I have been struggling with how to put intuitive parenting into words just because it is hard to analyze and quantify.  The biggest reason is because parenting for each of us can be as unique as each parent and child relationship is.  When it comes to parenting, parents need to learn to trust themselves more and stop always looking for answers outside of themselves.  I know this is hard to do when there are a myriad of books, websites, magazines, family and friends as well as professionals that tell you that you don’t know what you are doing. 

      The simplest way to describe intuitive parenting is to put it into two words – stop and listen!  An intuitive parent doesn’t just listen to what is going on around them but also listens to how it is making them and their children feel and why.  That doesn’t mean that they won’t run over to their injured child or stop their child from doing something dangerous before it happens.  It means that they won’t resort to spanking, yelling or being controlling when something doesn’t go right.  Instead they stop, listen and completely assess a situation before they do anything or say anything.

      I understand this is a hard transition for some people to make.  You are made to feel like you always must DO something if you see something not going the way you want it to go no matter how unrealistic your expectations may have been.  Or worse, you do nothing and just accept bad situations for what they are because you feel like you can’t do anything about it.  Both action and acceptance of “the way things are” are socially rewarded so when it comes to parenting you may feel it hard not to follow one of those routes.  

      Intuitive parenting is the complete antithesis of this.  When a parent is able to parent intuitively, they are not coming from a place of worry or fear.  They are coming from a place of feeling the path of least resistance and least stress.  Most importantly, they are feeling their way to the path that’s most joyful for their child.

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Sometimes, you have to experience what you don’t want to truly understand what you need.

Recently I have been dealing with the fact that we are paying almost the equivalent of a car payment, spending countless hours in the car and dealing with constant schedule changes for one of my kids’ activities and yet the communication that goes home is seriously lacking.  I first saw the issue back in December when he needed something in particular and had no idea that he needed it.  It all worked out fine but when one of us spoke to someone who was in charge about it, we were dismissed like it was no big deal.  It would have indeed been no biggie if the communication hasn’t gotten progressively worse since.

I wonder if I am asking too much and also wonder if other parents aren’t caring enough to notice.  Is it just that since we’re a bigger family, the last minute schedule changes and the “You need such and such for tomorrow” is a much bigger deal for us?  Is it that since we are a homeschooling family and have really great communication, we come across as controlling in wanting communication to be better than we are getting?  In this day and age I think it’s inexcusable to find out the day of the lesson, and upon arrival, that a lesson time was pushed back with the only explanation being “I’m sorry.  I thought you knew.  We must have forgotten to tell you.  It will be at this time from now on.”  Between email, internet and, excuse the sarcasm, but this old fashioned thing called the telephone, I don’t think I am being unreasonable to think that since we are paying for services rendered that we are entitled to know about changes and new requirements as they happen.

I even went through the lesson of trusting my child over other adults.  I was initially worried that he was forgetting to tell us things we needed to know.  I’ll admit I grilled him a little more than I should have before I realized that his communication skills are completely age appropriate.  He admits that there have been a few times that the end of a weeknight long practice ends with a 40 minute information lecture and he ends up just trying to keep his eyes open and has missed a couple of things.  When he showed up at the time on his printed schedule for a rehearsal and only a handful of other kids were there, I knew that it wasn’t his fault that he was in fact an hour early.  Those other kids and their parents didn’t know either.

So I am on a quest for a new venue for this particular activity.  I have learned that just because a business is kid related, sells itself well and has a price tag to match, I can’t expect that their communication will be at the level that I want and need.  I am anxious to see the end of year presentations to see if the price we paid was even worth it.  I am hoping that at least my child has learned something.  And while on one hand I have been hoping that they invite him to try out for the next level “club” of what he is doing because I know it will make him feel good, on the other, I am hoping they don’t so I have even more of an excuse to find a better fit for what we are looking for.

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      I haven’t had anything inspire me enough or stir me up enough in the past few days to blog.  That is, until this afternoon.  It started innocent enough.  A friend posted a link to an article of a study against spanking and why she liked it and I shared my opinion in support.  Then, there was a very defensive post, pointed at me, as if I singled this person out, and I don’t even know the guy.  I even apologized if I offended him.  I got a snarky comment back so it was obvious I hit a nerve.  Ah, the spanking debate…

      Really, is there anything left to debate about?  I have yet to see one study saying that it’s ok and doesn’t do any damage.  If you are familiar with Alice Miller, she explains why it continues to be a somewhat ambiguous subject among parents.  Particularly among those that were spanked, in turn spank their own kids and continue think that it’s not only acceptable but are thankful of their own parent’s abuse.  I tend to appreciate her works, being raised by an abusive step-parent, and a father who would spank with a belt, bare bottom, military-style every time no one would admit to really dumb things like who ate the chocolate chips.  To me, it is never ok to hurt a child.  I teach my children, hurting someone else is called assault and people go to jail for that.  It’s not that I want to scare them but I want them to know what the societal boundaries are and not only that “it’s not nice.”

      I think the problem lies in not only getting through to the parents that still think it’s ok because they are subject to a neurosis because they were spanked, but the problem also lies in giving parents resources and ideas of what to do instead.  I will admit that I am far from perfect and have given a swat or two to my kids for absolutely asinine reasons – like “You could have seriously injured your brother.”  That makes sense right?  A swat in the butt for hurting someone else as a “don’t do that” message?  It’s quite the opposite if you think about it isn’t it?  In the moment, I was angry with my child’s behavior and mortified that they did something they knew better than to do.  In the moment, I really didn’t know what else to do.  I was more afraid of what would happen if I did nothing. 

