While I was laid up over the past two days I spent some time browsing my new Parenting and Parents magazines. Nothing like my monthly dose of “What rare disease or disorder could your child have?” to cheer me up.
Truthfully, I love reading all of the advice they dole out in these magazines. While some of it applies to me, most of it does not. I notice that many of the same topics come up over and over, leading me to believe that there is an “epidemic” of these problems among parents.
Now, my daughter certainly isn’t perfect. She’s stubborn. She’s strong willed. She has a fiery temper that could bring some dictators of small countries to their knees. She doesn’t nap long enough. She still won’t completely hold her sippy cup (we’re making progress, though!). She bites and hits when she’s angry.
But after reading these magazines, I see that really I’m pretty lucky. We’ve managed to avoid some major battles. While I could credit it all to my spectacular parenting skills (sarcasm there, folks), I don’t think that’s it. I think the particular problems we encounter as parents are due to two parts: the genetic cards we’re dealt, and how we manage those cards.
Here’s a list of some of the “major issues” (as determined by reading parenting magazines) we’ve managed to avoid so far.
Pacifiers – Oh, when she was a colicky newborn, I begged for her to take a pacifier. I would have given all my assets for someone to come along with the perfect pacifier that she would accept with ease. We tried just about every kind, but she wasn’t interested. In a big F.U. to Freud’s stages of development, she proved that her oral fixation was more towards screaming, and less towards sucking. However, it seems that this may have worked out for the best. Other kids her age and older are fighting their parents over weaning off the pacifier. That is one battle I’m happy to not deal with.
Extended sleep routines – Bedtime here involves daddy giving her milk, then carrying her upstairs, putting her in her crib, pulling the blanket over her, and walking out. She rolls over and goes right to sleep. She doesn’t insist on a book, or three, to read. She doesn’t even mind much if daddy isn’t the one to put her to bed. I have a friend who still nurses her 23 month old, and bedtime for them involves nursing him down, patting his back, and laying with him until he falls asleep. It usually takes 45-60 minutes! Plus, she has to be the one to put him to bed – it doesn’t work well at all if his father tries to lay with him to get him to sleep. Now, while I think in that situation she’s partially to blame for the difficulties she goes through, there are other kids who are just scared to go to bed and be away from their parents, which leads to long, drawn-out routines. Little Miss Independent doesn’t care about being away from us at night, I guess.
Co-sleeping – It seems that half of the families on Nanny 911 have the problem of co-sleeping when their kids are 6 or 8 years old. I guess some kids like co-sleeping so much they refuse to give it up. We originally co-slept with Cordelia, but only until 4-5 months. It’s not that we didn’t like it: she didn’t like it. When we moved her to her crib, she started sleeping better and only waking 1-2 times a night at most. It was clear that being in bed with us was not her style. At least it gave us the ability to have sex at night again.
Refusing to eat – Some of my friends are dealing with this one. They have toddlers who occasionally refuse to eat and survive on dust and air for entire days. Not my bottomless pit. Food is something she’s very serious about. Missing a meal is unheard of here, or at least, if we miss one, she’ll make sure we do hear all about it. While she has some serious preferences towards certain foods, she’ll always find at least one thing to eat, like three dinner rolls.
Respecting pets – Our cats were here before Cordelia, and we wanted her to learn to be gentle with them early on. So far we’ve been successful. The cats love her, and she adores them. Other toddlers tend to chase the cats, or get so excited around them that the cats become scared and run for the upstairs. Cordelia is very gentle with them. She will wave cat toys around for them to play with. They are her furry brothers.
Fear of strangers – While she occasionally gets upset when I leave her, most of the time she’s comfortable with anyone. I keep waiting for the stranger anxiety to come back, but nothing yet. We were at a housewarming party on Sunday, and Cordy was the center of attention. She had no fear going up to people she’s never met and talking to them (or trying to sneak food off of their plates). I hope she eventually develops some fear of strangers, or teaching her about bad strangers when she’s older will be difficult.
Now, I’m certainly not saying that my daughter is a candidate for Miss Toddler USA. She’d probably dirty the pageant dress when she threw herself down for a tantrum, smear food in her hair, run away with the microphone and bite the judges. But sometimes it’s good to see that she doesn’t have every behavioral problem out there. She’s a normal toddler, although a normal toddler who happens to have some different issues than others.
So, what common issues do your children not have?
I have a child in each of the categories you mention. One that loves to co-sleep, one who hates it, one who has a paci, one who never took one, one who goes to sleep easy and the other who needs 20 good night kisses, on who loves people, even strangers, one who is bashful…same two parents, born 22 months apart so we’ve done it all about the same…difference in personality not parents…I adamantly vote, YES! you put it all so nicely in categories though, not all mumbo jumbo like me
Jerri Ann
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Just like you guys, we had four months of colic and a baby that would SCREAM if you stuck a pacifier in her mouth. Though the first four months may have gone a little bit easier if she had taken one, now I’m glad that she didn’t because that’s one less thing to clean the dog hair off of!
