Letters in issue 16

Alternatives to vaccination

Thanks for your terrific magazine. When our baby girl was born in February we decided to hold off vaccinating her for at least 6 months until we could do some further research and to get to know her better. Your recent articles have helped us to believe that we have made the right decision so far. We have also recently started her on a homoeopathic innoculation process which our natural therapist tells us will go on for many more years. Not only is this process labour intensive (ie there are three different formulas to be given at seven times in total during each day) but it is also much more costly.

While I don’t begrudge this duty, I am interested in what alternative options there are to help boost a baby’s immune system. Can I encourage your future issues to provide us readers with some understanding about these alternative options and approaches?

Monica Richter
Email


Thank you for your wonderful magazine. My partner and I along with our two-year-old son are planning a trip to India and Bhutan next year. I am interested in hearing of other readers’ experiences of travelling in a third world country, particularly with a child that is not immunised. Others’ suggestions and advice would be great or relevant websites would also be helpful.

Dunstan
Coffs Harbour, NSW


Editor’s note — some helpful resources

• Vaccination Information South Australia does a great booklet.
visa@adelaide.on.net,
see www.visainfo.org.au
•  Vaccination Information Service
vaccinfo@bigpond.com,
see www.vaccination.inoz.com
• See ‘Should I Vaccinate My Child?’ by Jini Patel Thompson, Vol 14, June – August 2005 edition of byronchild
See ‘Homoeopathic Disease Prevention’ by Isaac Golden, Vol 2,  June – August 2002 edition of byronchild.


Beef association pays for anti-vegetarian study

I thought you might want to know that the article ‘Children on a meat free diet....’ (June 05 edition, Childnews) was based on a study funded by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association. Below is an excerpted article, which will explain better than I can. I hope that you find it informative and see fit to print a correction. It is hard being a vegetarian mother. I know several, and all their kids are healthy and happy. There is a lot of evidence to say a vegetarian diet is better for kids, especially compared with the diet of the average child these days.

Excerpt from Vegsource.com:
Dr. Lindsay Allen, currently of the US Agricultural Research Service, told the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) that a vegan diet was so lacking in necessary nutrients that it is tantamount to child abuse.

Was this based on carefully conducted research? No. Was it based on structured study with control groups and meticulous monitoring of what children ate? No. Was it perhaps based on a large number of children eating a normal vegan diet who were found to have a greater than usual risk for illness? No. Her basis for this bizarre and completely unfounded declaration was her experience in Africa. Children who had been eating nothing but corn and beans were given a little meat and their health improved. Not children on a normal, healthy vegan diet — children who had been eating nothing but corn and beans. Adding almost anything to their diet would have caused improvement.

Just eating beans and corn isn’t an accurate representation of a vegan diet any more than it’s an accurate representation of a kosher diet. So what do you find when you look at children who are eating a normal vegan diet?

Children raised on fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes grow up to be slimmer and healthier and even live longer than their meat-eating friends. Vegetarian and vegan diets can be a healthy way of eating for all age groups.

So why then would a USDA representative make such a ridiculous claim? Could the many and strong ties between the USDA and the meat industry be one reason? To find another, one need only look to who paid for this ‘study’ — none other than the (US) National Cattlemen’s Beef Association.

Robert Servine
Email


Questions and concerns about attachment parenting

I have a four-month-old son. I came across a link to your page and read your article, ‘Bonding and the Origins of Love’ (June – Aug 2004 edition). While I think the ideas are good, I think your conclusions are wrong, and here is why.

My husband’s mom followed the ideas you present. She breastfed him, held him all the time etc. As he grew up, he was taught that his mom was responsible for everything, his care, his wellbeing, etc. He was not. He was treated very differently than his other siblings, who are girls. They were taught to be strong and independent. Now that I’m married to him, I see that he carries a lot of baggage with him. He still is very irresponsible. He was always allowed to do what he wanted to do when he wanted to do it. If he wanted something, his mom would serve it to him on a silver platter. He never had to do things himself (chores etc) because his mom felt like ‘he shouldn’t have to’.

So I’m left to pick up the pieces. I’m at home with my son, cleaning the house when he’s sleeping, getting the errands done around town, and then cooking and cleaning up when my husband gets home from work. What does he do?

Watches TV, helps me with something if I ask him to several times, watches movies or plays video games. Myself, on the other hand, my mom taught me to be independent. I was not breastfed because my mom physically was not able to do it (she had twins). She could not carry us around all the time because there were two of us. We would play independently or together. We never slept with her (unless we were afraid of the thunder storms). And I grew up to be a perfectly healthy individual. My mom and I have a great relationship, and I am a healthy adult.

My parental views are to do as much for my son as I can, but to also teach him the way the world works. I have a few medical conditions which required me to get on prescriptions as soon as my son was born, so I never breastfed him. Yet I hold him and look into his eyes as I bottlefeed him. He smiles as soon as he sees my face and is advanced in his milestones. I do not carry him around all the time because am I going to do that when he is one and two years old? No. So I don’t think he should get used to it now only to have to re-train him later. I don’t want him to think I ‘don’t love him anymore’ because I stop carrying him. Instead, if I never start carrying him all the time, then he learns not to associate me carrying him with my love for him, which is the way it should be.