      I have learned a lot in my 13 years of parenting and I know how challenging parenting can sometimes be.  The most important lesson I have learned is to always check with your emotions when it comes to your kids.  If you feel like you are going to do or say anything you would never say to another adult, then you need to calm down and think a little more.  My best way of working out an issue like this is telling my child what I’m not happy about and why, and that I will have to talk to their dad about what else I can say about it.  This has been working amazingly well since I am lucky enough to have a husband that is on the same page as I am in striving to show respect to our kids even when it comes to some tough issues that come up.  The issues just get more complicated as they get older so you need to find your own peaceful method of dealing with things.

      I will post some great sites that suggest different ways of parenting through conflicts and none of them will be the “tough love” garbage that a lot of us had to grow up with.  Click on my Recommended Resources the tab above and check back periodically as I will try to add more as I find them.  You can also suggest resources using the form at the bottom of that page.

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     First let me tell why I think that January 1st is the absolute worst time for resolutions for the new year.  We all just get through two months of holidays and all of the stresses that go along with that.  Those stresses include food that we may not normally eat and in the amounts that we may not normally eat them in.  Another source of stress is visiting with family that may include traveling or having family visit us.  And finally the shopping that a lot of us do that we may or may not have budgeted for.  Here we are just getting through all of this craziness and now we add a completely new stressor onto the mix called a New Year's Resolution.  No wonder most people can't follow through!

     Adding a resolution that causes more stress is not a good idea at this time.  There are no more stressful words that we can say to ourselves than the words Diet and Exercise.  The reason why these are stressful is because we are forcing ourselves into major life changes by following a "program" or by changing our schedule and paying some hefty gym membership fees.  We all should be getting more sleep and paying attention to eating better.  And by eating better I mean paying attention to what we eat and how it makes our bodies feel after we eat it.  We should also be focusing on any debt we got ourselves into during the holiday's and paying it off.  (Congratulations if you didn't!)  The focus should now be on taking care of ourselves and gently at that.  Have you ever noticed how many people end up sick during the months of January and February?  Don't you think it has as much to do with stress as the lack of vitamin D due to shorter daylight hours?

     So when is the best time for resolutions?  In my humble opinion, the best time is at the beginning of spring.  By the time spring comes, you have had time to recuperate from the holiday season and get back into your normal schedule and rhythms.  Instead of New Year's resolutions, I would call them Resolutions of Renewal.  Instead of focusing on fixing what's "wrong" or "bad" you should be thinking of ways to renew your life.  Now that has a much different energy to it doesn't it?

     Make your new resolutions things that will make you feel good both physically and emotionally.  It's time to get outside and think about the exercise you want to do.  You may decide that it's hiking, walking the neighborhood or biking.  You should have already been paying attention to the food you have been eating after the holidays and how it made you physically feel.  Any changes you made over the first few months of the year in your eating habits can be further refined by making new goals like eating more of the fruits and vegetables that are now in season, or even better, growing some of your own.  Even if you don't plant a garden, you can very easily buy a pot, some dirt and some seeds and plant something edible.  Or it just may be cutting out more sugar from what you eat.

     Changes we force ourself into never last.  Small changes repeated over a longer period of time are the ones that do.  So what Resolutions of Renewal are you going to make for yourself this year?
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With the constant bombardment of information, especially regarding parenting, I find myself wondering once in a while if I am supposed to be spending more time reading about it.  After looking at how I was raised, and often wondering how I survived it, I realize that my parenting style has absolutely nothing to do with my own upbringing, aside from knowing how not to do a lot of things.  I have gotten pretty good at giving myself a reality check in realizing that I have four happy, healthy well-adjusted kids.  Parenting has nothing to do with reading articles and books written by people that sometimes don’t even have children and others who, in reality, quite possibly may not be very good parents themselves.  After all, I don’t know them personally, so why should I put any stock in what they have to say.  So how did I get to be the parent I am today?

I approached having children with very much of a “I don’t know a lot, but I’ll do my best.“ attitude.  I had no idea just how seriously I would follow that.  Sure I read a few parenting books and magazines and got plenty of advice and thought that I had an idea of what being a parent is like.  But after our first was born, my biggest surprise was that not one person, book or magazine ever mentioned how absolutely amazing it is!  Not one of them mentioned that you won’t even know what your capacity for love is until you have a child of your own.  As a child, I don't remember experiencing it myself so I had no idea that it even existed.

That is the place where I parent from.  That is what drives my every decision regarding my kids.  That is what keeps me from being a parent of fear, and keeps me a parent who just knows what is right for my kids even if I have to search for some answers from time to time.  That is what reminds me to stay connected with my kids so that I may continue to parent this way.  This is how I know that helping my kids develop their talents is not only the right thing to do, but the responsible thing that I must do.  This is how I know that my children are each their own individual and who they are is perfect.

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     I wanted to make this short since it's a beautiful, sunny day in New England and I want to get my children outside.  To continue my theme from yesterday, I know a lot of people either tend to completely shy away from all chemicals they can't pronounce or they figure that the FDA said it's ok so why bother worrying about it. 
     Here is some good news for all of you, no matter which side you are on.  I have a website for you today that gives you THE SCIENCE of the chemicals in your cosmetics.  Some of them will also show if they are approved as a food additive. (I did see BHT on there so check your cereal boxes!)

Environmental Working Group's Skin Deep - Cosmetic Safety Database

http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/

Happy hunting!
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