Wow she does sound alot like G! G also didnt do most of the above She sleeps through the night…never ever wakes up! Never would take a pacy or a bottle, good with the dog…loves animals. But she does have a fear of strangers which I am glad she has I dont want her to feel comfortable talking to people she doesnt know. She eats..ok. At Cordys age she was eating a ton! But when she hit 20 months or so that really slowed down. I am glad we didnt have to deal with those issues but I think what we dealt with was harder the colic, her highneeds attitude. I almost think it would be easier to deal with all the above and have a happy baby then the little grumpus we had most of the time. Nobody ever said it would be easy and they werent lying!
well, aren’t you perfect?
I am with you…I often read those magazines and wonder how I got so lucky. My daughter is far from perfect, but she is pretty laid back. Never had a pacifier or a bottle, went from breast to a slippy cup. Sleeps in her big bed since she was 15 months old. Eats or at least tries everything we cook. Strangers a little harder since we are so far from family we rarely go out without her.
Kudos to you..I think at least in our situation it is part parenting part awesome kid!
Anonymous – I think you missed me saying I’m not perfect. By no means. In fact, I point out that my child is a complete and utter monster at times.
Or is it that we moms can’t write about the things we’ve done right? Must we only dwell on all of the mistakes we’ve made and beat ourselves down for our errors in judgement? Sorry, too depressing for my tastes.
mmmm The sleep routine was never really an issue because it was just me and her and she was in the bed with me….she did go into a cot no worries though. As for a ‘routine’ seeing as how it changed on a daily basis there wasn’t one! She would sleep anytime, anywhere. We did a lot of travelling too so the anywhere turned out to be a blessing…
The only other thing I can think of the security item most kids have…you know a teddy, or blanket, or mum! She had her bellybutton..it was great, we couldn’t lose it, it was always there. Only problem was all those jumpsuits i’d bought her were useless!!
Great post, I think it highlights that when it comes to kids, there aren’t any rules. Me and my sister are black and white when it comes to parenting – I did demand feed, sleeping and just went with the flow. My sister did the 4 hour feeds on the dot, in bed on the hour and everything by the ‘book’ yet we both have very happy well adjusted kids!
I am now scared you jinxed yourself by saying all of those things outloud.
Go do a voodoo dance or sacrifice something to the baby gods…quick!
You know I was joking ,right…unlike that troll up there…
I can totally understand what you’re saying – and not that you think your daughter/yourself are perfect in any way. It’s just that her difficulties aren’t maybe the stuff of parenting magazines or Nanny 911 (love those shows by the way). And I think it’s awesome that you take some credit for doing good things! You should. Why is okay to “blame” parents when stuff goes wrong but not okay to give them credit when things go right? (It’s the same way with my students, FYI … if they do badly on standardized tests I get blamed but I never get any credit if they do well!)
One thing I’ve learned is that for every “problem” we miss, we make up for with the ones we hit. Different kids have different temperments, and different issues, just like you said. Another reason those parenting magazines just end up annoying me–most of it doesn’t apply, like you said, and then if it does, the advice they give is so generalized and pc, it’s not really useful!
Isaac was always a really good eater, so we didn’t have that problem with him. Vivian is more picky, but still not terrible–though it’s also true for both kids that they go through phases of eating a ton, and then not eating much at all. Vivian loves her pacifer, but Isaac gave his up on his own.
Oh, and hey–I think you’ve made the big time–you have a troll! COngratulations! 😉
anon,
Christina never claimed to be perfect, nor that Cordy was a perfect child. God knows that Cordy has her share of issues. And issues. And issues.
She was simply commenting on the fact that Cordy seems to have avoided most (though not all) of the common places that children her age have problems, so that Lil’ Miss Individual can find other new and exciting places to be a monster.
I find myself reading the same slew of magazines as you do, and I get the same feelings as you (only my kiddo’s only 4 months…).
Let’s see we’re pacifier free, we don’t have a “set” bedtime routine because the kid is practically sleep-walking by 8:00 so it doesn’t matter what we do. We didn’t have colic (knock on wood). But you know what? We’ve had our share of problems, and that’s life. Old anonymous up there either does not have children or he/she had a nanny raise hers.
Kinda makes you scared to have other children doesn’t it? Like you, my first, for the most part, borders on angelic. I just know the next one is going to be karma’s payback.
This entry made me laugh, in a good way! Brought some reality to my life with my 18m son. Some things are good, aren’t they?
My first child was like Cordy on every point. We had no idea how easy she really was (excluding colic) until my son came along. Now we regret not appeciating how good we had it!