Even though I've been "back" at work after my sabbatical for exactly a year now, it has continued to be difficult to integrate my inner world with my daily responsibilities and roles. Internally I continue to grieve, to feel a loneliness that is both missing Midi and the reality that I no longer have this person who was so a much a part of how I was known and cared for, to feel some amount of disconnect with Jesus, to wrestle with how life feels difficult and disappointing most of the time these days. Externally I either spend my time leading a ministry to college students, being focused on things like vision, evangelism, leadership development and pastoral care, or caring for two young kids, shuttling to soccer games, interacting with other moms, washing clothes, making meals, and working hard to be both compassionate and authoritative with them in healthy ways. Neither of those roles either lend themselves to mourning or internal struggle readily or leave much practical space for those kind of things.
Two things have proved to be helpful, though. The main one has been creating margins for myself. I need more time to just be, to pray, reflect, read, to have space for things like exercise or just resting, than I used to. Perhaps some of that is just getting older; I can't function at high RPMs all the time anymore without serious burnout. But I think a good deal of it is simply that I need more space of the internal stuff to come to the surface. Rushing around the house or the various campuses I supervise does not give me enough room for the deeper issues to come up, but if I don't make space for that surfacing, it becomes even more painful at times. So as difficult as it has been for me logistically, I'm trying to get better at giving myself margins at least weekly, if I can't manage daily.
The other thing that has been helpful is being able to go deep, to be fully myself with people. This is no easier logistically than having margins; the people I'm closest to have as many competing responsibilities as I do, and it takes a work of God sometimes to have schedules converge for a deeper conversation. Even with David, the window where we have time and energy for depth can be pretty small some days. It doesn't really work at the dinner table to share our struggles with each other; conversation there tends to focus more on homework, Star Wars, and the like, and by the time the kids are in bed and we both have finished other responsibilities, the level of tiredness doesn't lend itself to prolonged sharing. But I've noticed that I am more down the months I haven't been able to connect deeply with anyone. It doesn't help that I don't feel like initiating as much as I used to. But as difficult as it's been to make space both for myself and for deeper conversations, they both have been elevated to the level of needed spiritual disciplines that make the rest of my life more feasible.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Philosophy of Parenting
The following is a piece on parenting philosophy I wrote for the ministry I work with, aimed primarily at new moms.
Before I had kids, I found it interesting on an intellectual level that there were very different parenting philosophies out there. On one side of the spectrum was “attachment parenting”, basing parenting behavior on cues from the child, with Dr. William Sears as its most well-known proponent, and on the other end was “parent-directed parenting”, where parents set the structure for life with a baby/child; Dr. Richard Ferber and Gary Ezzo (author of the Babywise books) have popularized the latter approach. It seemed to me that both ideas had merits, and I more casually wondered which methodology I might prefer as a parent.
It was a little less interesting and a little more disturbing to me to realize that amongst many parents, value was attached to how much particular philosophies and parenting practices were adhered to. The vitriolic is such between the two camps that libel lawsuits are not unheard of, and devotees have been known to do things like hiding the “enemy’s” parenting books in bookstores or sticking notes on them warning people against buying that particular book. The internet abounds with attacks, comments and blogs galore about the problems and evils of the opposing philosophies.
Perhaps less surprising but even more disturbing was the dawning awareness that it wasn’t just out-there, emotionally-out-of-whack people debating these philosophies with such heat, but this dispute was taking place primarily within the Church. Both camps have books explaining the Biblical basis for their particular view. Dr. Sears’ The Christian Parenting Book advocates for “what (they) believe are the three primary goals of Christian parenting: to know your child, to help your child feel right, and to lead your child to Christ." But Gary Ezzo’s Babywise series also proclaims itself to be “Biblically-based parenting”, arguing that Christian parents need to train their children in obedience, starting from infancy. The whole Christian debate over the “right” way to parent bothered me, mostly because it was full of such anger and critique that none of it felt particularly Christ-like. However, within the larger church culture, I could kind of shrug off the way others were debating each other. Perhaps these angry Christian parents simply did not come from the same stance of theology and praxis that I did.
