 30! So it would seem to me that the underlying motus operandi in this case is fear. But doesn't the Bible teach to fear not?
Along with prayer and guidance from the Lord for our individual circumstance as a family, we find that most parenting teachings come secondary and I hesitate to subscribe to teachings that use fear and a rigid set of rules as its basis, rather than incorporating a parent's intuition and a child's individual needs. When we don't take into consideration the sensibilites and intracacies of a relationship, a program can backfire and we will have lost the opportunity to help a little person to be all God has called them to be. After all...Rules minus Relationship equals Rebellion.
I often think of that episode of Mad About You and wonder how the relationship grew with their daughter. Did trust have to be rebuilt in later stages of development, or was the child easy-going enough to be able to "roll with the punches" of their particular intervention? (I know children are supposed to be pretty resilient, but how much of what we expect of them is TOO MUCH?) Then I think about Benjamin and how he is a real boy, not fictional, who came into the world with particular needs and particular sensitivities and how one day I will stand accountable before a Holy God for how I loved and took care of him. Did I respond with sensitivity and compassion as well as a balanced discipline informed by my conscience? Did I accept counsel from those who have studied aspects of child development for which incorporates conditioning and psychological principles? Or did I seek to strike a balance between the two, sifting through the information for myself, rejecting what is outright false and harmful, humbling myself when making a mistake in judgement, and above all, using time honored wisdom and prudence? I suppose only time will tell. In the meantime, I pray, listen, and in regards to finding my (our) own particular parenting style, I try to remember the words of my husband who so aptly put it: try not to go too far to the left nor too far to the right.
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