Picky Eaters

Feeding our children is the most important and time-consuming aspect of parenting. Most of us aren't accustomed to thinking about food so much. We aren't all chefs. If you missed that book "French Children Eat Everything" it's a good book to pick up before your child starts eating solids. It tells you how to prepare a variety of colors for your baby when they're being introduced to solid foods to accustom them to the concept of variety. I missed that sensitive period, so I played catch up when my son was weaned. Here is what I have observed.

1. Children don't need to eat as much as we like to see them eat. Keep the excess in tupperware and save it for later. If you prepared a lot of it, freeze it to save time later.

2. Children enjoy taking little tastes of a wide variety of food throughout the day. This can be called snacking or grazing. Get creative. Don't stick to staple snack foods. Mix it up. Hummus, grapes, tomato wedges, red peppers, cauliflower. Offer a few different basic foods and let them pick from the variety.

3. Reflect on the quality of your own diet. Educating yourself in nutrition and cuisine is not an easy task, but it doesn't have to happen overnight. Its a journey that you'll take along with your child. Slowly get rid of the bad stuff and replace it with the good. Taste buds adjust. Eventually all that healthy food will cease to taste bland and will offer a huge variety of flavors never before perceived. If you took care of your body while you were pregnant, you still have the same incentive to continue doing so. You're still eating for two (or more)!

4. Resist breaking down and buying packaged food with high fructose corn syrup, food coloring, or... any packaged food in general. Its dead inside. Shop on the perimeter of the grocery store, only going into aisles for the staples you absolutely know ahead of time that you need, like corn tortillas and salsa! 

5. Avoid stress around food. Prepare food together with them. They're more likely to eat it then, anyway. There's tons of resources on cooking with kids through sites like Pinterest.

6. In order to not stress around food, you need to feel good about what they're eating (99.8% of the time). You can sneak in greens by making smoothies or mixing algae tablets in with some apples in a high-speed blender (or the pot if you boil apples to make apple sauce). I like putting kale or spinach with banana and a little bit of peanut butter. My son doesn't always want some, but occasionally he'll devour it. So again, their bodies want different things at different times. Take care of your own body, and let them share your food when they want it. If you eat well, they'll eat well. 

You don't have to drastically change everything you eat in order to be healthy. After tweaking a few aspects about what you eat, a rhythm emerges. In place of cereal from a box and milk you may pour oats, raisins, chia seeds, chop up some banana's, drizzle some honey on top, and pour in some almond milk. You'll live longer, you'll feel better, and the kids will eat better. 

"Non Violent Communication"

I just wanted to put this picture here because its hilarious. Not entirely relevant, except that if you use non violent communication with your child, they won't become a douchebag.

 My son is in the range of the horribly named "terrible" two's. Its an age where they're learning to communicate. Many parents don't know how to communicate, and so the honeymoon phase of having a perfect infant is over. Now its a relationship, and lord knows, we could all use help relating better.

What do we do when our own needs are conflicting with the desires of our child?

I have briefly studied Non Violent Communication (NVC), but haven't had much practice. There are groups in metropolitan areas where one can practice in groups if you're interested in learning more.

My son was waving his hand close to my face. In an effort to practice NVC i said "I feel attacked!" and i retreated. I looked at him, and then I tried to see why he was doing it. I hadn't really looked at him in a while, and he wanted me to look him in the eyes and to connect. He showed me what he wanted, and I was able to give it to him. Alternatively, I could have just said "Don't hit me!" but that wouldn't have addressed his need for connection. I could tell him "Go play somewhere else." and cut off connection, but that would become a habitual response in our relationship and we'd create a wedge in our relationship. NVC works to always get closer, and to create more understanding with each other. Its a great way to feel heard, to create a change in behavior, and to become more satisfied. Identifying needs and feelings is a key to non violent communication, so it requires practice, but once you get acquainted with the various needs and feelings, you can access creative solutions to relationship conflicts. So, to summarize NVC briefly here:

First, make an observation without evaluating it further. "I noticed that you're frantically waving your hands in my face." Then state what this situation made you feel. "I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and slightly afraid for my safety." Then, state what need the feeling was prompted from. For example, "I feel attacked! I'd like to feel safe, loved, connected, and/or nurtured." Then, offer an action for the other person to take that would help you feel that way. For example, "Could you touch me gently?" Of course, you can also go to the other person and say "I'm wondering what you're feeling, what you're needing, that you want to frantically wave your hands in my face. I'm just guessing, but perhaps you want to play?"
Here is a video about non violent communication in regards to parenting.

idle nannies

A nannie sits at the side of the playground chatting with her friend. The adorable child says 'hello' as i walk past, and begins to follow me to the tennis court. She's being friendly and curious. The nanny jumps up and runs after her shouting "No!!!!" in a frightened and fearful tone.

If she'd been paying attention it could have been pleasant and wonderful. That child is now slightly more stressed around strangers and will likely grow up to stay contained. I wish her luck and an impulse to grow and explore in later years when she is offered freedom.

assert yo'self, momma!