But then came the real shock. Friends and mentors ahead of me on the journey of becoming parents, many of them on staff alongside me in InterVarsity, held as strongly to parenting philosophies and practices as they did the theological tenets and spiritual values that I held in common with them. Colleagues and peers who would be in total agreement on such potentially controversial subjects as the motivation for obedience, Biblical authority or the socio-economic implications for Biblical justice had almost as strong but quite divergent views on things like co-sleeping with infants or how to feed their babies. This was quite disturbing to me. If the people I most closely lined up with in terms of theology, spiritual values and ministry practices couldn’t agree on what constituted “faithful” parenting, what hope did I and my husband have to figure it out? Some amount of desperation got added into the mix once our children came. When your one month-old is waking up every two hours at night, and two different camps are telling you if you pick their particular “Biblical” parenting style, they will eat and sleep better and longer, your interest in picking the “right” parenting philosophy rapidly moves from theoretical to practical.
Of course, parenting philosophy isn’t the only controversy to navigate if you are a working mom, not to mention a working mom in Christian ministry. There is no shortage of people happy to point out why whatever you happen to have chosen for yourself and your family is ignorant, wrong, selfish, arrogant, enabling, un-Biblical, or even just plain evil. Women are particularly guilty of judging and critiquing one another, but our society in general is full of strong opinions about the roles of women/mothers. Personally, I had had to do enough work just to get in a place of confidence about who God had called me to be as both a minister of the Gospel and a woman that I really was not excited to have to do it all over again when I added the role of “mom” to my life. I had the responses already prepared for why I felt it was Biblical for me to be in ministry, but I wasn’t as ready to explain to other stay-at-home moms why I thought it was Biblical for me to work as a new mom.
In the interest of sparing other new moms, and in particular women in ministry like myself, some of the angst of sorting through all of these various voices and opinions about parenting styles, I offer some suggestions. While I certainly have my own opinions of the merits and faults of various parenting philosophies and methodologies, I think it is more crucial to come to a place of peace and ownership over whatever parenting style you end up landing on, so these are recommendations more about making those choices.
1. Have grace with yourself/be flexible. All of the advice that I received as a new mom that I found most helpful in the experience of having kids boiled down to one basic idea: figure out what you would prefer as a parent, but be prepared for things to not work out that way. Whether it was about having a birthing plan, when and if to go back to work, or even how discipline your kids, it is helpful to have a plan but to not hold on to it too strongly. There are elements of both grace and wisdom in that advice. The wisdom is indisputable; no matter what you may want, kids have a way of messing up the best laid plans! They get sick, they have emotional needs very different than what had anticipated… they will inevitably poop in their diaper or pee in their pants the moment you are loading them in the car on both metaphorical as well as the physical level! That’s where the grace comes in. If you approach parenting having done some work to vision for what you think would be best for you and your family but still have the flexibility to change those plans when it’s clear a change is needed, you will probably be in a better position to enjoy the ride, even when things go awry.
2. Know yourself. While the experience of having children is inherently chaotic, a good amount of planning and decision-making is also required. Where will you raise your children? How will you discipline them? How will you balance family and work? Having some sense of how you operate as a person will come in handy as you discern what choices will be best. We had thought before my first child was born that we would have our daughter sleep in the same room with us. It took maybe two nights for me to realize that I was not a sound enough sleeper for that arrangement to work well. Every little grunt or shift would wake me up, fueled in part by new parent anxiety, I’m sure. Having an extra wall between her and me, however, insured that I actually slept when she did at night, making me much more functional than I would been otherwise. Any ideals I had about co-sleeping were quickly out-weighed by the necessity of having more than an hour or two of sleep each night! When my second child arrived, I installed him in his own room with no qualms about what would be best for both of us!
