Stealing the term from my friend Elvis Canino, author of the blog Do not mistreat me, I am a child, who highlighted precisely a post on this subject in our last review of blogs of moms and dads, I want to talk today about the capricious upbringing.
And it is a question with which, every time, I find myself more puzzled. It has taken me years, I suppose that it has taken my son to grow, to realize that it is necessary to clearly explain that Respectful upbringing is not a capricious upbringing.
My personal transit through respectful upbringing has been simple, my son has been respected in his needs, accompanied by his emotions, but he has also received explanations so that he could understand that others, like himself, deserve respect and have needs.
When we talk about raising without scourges, without punishment and without violence, I usually encounter criticism from parents who cite families who know that, in the end, they have not been able to understand the essence of respect well and have turned their children into small tyrants who believe that any appetite, desire or idea must be fulfilled immediately by their parents.
They confuse, then, those who criticize them and those who have allowed the child to become the absolute owner of everyone's lives, respect for the whim.
But it's not the same, rather it's the opposite, because respect is not something unidirectional, respect is to understand the needs of the other and to accommodate them in our lives, differentiating the basic need for security, affection and care with specific whims or expressions of needs that disguise themselves as non-logical requests.
Whimsical Parenting
The parents, in those cases, are responsible for channeling the child, educating them in values, explaining it, embracing it if necessary, but not putting it above the same Universe.
Children who, past the age of tantrums, those moments in which the emotion surpasses them and they do not know how to express or channel their feelings, naturally overflow, continue riding dramas for real nonsense and, their parents, without authority or arguments, give in to them by putting the children above all and of the same logic.
Impertinent children, who are not able to mark the limit of respect for others, who try to impose themselves on other children or adults, who do not behave politely. Whimsical children who do not return respect, who speak to their parents in an angry way while they humble themselves to calm the little rabid.
Not that is not respectful parenting. Respectful parenting is an example and education, children really educated in respect know how to respect others. That's capricious upbringing.
Baby's needs
The needs of a baby are sovereign. They have no place for explanations and only the real limits of the parents should be a brake on the needs of the baby. Sleeping accompanied, being hugged, carried in arms, fed on demand and attended in your request for contact and love are needs. Given that, parents, we have little sleep, little to leave and leave our personal desires parked when our child needs us.
But as the child grows and is able to understand language and others, the role of parents increases in their demand although the real requirement of direct attention may be less. Now we must educate, not control or channel everything the child asks, but understand that the real need is one thing and the expression of those needs is another.
Needs and whims
A child who asks for a toy, be the first to sit in the car, choose his place at the table, eat certain foods that are not suitable for his health or simply, see all his wishes fulfilled, what he expresses is not that he needs that specific thing , but he is asking for something else: sometimes they are limits, sometimes they are explanations, to overcome is the continuity that he is loved, understood and also, and that is fundamental, guided.
An excessive belief that children, innocent and free, should be our only guide is an error in my opinion. The child needs certain parents who are safe, understanding, capable of empathizing with him, but also to show him that others, themselves included, are people with rights and needs.
Giving a child guidelines and limits in which to grow freely and respectfully is not to punish, much less to hit or threaten. It is more complicated, more tired and demanding, implies great dedication and enormous personal learning. But certainly the alternative to punishment is not capricious upbringing.
