They both:

• grow fast
• get out of sorts.
• develop  “growing pains”

It took me a few days of total chaos around here to figure out that the puppy was growing so fast her body became unfamiliar to her.   She ran around yipping, biting, and basically being obnoxious!   She didn't know  

• if she was hungry
• if she was tired
• if she wanted to play
• if she wanted to sleep

  So after missing the obvious for a bit I figured it out….

Puppies are a lot like young children!!

I remembered that when my son was young he often acted in similar ways.

He would want to eat but then not eat.

He would act like he was tired and wanted to take a nap but then jumped up quickly to go play with something…

So what I did with puppy was what I used do with my son: Massages!

It works! She relaxes and then sleeps.

YES!!

Comments? Thank you!!

Serious child abuse is on the rise!

While many reports about child abuse show that it has declined over time, one recent study looked at serious child abuse…abuse where there are fractures and brain injuries and found that there was a slight increase of about 5%.

Before you think or say 5% is not such a major increase – ANY increase in child abuse is too much!

And the study also found that

Hospitalizations among children less than 1 year old increased 10.9 percent….

[The data used was from between 1997 and 2009 – so we do not have more recent similar statistics.]

In the past I worked in the field of Child Abuse and Neglect, both as a Psychologist and as an Attorney,  and it is not a pleasant field and one where all those who worked in it, fervently wished ourselves out of business…..

Seeing infants hurt by parents and caretakers – often for what most would consider trivial reason is not pleasant.

My happiest moments came when parents gave up the rights to their abused children and they were adopted by loving families.

This abuse is an issue we all need to be aware of and work at stopping!!

Thoughts? Comments? Thank you….

Ok – here is part 4.

The previous 3 "arenas" were:

1 – Education

2 – Toilet Training and Weaning

3 – Sports

The 4th arena of competitive parenting is Parties!

• birthday parties
  
• any rite of passage that comes with an expected party like a quinceanera, bar/bat mitzvah
  

These events can get very spendy what with gift bags, décor, and food.

They can be bowling or pool parties, or trips to amusement parks or having clowns and pony rides come to your home.

And when the child is older, as in a bar or bat mitzvah it can be an event at a hotel with a sit down dinner, music and gala happenings.

Do the kids enjoy these? Yes and no – it mostly depends on their age. 

Very young children can be overwhelmed by the huge event and number of people.

Teens at bar and bat mitzvahs and quinceaneras probably enjoy the fun and attention.

Do parents enjoy these? Not always. It can be a lot of work – even for a modest party.

Do the adult guests enjoy them?  At the time, yes, but often they can hardly remember the individual event when each tends to blend into the previous and next….

All this can lead to more and bigger so that “your” event is memorable!

I'm not saying any of this is bad – but what is the message you are sending to your child? Or to your guests?

And guests? What message do you take from it?

If it is to only think of how you can out-do the one you are at – you are competing!

If it gives you good ideas for yours? Go with it!

Thoughts? Comments? Thank you.

In this series, there has been a post about competing in education, and competing in toilet training and weaning.

This post is about competing in sports.

No – not as in the kids competing as they play –

it's about the parent's competing with each other as to whose kid is good, better, best.      

We have all read the tales of parents fighting with each other at Little League games, fighting with the umpires or screaming at the kids…their kids and the other kids.

Ditto at soccer games. The kids are there to have fun and learn "sportsmanship" but the parents are teaching a far different lesson.

And cheerleading? I do recall news about a mother hiring a hit-man to kill her daughter's rival!

So why are the parents competing with each other? Why not let the kids have fun and enjoy the sport?

Are the parents that ego involved in their kid's sports because they see it as a ticket-to-wealth or a ticket-to-college?

Or is it to give a boost to what they consider their great parenting skills? And show that off to everyone else?

Next up: parties

Thoughts? Comments? Additionall areas of competition? Thank you for your input….

This is an idea I have had in my head since years ago when working with suicidal male teens.

Most were suicidal because at ages 13, 14 or 15 they were experiencing a failure or a loss for the 1st time! No matter their background, they had never learned about failure.

And learning it when hormones are raging and your body is out-of-whack is not the best time developmentally to experience what you consider a major loss.

What were their losses?

• Being dumped by a girlfriend.
• Failing a class.
• Failing a test.
• Not getting a high enough grade.
• Not making the basketball team….

From an adult perspective we might not see these as major loses. But these boys were in a hospital because they did – and they wanted to end their lives!

As parents we want to help our kids and protect them from failure and here are 2 examples:

• we intentionally lose games so they win
• we do their homework so they get good grades or don't feel "bad"

But are we helping our kids?

Failure can be a learning experience – and part of growing up is learning that actions have consequences [both parental and child actions]

Parents, let your children lose that game when they are losing!

If you are capable of winning it – win it.

Yes they will probably have hissy fits but they will also learn a lot.

Talk to them about losing games and emphasize that a loss has no reflection on their worth as a person! And after a bit they know you lost on purpose anyway and that is an odd lesson!

Please don’t do their homework.

This is wrong on so many levels it needs a post of its own.

Help? Sure? But do all or most of it?

Whose homework is it?????

To be continued……..

Thoughts? comments? thank you

Part 1 was about competitive schooling.

Part 2 is about competitive toilet training and weaning…..

