Mary P.'s recent post about Burton White's Raising a Happy, Unspoiled Child, got me thinking.
After pondering about Aidan's lack of maturity, it occured to me how dependant these books are on the accepted learning curve. I like the advice Mary has found - that fine line between spoiling and setting boundaries. Sometimes I think I teeter on that fence daily. And when my kids were babies and someone muttered "Would you just put that baby down?! Letting him cry it out will do him some good". I wish I actually had that book to throw at the offender. I also teeter on that precarious fence between thinking there is nothing wrong with my kid to creating a knot in my gut with worry about Aidan's slow speech development. And one thing that I learned through my experiences with Owen - is that weekly one hour speech therapy sessions merely loosen mom's knot of anxiety. That amount of therapy doesn't really contribute much, if any, to a child's speech development. And sometimes it can even heighten a parents anxiety by contributing to their fears with the contant reminders of how far behind they are. With Owen, I've become hyperconscious of the power of labelling and how they are not just words. They can affect a child's development, and self identity and the way we learn to treat them through that label. Think about it. Another case in point: in the 50's homosexuality was a psychiatric illness. Now it is way of being one is born with (I don't really buy into that arguement that its an immoral choice).
INTERJECTION: folks at CBC...Negotiate that settlement already!! I want my morning radio show. Given that my morning show typically consists of talk radio, hearing music is discombobulating. K-OS followed by Leonard Cohen folllowed by The Barenaked Ladies....come on!!
Back to my regular scheduled program...
So when I was camping at Fundy a couple weeks ago, another parent was admiring the precociousness of my kids. He was sincere. (It wasn't one of those back handed compliments.) "You have three indigo kids! Amazing!"
Huh? Whats an indigo kid?
I'm imagining Violet Bauregarde after the infamous peice of full-meal chewing gum.
"Indigo kids are very special children who are often misdiagnosed as having ADD or ADHD"
I was hooked. The word misdiagnosis has me hooked.
Then he mentions he just read the book, and he'll give it to me.
And he did. The nice thing about camping is that I was able to arrange a bit of child free time and sat at picinic table and read it. I skimmed. I am good at skimming.
I have to admit, that the advice was great - give children lots of choices, honour their differences, keep boundaries clear and firm...that sort of sage advice. The context for this advice was...well you decide for yourself.
The term indigo is used, because it refers to the color of their aura. These children have been "arriving" on earth since the 1980's (some claim the 60's) and they are more spiritually evolved than non-indigos. (There is a whole typology associated with Indigos. Check out their website and scroll down...you can see it for yourself). Apparently they have arrived to meet the advanced techological and moral challenges of our world. This was learned through the use of channelling by the way.
Yeah...
I am open to many things. But I tend to furrow my brow when it comes to mention of crystals
and trance channelling. Its' in my nature. Teaching the academic study of religion for these ast 8 years has given me a tough as nails approach to the new age movement. Yet the advice was good, and did not involve the use of Crystals, Spirits, high vibrational frequencies or auras. Normally I would be all over this topic like a pirranah on flesh. I'd be vicious and scathing, critical and condescending.
I hesitate. I liked the fellow who swore by this book. I met his kids. They are unbelievably well adjusted and very normal. Harry and his 12 yr old son had a blast making up stories about farting, pooping and death. His daughter was the most intelligent, mature and sweet 10 year old I have met. I mentioned in a previous post that she offered to help put my kids to sleep so I could enjoy some grown-up time by the campfire. I might not have converted myself to the theology around the indigo kid...but it sure humbled me to meet a dude with such wacky ideas with such well behaved kids.
So, you can't really judge a parenting manifesto by its cover...
Three Years
6 months ago
3 comments:
How do you stop worrying? A friend of mine said if he didn't have any kids, he wouldn't have anything to worry about. Even non-worriers worry about their kids. If you had 12 kids and couldn't remember what they were called half the time, would that diffuse the worry? Or would there just be more of the wee buggers to worry about!
The important thing is that Aidan is safe. The rest is not interesting. So what? Did you have guilt feelings or shame? If you didn't, who cares? You can go to jail. And they can go to hell!!!
When my eldest son was a little boy, he almost drowned in a pool two feet in diameter and one foot deep. Everybody's forgotten the incident already. My wife, who is an alcoholist and still is, was the one who found him. I hate my wife for being an alcoholist but this is one of the things I really love her for.
I am new to your blog, but I loved this post. I was in an elevator with my son one day and a woman we had spoken to several times said to me, "He is an indigo child, I can tell." I was freaked out. She gave me the titles of a few books and I read them, but I'm having trouble getting past all the new age speak.
Although, so much makes sense about there being a "new kind of human". Think of all the over diagnosis of ADD and ADHD. It's become the trash can diagnosis. I could babble about this for days, but your children sound wonderful and just as they should be. (Whatever the hell that means.)
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