3. Know your child. You can vision for what you may need as a parent before your child comes, but only after you begin to get to know your child will you really be able to figure out what is going to work best when it comes to parenting styles. Some kids really need and thrive in a more structured environment, while others do better with more responsive circumstances. And what works for one child may be a total wash with another. My husband David and I are opposite temperaments, and so far, it appears that our daughter and son have taken after their same-gender parent. My daughter wants to know the plan for the day, delights in following rules, and is very reasonable and goal-oriented. If negative consequences are explained to her, she is quick to modify her behavior, and if anything, struggles with people-pleasing rather than defiance. Her brother, on the other hand, is more happy-go-lucky, is more motivated by empathy than reason, and has no problem with defying others, particularly his parents. Their needs for structure and discipline couldn’t be more different at times, and any parental technique that works for one of them usually will not translate to other. We have needed to be thoughtful and child-specific in how we parent each of them. And I would say in general, a parenting philosophy that takes into child temperament rather than just abstract ideals will most likely be more effective than one that doesn’t.
4. Take circumstances into account. We can plan, vision and philosophize all we want about the best way to rear our kids, but sometimes certain things simply aren’t possible. Personally I think co-parenting, having both gender parents equally involved in childcare, is a great way to raise kids. But David’s more inflexible job schedule in the corporate world does not allow us to share duties to the degree we would like most of the time. He’s still more involved than many dads are, particularly given his job schedule, but whether we like it or not, our reality will probably never totally match our ideals in how much we share parenting duties. Similar to being flexible and having grace with yourself, knowing ahead of time that circumstances may not always allow you and your family to have the same options that others might can create some amount of freedom for you to make decisions that fit with the circumstances surrounding your family.
5. Work through judgment issues. There is nothing like parenting, and mothering in particular, to bring out people’s critical side. Others judge us, we judge them, and maybe worst of all, we judge ourselves. No matter how you decide to raise your child, someone will probably find fault with it. So getting to a place where you are secure in the choices you are making is vital. Be prepared to brush off some well-meaning (and perhaps some just purely disapproving) parenting advice.
6. Find people who can be voices of encouragement and support to you as you make parenting decisions. One healthy way to filter the myriad of judgmental voices about parenting is to pick a few people who know you well and whose wisdom you value to help you sort through your decisions and feelings in regards to raising your children. Certainly your spouse should be one of those people, but it can be very helpful to have someone outside of your family, someone who is clearly “for” you, to encourage you as a mother. I met with a spiritual director for a season shortly after my second child was born, and one of the ways she helped me was to affirm that it was fine for my life with Jesus to look different while I had young kids. A sample of her advice: prayer times didn’t need to be hour-long devotionals to be effective; short prayers throughout the day while changing diapers or rocking babies could be equally vital times of connecting with the Lord. I met with her during a season where I was experiencing a good amount of conflict and criticism, and she was a definite blessing to me in affirming me as a mother and a minister. Hearing that kind of encouragement from someone other than a spouse can go a long way towards helping us knowing that God affirms and values us both in our parenting and ministry vocations.
There is a great movie from 80’s called “Parenthood” that likens raising kids to riding a rollercoaster: crazy, unpredictable, a little scary at times, but a lot of fun if you learn to enjoy the ride. May your experience of motherhood be one where though the ride may be stressful at times, the Lord is with you in it, and you are able to experience joy through it.
Before I had kids, I found it interesting on an intellectual level that there were very different parenting philosophies out there. On one side of the spectrum was “attachment parenting”, basing parenting behavior on cues from the child, with Dr. William Sears as its most well-known proponent, and on the other end was “parent-directed parenting”, where parents set the structure for life with a baby/child; Dr. Richard Ferber and Gary Ezzo (author of the Babywise books) have popularized the latter approach. It seemed to me that both ideas had merits, and I more casually wondered which methodology I might prefer as a parent.
It was a little less interesting and a little more disturbing to me to realize that amongst many parents, value was attached to how much particular philosophies and parenting practices were adhered to. The vitriolic is such between the two camps that libel lawsuits are not unheard of, and devotees have been known to do things like hiding the “enemy’s” parenting books in bookstores or sticking notes on them warning people against buying that particular book. The internet abounds with attacks, comments and blogs galore about the problems and evils of the opposing philosophies.