Right now I do not have a college degree. Next fall, I will be going to college to get an associate’s degree in Nursing so that my husband and I can provide for our son. I will have no other choice than to put him in daycare temporarily, but the monetary situation will bring about a good future for us. Sometimes we have to make those sacrifices. It is life.

My son sleeps in his own crib because again, having to re-train him later to sleep in his own bed is much harder than starting him off there in the first place. Now, I never ever let him cry it out. I will always go to him and meet his needs when he cries. But he and I have very good communication. I can tell by his cries what he needs when he needs it, sometimes even before he cries for it. So he never has to cry for more than a couple of minutes before his need is met.
I believe my son will grow up to be a healthy child. I don’t think that everything you said is wrong, I just think you came to the wrong conclusions about things.

Also, it seems like you put the child as the number one priority. That is exactly backwards. My son is my number two priority. My husband/marriage is number one. Being a child of divorce, I see how absolutely crucial it is to maintain a strong marriage for the health of the child. We both feel that things like co-sleeping would interfere in our marriage, and that is another reason why we don’t do it. Parents need to put their spouses first, otherwise, when the demands of the baby take over, the marriage falls apart because the other spouse (usually the father) feels like he gets the ‘leftovers’ of his wife’s time and energy.

Candace
email


Editor’s response

Thank you for your email and for your interesting points. I must first say that the neurobiology behind bonding and attachment has nothing to do with raising a child to think that everything is done for him and revolves around him.

Breastfeeding, co-sleeping, holding, touch and eye contact are practices instilled by nature from the onset of our species, impiemented to ensure the continuous optimal evolution of humanity. That is, these practices literally hardwire the brain towards health and wellbeing.

There are of course grey areas within each of our unique situations that give a degree of variance manifested in our lives — for example, you were not breastfed, but perhaps your mother stayed connected to you in other ways, which certainly contributed towards your wellbeing.

But you must also bear in mind that while you feel that you grew up to be a perfectly healthy individual, you have engaged in a relationship with a man who refuses to take personal responsibility for himself or his family. Choices we make like this are a direct result of how we were raised. There is no shame or blame here, it is just a simple and straightforward fact, from a neuro-developmental perspective. And, as products of our time, we (you and me and everyone) are all in the same boat.

That is why the science of how we develop as children is so important for our time. Because we want better choices for our children, and ultimately for the planet.  A child’s wellbeing is determined by the sum of many variables, which is great because none of us are ‘perfect’ parents. But in extreme cases, where none or few of those variables are met — then the damage is irreversible — as in the orphans who were never touched; their brains showed literal ‘black holes’ and the results were children who were totally emotionally damaged.

But bonding is completely different from the fear-based dynamic that a parent might create by teaching their children that ‘their mother is responsible for everything’. This is not bonding, but is actually the reverse. It is fear of one’s own authority as a parent to set limits and boundaries. Your husband’s mother developed this fear of her authority because she herself was probably, like most of us, raised without a sense of security (bonding). She may have been breastfed, but certainly in those times other important emotional needs were not met in children.

And so the cycle is continued and now your husband marries a woman who is fearful in the same way and will not set clear boundaries with him and allows him to do what he wants. Again, this is not a judgment; this is the challenge for so many of us — we are products of how we were raised. To the degree we were raised with love, REAL love — not just ‘letting a kid have it the way they want’, and connection — is the degree that we will live that way as adults. Simply seeing it in an unemotional way helps us to move beyond it.

I am concerned when I see you write, ‘I don’t think he should get used to it now only to have to re-train him later’. Children are not to be ‘trained’. Children are innately intelligent, and respond to the appropriate developmental cues according to their sense of being connected to their world — primarily the mother. Again, this is not a ‘theory’; this is hard neuro-developmental science. Independence emerges in children quite naturally when they have a sense of security.

When they feel insecure (their needs are not being met) then they are less independent. You have seen this from your own experience with your son. You meet his needs — sometimes even before he cries! Parents who let their children ‘cry it out’ for the sake of ‘training them to be independent’ are in for a rude awakening when their children begin to show signs of insecurity in various ways. I didn’t have to ‘train’ my children when they were older that ‘I wouldn’t hold them’; they quite naturally were not interested. They had moved on, but by their own developed volition. This is very powerful.

It sounds to me like you are bonded with your son. But remember that the neuro-science behind optimal brain development is just that — what is ‘optimal’. It is optimal for me to exercise three times a week. It doesn’t mean that I do it. But I know, and the research tells me, that it is optimal. I won’t vilify the research if I decide not to exercise three times a week by saying, ‘Oh the research is wrong, it is actually better if I drink beer all day and sit in front of the TV”. I will say, ‘It would be best if I exercised, but I choose for my lifestyle now, not to do it.’ It is exactly the same with the science of bonding.

