Читать книгу The Fussy Baby Book: Parenting your high-need child from birth to five - Martha Sears - Страница 10

Hayden’s persistent personality forced us to keep working at a parenting style until we found what worked.

Hayden taught us that tiny babies don’t manipulate, they communicate. A child psychologist friend who was visiting us was interested in Hayden’s cry. She was impressed that the cry was not an angry, demanding one but rather an expectant one, as if Hayden knew she would be heard.

Hayden caused us to re-evaluate our job description as parents. We had always thought an effective parent needed to be in constant control. Then we realized that mind-set was self-defeating. It assumes that there is an adversarial relationship between parent and child: the baby is “out to get you”, so you better get her first. Hayden made us realize our role was not to control her. It was to manage her, and to help her learn to control herself.

What helped us get over the fear-of-spoiling and the fear-of-being-manipulated mind-set was the realization that it was better to err on the side of being over-reactive and over-responsive. As we worked on developing a balance of appropriate responses, there were times when we responded too slowly and times when we jumped too quickly, but we felt that when in doubt, it was better to be responsive. Children who are perhaps indulged a bit (as many firstborn high-need children are) will at least develop a healthy self-image and trust in their parents. With this foundation it is easier to back off a bit as you try to create a healthy balance between parents’ needs and child’s. The child of parents who respond too little develops a poor self-image, and a distance develops between parent and child. This situation is harder to remedy. I have never heard parents in my paediatric practice say that they wish they hadn’t held their baby so much. In fact, most, if able to rewind their parenting tape, would hold their baby more.