Thinking about parenting in America

We parent just a little bit outside the mainstream, it seems. I've read that there are two schools of thought about being a parent, one that you fit your baby into your life, and the other that you fit your life around the baby. Of course it's not ever so black and white as that but we lean towards the latter as we don't do much scheduling and don't sleep train, and we cosleep with our babies, etc. I have been thinking about this quite a bit lately, especially as we now have two kiddos and there is a little more method to the madness (as opposed to the just-survive-it perspective of the first time parent).

Americans place a very high value on independence and self-reliance. Think of the classic American archetype of the rugged cowboy who doesn't need anyone and doesn't let anyone tell him what to do. This is often reflected in our typicaly childrearing practices where there is a similar emphasis on training the child to become independent from an early age. You've heard of the expression that a parent's goal is to put themselves out of a job. I've seen this taken to the extreme of parenting books advising moms to put their infants in a playpen out of sight for half an hour per day so that the baby learns to play alone, or of course the more hard core versions of cry-it-out sleep training when you ignore a crying infant for long periods of time. Something seems out of proportion to me here.

Independence is of course a virtue but not a singular and unique virtue, and there is balance needed to an overemphasis on self reliance. This is because our basic orientation as human beings is actually dependent, as creatures of God's making. Our primary relationship with our Maker is one of total dependency. Not to mention the interdependency inherent to all important human relationships, marriage, fellowship among believers just to name a few. And frankly my own mom has not put herself out of a job yet as her two grown daughters still need her from time to time (reference last summer when she looked after me and my son for six weeks...). And to flip it around, I am sure that one day when I am old I will depend on my own children.

What I notice as George gets older is that I don't have to do much to encourage him in independence. He has the concepts of "mine" and "I do it" down all on his own. I find it harder, with a toddler, to teach him to allow help when he really needs it. This is a lesson Americans could surely use as we are so in fear of asking for help, of being in the way or inconveniencing others. In our parenting Tim and I try to balance encouraging independence, at a rate largely set by the developmental trajectory of the child, and offering help when needed. There is such blessing in allowing others to help you and we don't want our children to be overly inhibited about asking for assistance. So in sum, we tend not to let our kids cry too much, as we read that as the signal of a kid who can't quite handle the situation. Not that we always jump in and "do for" the child, and sometimes just a little frustration is good motivation for the child to figure something out, but we try to give what's needed, no more and- also- no less.

I hope we don't ever completely put ourselves out of a job.

(ps Sorry about the recent lack of pictures, we have a new camera and George is fascinated by it. Whenever we pull it out he wants to push the buttons and won't let us get a picture of him. We'll keeping working on it!)