It is inarguably optimal if children are: breastfed for two years and beyond, can sleep near or next to us, are carried often in the early months, have no television for the first two years, have been born naturally, stay out of early childcare ... and, life and society has its way and we make our own choices around that. Unfortunately, the market-driven society and our current hurried culture is completely at odds with this large body of hard science. And making these choices becomes harder and harder. But to vilify the research only undermines us and our children in the end. It takes the pressure off of public service and our government to make changes so that we can be more available to our children.

My hope is that you will do your own further research behind the science of bonding. Check out the website http://www.ttfuture.org where you will find many resources. Then, gently let in the reality that, for whatever reason, some of those practices you did not do, or will not do. Explore too, what you might have missed out on as a child yourself and how that feels. Don’t let guilt come in, or judgment. Just let it all be there. And then, see what flowers.

Kali

 

As you may remember I am a faithful reader of your inspiring editorials and never miss one!

A couple of issues ago you wrote about Super Nanny, and your thoughts are largely shared by me in this regard. I confess I have a real love-hate relationship with this show. I have read all the books out there on ‘positive’ discipline — ie, Aletha Solter’s books, Faber/Mazlish, Alfie Kohn, PET etc, yet I still watch this show and implement some time-out in order to keep myself sane (my girls are 3 and 5).

I find that I still have misgivings about some of the aspects of positive discipline, and was wondering if you may share my concerns and if you have any possible insights? For one thing, when I read Parent Effectiveness Training, I was a little concerned by the fact that Gordon basically suggested the parent is supposed to have NO authority. At least not demonstrate any. This seems, frankly, a little ridiculous to me to deny there is any hierarchy within the family, especially when children are small. There was also precious little about how to implement such a system with young kids.

Also, I wonder if teaching our children that EVERY issue is up for negotiation is a smart thing? I wonder if this is creating a person who has little respect for boundaries of any sort. I have a psychologist friend who has seen adults in therapy raised under this philosophy (she has read the book) and she believes it sometimes ‘creates a monster’ so to speak. That they are unable to hear a firm NO from someone and handle it gracefully.

Many of the other books along these lines have the same emphasis on democratic discipline, even for two- and three-year-olds. I wonder if the pendulum has swung too far in this direction? Surely there is a place for parental authority (as opposed to an authoritarian insistence on blind obedience at all times)? Surely sometimes it is necessary to put your foot down with a firm NO, without endless negotiation?

Do you think sometimes kids need to know that WE are going to make some rules with their interests at heart? Sure, we welcome their feedback, but essentially someone has to be the leader? Perhaps it gives them a sense of security to know that someone older, and hopefully wiser, is making some of the decisions for them until they are at an age to appropriately do so for themselves? How, though, to ‘enforce’ any rules that are made?

I also wonder if positive discipline promotes a ‘parent as peer’ atmosphere, where the parent is basically on equal footing with the child, almost like a sibling. Is this a good thing — maybe they sometimes just need us to be a ‘parent’? After all, every culture seems to have some version of ‘respect your elders’. When I think back to school, the teachers I liked best were most certainly NOT seeking out our friendship, they were the ones most interested in doing a good job and bringing out the best in us. The ones that tried to be ‘popular’ and be ‘on our level’ were seen as a bit pathetic! Anyway, I hope I have made sense here, Kali. I am not comfortable with behaviour modification tools like time-out and rewards, etc. Neither am I entirely comfortable with a complete abdication of authority. Nor do I always have the energy to think ‘creatively’ about every single little problem that comes up. Surely a few minutes of time-out sometimes is not going to do lifelong damage, is it??!!

Carly
Newcastle, NSW


Editor’s note

There are many articles in byronchild that address this subject, but try specifically, Who’s in Charge? The downside of confusing continuum parenting with child-centredness, by Jean Liedloff, March – May 2005 issue, and Redefining Authority, the September – November 2002 issue’s editorial by Kali Wendorf.


Attachment parenting support groups are great

I am bringing byronchild to our local attachment parenting support centre in Perth called the Family Nurturing Centre. This is a great yoga centre that is just so much more! It’s run by Sam and Sydel Weinstein and has had over 2,500 families through its doors, as well as running a 24 hour help-line (ConsciousParentingHelpline@compuserve.com), 08 9482 4154, a global parent/baby clothing recycling program, (It outfits locals in need as well as parents in need around the globe.) and the list truly does go on.

I personally have had mountains of unconditional support from not just Sam and Sydel but the many midwives, therapeutic practitioners and mothers who give so much to the centre in the name of creating a ‘community’ to raise children in, that is free from violence, abuse and ill health and one that encourages attached, natural, loving and conscious parenting.

The parent chat line I spoke to you about is run through the groups on Yahoo, with many mums active contributors and many more local and international silent watchers. You can go through the Yahoo home page > groups > fncparents, and see what kind of things we chat about — nothing new for you I guess, but it’s great that anyone can use these resources to get answers and opinions.

Keep up the great work, there’s plenty of us over here that you’re getting through to.

Steph
Perth, WA