Perhaps less surprising but even more disturbing was the dawning awareness that it wasn’t just out-there, emotionally-out-of-whack people debating these philosophies with such heat, but this dispute was taking place primarily within the Church. Both camps have books explaining the Biblical basis for their particular view. Dr. Sears’ The Christian Parenting Book advocates for “what (they) believe are the three primary goals of Christian parenting: to know your child, to help your child feel right, and to lead your child to Christ." But Gary Ezzo’s Babywise series also proclaims itself to be “Biblically-based parenting”, arguing that Christian parents need to train their children in obedience, starting from infancy. The whole Christian debate over the “right” way to parent bothered me, mostly because it was full of such anger and critique that none of it felt particularly Christ-like. However, within the larger church culture, I could kind of shrug off the way others were debating each other. Perhaps these angry Christian parents simply did not come from the same stance of theology and praxis that I did.
But then came the real shock. Friends and mentors ahead of me on the journey of becoming parents, many of them on staff alongside me in InterVarsity, held as strongly to parenting philosophies and practices as they did the theological tenets and spiritual values that I held in common with them. Colleagues and peers who would be in total agreement on such potentially controversial subjects as the motivation for obedience, Biblical authority or the socio-economic implications for Biblical justice had almost as strong but quite divergent views on things like co-sleeping with infants or how to feed their babies. This was quite disturbing to me. If the people I most closely lined up with in terms of theology, spiritual values and ministry practices couldn’t agree on what constituted “faithful” parenting, what hope did I and my husband have to figure it out? Some amount of desperation got added into the mix once our children came. When your one month-old is waking up every two hours at night, and two different camps are telling you if you pick their particular “Biblical” parenting style, they will eat and sleep better and longer, your interest in picking the “right” parenting philosophy rapidly moves from theoretical to practical.
Of course, parenting philosophy isn’t the only controversy to navigate if you are a working mom, not to mention a working mom in Christian ministry. There is no shortage of people happy to point out why whatever you happen to have chosen for yourself and your family is ignorant, wrong, selfish, arrogant, enabling, un-Biblical, or even just plain evil. Women are particularly guilty of judging and critiquing one another, but our society in general is full of strong opinions about the roles of women/mothers. Personally, I had had to do enough work just to get in a place of confidence about who God had called me to be as both a minister of the Gospel and a woman that I really was not excited to have to do it all over again when I added the role of “mom” to my life. I had the responses already prepared for why I felt it was Biblical for me to be in ministry, but I wasn’t as ready to explain to other stay-at-home moms why I thought it was Biblical for me to work as a new mom.
In the interest of sparing other new moms, and in particular women in ministry like myself, some of the angst of sorting through all of these various voices and opinions about parenting styles, I offer some suggestions. While I certainly have my own opinions of the merits and faults of various parenting philosophies and methodologies, I think it is more crucial to come to a place of peace and ownership over whatever parenting style you end up landing on, so these are recommendations more about making those choices.
1. Have grace with yourself/be flexible. All of the advice that I received as a new mom that I found most helpful in the experience of having kids boiled down to one basic idea: figure out what you would prefer as a parent, but be prepared for things to not work out that way. Whether it was about having a birthing plan, when and if to go back to work, or even how discipline your kids, it is helpful to have a plan but to not hold on to it too strongly. There are elements of both grace and wisdom in that advice. The wisdom is indisputable; no matter what you may want, kids have a way of messing up the best laid plans! They get sick, they have emotional needs very different than what had anticipated… they will inevitably poop in their diaper or pee in their pants the moment you are loading them in the car on both metaphorical as well as the physical level! That’s where the grace comes in. If you approach parenting having done some work to vision for what you think would be best for you and your family but still have the flexibility to change those plans when it’s clear a change is needed, you will probably be in a better position to enjoy the ride, even when things go awry.
