Check that Expectation

THANK YOU ANNEKE AT The Dangers of Baby Training

This is most likely the single most important concept for me. The reminder that our children are biologically meant to respond to, demand, cry and need his or her parents on a consistent basis. They are hardwired from a millennia ago to be the same mammal, or human being that their ancestors were. Babies are born with the expectation that their needs will met because they are not able to do so on their own. The expectation or cultural shift that has been occurring in the last few decades have not changed the instinctual needs of our young. They have not changed. Their wants have not changed. Our perception of their wants and needs have changed and our expectation of creating these little minions to meet our needs is not only ridiculous, but negates the very biological nature of mankind!

"How do the forces that put him together in advance know what a human will need? The secret is experience. The chain of experience that prepares a human being for his time on earth begins with the adventures of the first single-celled unit of living matter.  What is experienced in the way of temperature, the composition of its surroundings, available nourishment to fuel its activities, weather changes, and bumpings into other objects or members of its own species was passed on to its descendants...."(Liedloff-Continuum Concept)

Think about it...what does your baby need? Food, comfort, warmth, love, protection....How else will a baby get this without letting us know that they need it? We are designed to fall in love with the infant and instinctually attach to them at birth so that we will take care of them...wouldn't this expectation be the case for the way we are instinctually designed to take of them from birth onward? Check this out: A Mother's Kiss

TELL ME THAT THAT ISN'T AMAZING! We have a release of oxytocin, which shows that we are instinctually responsive to our young!

Isn't this the way we have evolved as mammals? Look at the way other mammals care for their young. Contact, sleeping together, nursing....it's fascinating! When you break it down and think of us as bundles of instincts passed down through hundreds of thousands of years, mammals and their young....would they consider crying it out? Would they consider making the baby deal with their needs when it was scheduled or more appropriate from the family? NO WAY! All Animals Respond to Their Young  and Animal Mothers Love Their Babes

Once you peel away the societal expectations of how you are "supposed" to care for your child and you stop to think about the "advice" that has been mis-guided from the last few generations...you start to see that it is in fact mis-guided. The way that our children are meant to experience their world has shifted because of convenience and a change in the ideals of Western society. Mothers were meant to sleep with their young as a means of protection and proximity...granted...the threat of my child in Connecticut is much smaller than that of the child in the Amazon...the instinctual need for safety is still there...the psychobiological desire for both mother and child still exists. 

"Anthropologists link the objections to an increasing sense of individualism in Western society. Whereas the parent-child relationship was once seen as foundational to a family, the spouse-spouse relationship is now prioritised. Along with the fairly modern concept of privacy, and American-stressed values of independence and self-reliance, the model of sleep began to shift to allow parents their own sleeping space. Children were encouraged to "self-soothe" and follow adult (monophasic) sleep patterns, despite infants being wired for polyphasic sleep."

Psychological Benefits of Cosleeping: How Bedsharing Emotionally Impacts Mothers and Babies

We will dive into each principle of Attachment Parenting at a later date...the purpose of this "rant" is to try to shift the mindset of our culture. This is indeed NOT a new trend or a NEW way of doing things...this is in fact returning to our original place in life, our original purpose. Once we are able to change the initial gut reaction of the public to listen, to not judge instantly, then we can move away from the name-calling-Mommy-Wars and further away from the negative terms like "spoiling"...We can move on to coming to a consensus for the benefit of our children, our world.

It may not be for everyone, but it certainly should not be denied or ignored. I am the first one to preach choices and the first one to respect ALL choices, however, the implications of such choices should be considered and at the very least, acknowledged. You may not choose to raise your child in this manner, you may not agree, but you can also not ignore the premise of mammalian instinct and desire to do the best that you do for your child.