** A collection of articles and other fun stuff from around the web. Mostly dealing with babies, parenting, moms, etc. But not always. **
Why Spanking Doesn’t Work (new study shows it might work temporarily, but in the long-term it will increase aggressiveness and other antisocial behavior)
Before Children Talk… They Understand a Lot! (I swear Adeline understands everything I say at this point… It’s kind of scary.)
Too Many Babies Receive Acid Reflux Meds, Says Doc (Really interesting article. I fully admit that we tried the meds, but they didn’t work. Things got much better when I cut out all dairy.)
Infants at greatest risk for child abuse (This is just so sad.)
Daughters Make Dads Let Go Of Traditional Gender Roles, Says Study (pretty self-explanatory)
Why French Parents Are Superior (While I don’t agree with everything the author says, the article does raise some interesting points, especially related to teaching patience and saying “No” like you mean it.)
Curious – what don’t you agree with in the French article? I thought that was very interesting.
I’m uncomfortable with the implication that the highest goal for our children should be complete obedience. Obviously I think that’s important, but I also think we should encourage creative thinking, independence, self-assurance, etc. To the extent she’s just talking about getting your kids to behave when you’re at the park or in a restaurant, I get it. But I felt that the undertone was more of just a “your kid should be seen and not heard” kind of attitude. And I’m not down with that.
I also definitely disagree with the implication that having your baby sleep through the night at two months is the best possible outcome. Breastfed babies almost never sleep through the night that early, and they shouldn’t: if they are it might mean they’re not getting enough to eat and it might interfere with long-term breastfeeding. I also think it just sets up an unreasonable expectation that leads parents to feel inadequate if their baby doesn’t sleep through the night. Even most parents I know who did the whole “cry it out” thing still struggled with night wakings for a long time after. It’s just not realistic and I don’t believe that all French parents somehow have magically sleeping babies.
I think there were other little things that rubbed me the wrong way, but those are the two things that really bothered me
The main message I got was not obedience, so much as it was patience. Remember how it said the concept of obedience is more ours than theirs – they see it as education? The kids need to be patient, and get accustomed to not getting everything they want the second that they want it. Be respectful of others, etc. I love these ideas. Having 4 kids we are constantly having to stop them from interrupting us while we’re trying to talk, or each other. Sometimes it drives me crazy – love the idea of it not happening. Totally agree with you on the sleeping – my kids were breast-fed and did not sleep through the night for quite a while. (We also didn’t have them in their own room for quite a while.)