Go read the Disclaimer again. I am not a doctor. This is not medical advice. Seriously.
I'm not going to write about gentle discipline, or how very small infants do not need discipline, or anything like that. I'm instead proposing something very simple, that may shock and appall you: Discipline is unnecessary and damaging. My firstborn is not yet seven months. Obviously, I don't know anything. Hang around for the laughs; you might find something useful here.
Current dogma about how to care for children goes something like this. When they are very young (certainly the first three or four months, possibly up to the first couple of years), children's needs and wants are the same, and the parental role is to fulfill those needs. After this phase comes to an end, discipline becomes necessary. Parents are believed to know what their children need, and expected to block their children's wants when they are different from their needs, and insist their needs be fulfilled, whether they want them or not.
In its early form (around four months), mothers are urged to "get that baby on a schedule". The population at large is roped into pressuring new parents into coercing their infants to sleep long blocks of time, and to sleep at regular intervals. Numerous people offer up their expertise in assisting the parents at this onerous task (one that is quite unusual across cultures). That is: the earliest forms of discipline for small babies are sleep training and scheduled feeding. Most parents do not think of this as discipline, and new parents are encouraged to do things to their baby that they would not do if they did think of it as discipline. Medical professionals and some scientists are rallied to the cause in an effort to give it credibility.
In a somewhat later form, discipline appears when a parent decides they are tired of changing diapers, and want their child to use a potty or toilet instead. Perhaps diapering should be thought of as the earliest form of discipline; certainly many babies and toddlers object to being diapered.
All three of these early forms of discipline can be completely avoided. Scheduled feeding is increasingly recognized as unhealthful; cue feeding ("demand feeding") at the breast is the nurturing action which scheduled feeding supplanted. Sleep training in its most toxic forms (putting young babies to sleep on their tummies, early food introduction and formula feeding) have been exposed as unhealthful; sleeping with or near your baby is the attachment-promoting, needs fulfilling action which isolated sleep supplanted. Diapers are not natural. They are there to protect flooring and furniture from baby bodily fluids. Natural infant hygiene, early potty training or elimination communication is the needs fulfilling action diapers and late potty training supplanted.
To take on so many basic cultural ideas all at once is to be in-sane, to be crazy. And these distinctions serve no purpose other than to make everyone feel bad, if viable alternatives do not exist. But, viable alternative ways of caring for young people do exist. And they are worth learning about. A number of very good books have been written for parents, describing in detail how to better interact with their children, to be more respectful, to better communicate with their not entirely verbal children, to better communicate verbally with their children, and to otherwise be a more effective parent. There are even books designed to teach parents how to teach problem solving skills to their children (while sneaking in teaching the parents along the way). With the exception of some of Magda Gerber's comments, I have not yet had an opportunity to use these ideas with my own child. I have, however, used them to a limited degree with friends who are young, and the children of friends. Certainly the general principles apply to all human interactions. Two obvious problems arise early that suggest this approach cannot work. The first problem is safety. Small babies do not survive unsupervised, although Magda Gerber and the folks at RIE advocate childproofing a room to such a degree that they could. Even if you do childproof a room for your baby, if you take your baby out of that room, the safety issues return. The second problem is the difficulty of communicating with a small baby. It can be difficult to imagine how to validate emotions or reach consensus with a tiny infant. The two problems are more intertwined than one might realize. Safety for babies requires some control of their environment and some control of them. This is relatively straightforward until they are mobile, and for some time thereafter assuming the caregivers are able to pursue, pick up and carry the toddler while necessary. Babies and toddlers who are carried cannot run out into traffic, nor can they stick a hand onto a hot burner (assuming the caregiver is adequately cautious) or pick up sharp objects (ditto). Protecting the caregiver, and anyone's property, from the mauling of the child is tougher, but that is not a safety concern. Physical control of the child can also protect the caregiver and property, without resort to pain or violence, but the caregiver might need to learn techniques. Physical modification of the environment (remove temptations and dangers), when possible, reduces the amount of effort required from the caregiver. Even very small babies are very expressive. The more you attend to what they are attempting to communicate, the more effort they will put into expressing themselves. The more you ignore what they express, the more they will escalate straight to whatever does work, which will probably be very unpleasant for you (wailing, for example). The single most helpful technique for protecting you, your baby and valuable/dangerous stuff in the environment is essentially communication, negotiation and problem solving all wrapped up in one parenting tactic: The Swap. Copyright 2006 by Rebecca Allen.What's Wrong With Parent as an Authority in Control of Their Child's Behavior?
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Created March 9, 2006
Updated June 28, 2006