In the United States we tend to use a calendar or an aging system to mark when children should do things. If you ask most American parents when their children were weaned or toilet trained they will give you the child’s age at the time of the “event.”

Parents sometimes feel that the earlier the child is toilet trained, the more “brownie points” they [the parent] get.

In some cultures toilet training is just not an issue. There is rarely pressure on the child to “act like an adult” and use the bathroom. Again, in the USA parents tend to compete to be able to say, “my child was fully toilet-trained at X age.”

Sadly X may be an age at which toilet training is not all that probable or even possible. I have seen too many cases of child abuse resulting from a child wetting a diaper when the parents thought the child should have stopped doing so.

Regarding weaning, in many places in the world, an infant is breast-fed for long periods of time. [And great that more recently there has been a move in the United States to also encourage longer periods of breast-feeding.]

Still, some USA parents pride themselves for having their child drink out of an infant cup at an early age. No bottles for these competitors!

When parents ask me what's the best time for "x" – I tend to ask back "Is the time an important issue?"

And "why?"

Next: sports, birthday parties and ?

please suggest more areas where you see competing

Comments? Thoughts? Thank you.

3 tips for new parents to help you lessen guilt

Tip 1 – Stop chatting with everyone

Everyone has parenting advice – even people who have never had kids!

You start getting this mostly-unsolicited advice when you are pregnant because unless you never look pregnant, you are a target for child rearing advice.

t’s part of the human psyche to offer advice to pregnant women – and it’s been done since way back when.

Here’s the way it usually goes:

h, you’re pregnant. That’s great. I know a good pediatrician – her name is…or there are such good new toys for newborns – you can get them at… or have you heard about the new music to play while you are pregnant – it will make your child a genius – and by the way – do you know if you’re having a girl or a boy?

You almost can’t avoid this onslaught of advice – so best to be polite and say “thank you” – but do not engage in the conversation.

[This onslaught continues if you have a baby or toddler with you so practice now.]

If you engage – you are caught for a long chat about babies!

Tip 2 stop reading every book or magazine you find on parenting

Google “books on parenting advice” and you will find 1000’s of sites! You cannot read them all – even in several lifetimes. Don’t even try.

Tip 3 trust yourself

Stop and ask yourself who will be raising your baby? The people with advice?  The books?

• Who will responsible for making the moment-to-moment decisions?
• Who will feed?
• Who will diaper?
• Who will play with?

That baby is YOURS!

You the parent[s] have to trust yourself at some point and you can start right now.

Comments? Thoughts?

In the USA there are many parents who have gotten into a behavior that I call “competitive parenting.”

This competing has been around for a while – but now seems to have gotten worse – and it has spread into many more areas of a child’s development. 

Even into areas over which a parent has little control!

We hear of parents signing up their not-yet-born children for the “best” nursery schools so as to ensure future entrance to colleges such as Harvard or Yale.

What a burden on that child! What if that child does not want to go to those schools – or heaven forbid – does not want to go to college at all? Or is not accepted?

We have parents pressuring children to get “good” grades as early as nursery school and kindergarten. I knew of a child who got ulcers in the 1st grade because she “only” got an A- or B+ on some assignments and her parents were making her study more so as to raise that to a solid A [no minus marks or B’s allowed in that family.]

Somehow making sure your child is seen as better than and faster than “those other children” either makes you seem like a better parent or proves your child is genius [and of course that will reflect back on you the genius parent.]

Please stop it!

Kids have enough to do just to develop…they don’t need added pressure from parents trying to prove something to the world.

Next – competition around weaning and toilet training…..

Thoughts? Comments? Thank you.

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Please be patient – I'm still setting up the process of getting you the chapter

I sure hope you do have questions about being a parent.

My son is in his 30's and I am still learning how to be a parent.

Now it's being a parent to a married grown-up man!  And is different, I hear, from being the parent of a married grown up woman.

If you have been here before, you know I don't answer questions – or answer with specifics.

Why?

As I say in the movie and the book – ask yourself  – who is raising your child?

That person has the answers. not me. Not the books. Not your neighbors, in-laws, etc.

Comments? Thoughts?

Thank you….

From way back when I was in graduate school until today I have advocated for good prenatal maternal health as it does help reduce premature births!

Being born prematurely is, in itself, the cause of many developmental problems through life.

But some politicians and other policy makers have always said:  Nope – no care for pregnant women – not on our dime!!  Which is an odd stance since prenatal care is less expensive than a newborn's intensive care. 

I will keep advocating for better health and better nutrition for everyone for the rest of my life – because I care about human development! 

And because these many many years later – we still have statistics like this:

The world's developed countries have seen their average rate of premature births double to 6 percent since 1995, despite efforts to reduce the phenomenon…

And the United States? Were we think we have superior health care? We rank 130th out of the 184 countries in the study!

What starts labor is still an unknown. What we do know is that keeping a fetus inside for the duration or a normal pregnancy – about 40 weeks is the best for the baby. 

As this study says:

The ultimate solution — keeping every baby in the womb for 40 weeks – is a challenge. Improving maternal health by treating high blood pressure and infections would help, as would changing obstetrical practices so labor is not induced early for non-medical reasons.

"We still don't know a lot about how to prevent preterm birth," Howson said. "We need vigorous, targeted research into its causes."

 

Thoughts? Comments? Thank you!