2. Know yourself. While the experience of having children is inherently chaotic, a good amount of planning and decision-making is also required. Where will you raise your children? How will you discipline them? How will you balance family and work? Having some sense of how you operate as a person will come in handy as you discern what choices will be best. We had thought before my first child was born that we would have our daughter sleep in the same room with us. It took maybe two nights for me to realize that I was not a sound enough sleeper for that arrangement to work well. Every little grunt or shift would wake me up, fueled in part by new parent anxiety, I’m sure. Having an extra wall between her and me, however, insured that I actually slept when she did at night, making me much more functional than I would been otherwise. Any ideals I had about co-sleeping were quickly out-weighed by the necessity of having more than an hour or two of sleep each night! When my second child arrived, I installed him in his own room with no qualms about what would be best for both of us!
3. Know your child. You can vision for what you may need as a parent before your child comes, but only after you begin to get to know your child will you really be able to figure out what is going to work best when it comes to parenting styles. Some kids really need and thrive in a more structured environment, while others do better with more responsive circumstances. And what works for one child may be a total wash with another. My husband David and I are opposite temperaments, and so far, it appears that our daughter and son have taken after their same-gender parent. My daughter wants to know the plan for the day, delights in following rules, and is very reasonable and goal-oriented. If negative consequences are explained to her, she is quick to modify her behavior, and if anything, struggles with people-pleasing rather than defiance. Her brother, on the other hand, is more happy-go-lucky, is more motivated by empathy than reason, and has no problem with defying others, particularly his parents. Their needs for structure and discipline couldn’t be more different at times, and any parental technique that works for one of them usually will not translate to other. We have needed to be thoughtful and child-specific in how we parent each of them. And I would say in general, a parenting philosophy that takes into child temperament rather than just abstract ideals will most likely be more effective than one that doesn’t.
4. Take circumstances into account. We can plan, vision and philosophize all we want about the best way to rear our kids, but sometimes certain things simply aren’t possible. Personally I think co-parenting, having both gender parents equally involved in childcare, is a great way to raise kids. But David’s more inflexible job schedule in the corporate world does not allow us to share duties to the degree we would like most of the time. He’s still more involved than many dads are, particularly given his job schedule, but whether we like it or not, our reality will probably never totally match our ideals in how much we share parenting duties. Similar to being flexible and having grace with yourself, knowing ahead of time that circumstances may not always allow you and your family to have the same options that others might can create some amount of freedom for you to make decisions that fit with the circumstances surrounding your family.
5. Work through judgment issues. There is nothing like parenting, and mothering in particular, to bring out people’s critical side. Others judge us, we judge them, and maybe worst of all, we judge ourselves. No matter how you decide to raise your child, someone will probably find fault with it. So getting to a place where you are secure in the choices you are making is vital. Be prepared to brush off some well-meaning (and perhaps some just purely disapproving) parenting advice.
6. Find people who can be voices of encouragement and support to you as you make parenting decisions. One healthy way to filter the myriad of judgmental voices about parenting is to pick a few people who know you well and whose wisdom you value to help you sort through your decisions and feelings in regards to raising your children. Certainly your spouse should be one of those people, but it can be very helpful to have someone outside of your family, someone who is clearly “for” you, to encourage you as a mother. I met with a spiritual director for a season shortly after my second child was born, and one of the ways she helped me was to affirm that it was fine for my life with Jesus to look different while I had young kids. A sample of her advice: prayer times didn’t need to be hour-long devotionals to be effective; short prayers throughout the day while changing diapers or rocking babies could be equally vital times of connecting with the Lord. I met with her during a season where I was experiencing a good amount of conflict and criticism, and she was a definite blessing to me in affirming me as a mother and a minister. Hearing that kind of encouragement from someone other than a spouse can go a long way towards helping us knowing that God affirms and values us both in our parenting and ministry vocations.
There is a great movie from 80’s called “Parenthood” that likens raising kids to riding a rollercoaster: crazy, unpredictable, a little scary at times, but a lot of fun if you learn to enjoy the ride. May your experience of motherhood be one where though the ride may be stressful at times, the Lord is with you in it, and you are able to experience joy through it.
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