A 3 year old boy becomes fascinated with me and we begin playing together. He is shooting imaginary beams out of his openfaced hands, and i am pretending to be loaded up with energy and occasionally blasted away. I shoot him back with imaginary beams out of my open hands. It begins to drizzle/mist very lightly, not enough to get wet. The mother follows us around for 15 minutes telling him how its raining and she wants to go in a tone of voice that sounds like a child whining. She is weak. He ignores her. When she finally asserts herself, he is leaving and I say goodbye, but he complains that he wants to stay. she gives him five more minutes and sets a timer (which had been going off over and over again previously and she would say "see? the timer is going off! We need to go!" but never followed through) We continue to play. Finally, I have to leave because my son is ready for his nap and they probably leave soon after.

unfairness in adult power

Two pre-school boys are fighting over a plastic phone that belongs to one of them. The nanny comes over after the owner of the toy wins in a scuffle saying "can i have the phone?" The boy sulks and gives it to her. The boy who had been fighting for the toy (but had lost) reaches out his hand to receive the phone. The nanny, not knowing the boy very well, gives it to him. The original owner/winner sees this and skulks away.

Poor kid. Kids work out their scuffles amongst themselves. An adult exercising authority feels totally disempowering and unfair.

unreasonable, unflexible, unkind

At the Clemejentri playground in falls church, virginia: A boy had (i gathered) commented that he was cold. His monster mother gave him a choice between wearing his little sisters pink fluffy jacket or her oversized sweater. He pouted and said he didn't want to wear a sweater and was fine and wanted to go play. She demanded for the next 5 minutes that he choose a sweater. His slightly older brother was watching, wanting to go play, but not allowed to do so. The mother said "If you don't wear one of these jackets we're going to go to the car and even if you change your mind we won't come back! She started moving towards the car. Nobody was happy. I was staring, fixated on what was going on, feeling sorry for the powerless boy forced to make a decision between two unsatisfactory choices. I bet he was wishing he'd never mentioned how cold he was.

Eventually the older brother gave his younger brother his vest, and his mother demanded he choose between the sweaters, and he was wearing his mothers oversized sweater that went to his knees and whose sleeves were way too long for him. It looked ridiculous and he couldn't really move in it, so the mother eventually allowed him to take it off.

It was mild and sunny.

She was sooo unreasonable!!!

Educating children

This topic may be where i am the most unconventional, but by the end of this post, hopefully i'll be able to present my case in such a way that you'll think its perfectly reasonable, and could be a new convention sometime in the near future.

Today, the vast majority of people, whether rich or poor, will have a baby and within a few months return to work, leaving their babies at daycare for most of the day. The child will stay in daycare until age 3, at which point they'll enter pre-school, where they learn shapes, numbers, the alphabet, colors, sing some songs, and spend the most productive part of their day running around the playground, but will be called in for more classroom time. At age 5 they enter school and begin to learn spelling, reading, addition, subtraction, natural science, and social studies or historical stories, mostly falsely patriotic or heroic or in some way misleading. The children sit in rows indoors, and listen to their teacher. As the years progress, the teachers teach increasingly complicated intellectual matters that sometimes they themselves have to review out of a textbook.

My understanding of child development is that the first five years are most significant for building the foundation off of which they learn. Children imitate their parents and people in their surroundings, so its important to be really conscientious about whose care your putting your baby under. They will definitely absorb that energy in some way and considering the possibilities of People in General, that can be a terrifying prospect!

Anyway, fear aside, here is my alternative approach to educating children in the first formative years. Since their brains are growing and they are sucking up knowledge like a sponge, it is easy to teach reading to a pre-5 year old child while they are still learning to speak. Speaking and reading can go hand in hand and need not be separated! There's a video called 'your baby can read' and i'm formulating a video myself that isn't as random and jumpy as that tutorial, but the basic idea can be applied to every day life, since written language is everywhere. The only problem with reading Everything is that a Camera might become Canon and a computer might become Macbook.... But that can be remedied with tape and a marker.

Before the age of 3, which is when they can be expected to be able to verbally express themselves sufficiently, they are completely musical, tonal, and energetic. If the caregiver is conscious of this tidbit, that musical start will blossom into further creativity later. After 3 until maybe 5 or 7, the child becomes very materially oriented, and sculpting and taking things apart and putting them back together will help them become empowered project-finishers, unlike myself, who was intellectually stimulated and materially deprived (!!) After that, the child wants to participate more in the adult world and is beginning to want to be welcomed into the adult world. They also begin to question the authority that they naturally imitated earlier, and now need more substantial evidence of the caregivers competence. If the caregiver is unworthy of their respect and imitation, this will most certainly lead to problems in the teens, but if the caregiver is worthy of respect and imitation, the child will be inspired to follow and reenlist their trust in the elder.

What does all this child development shit mean for education?
Well, since its not compatible with public school systems, it makes things very complicated for me if i want to do what i 'know' is best. Maybe i'll have to start a home-schooling group or a cooperative school and create a lesson plan revolving around sculpting, music, movement, and exploration of the natural world. My son is 15 months old. in 9 months he'll be nursery-aged, and in a year and 9 months he'll be pre-school age... can i get my shit together?

I think if my son gets through the first 7 years unscathed from the ordinary way of doing things, i may be able to put him in public school after that. I think it can be valuable in itself to simply be in that system, to compare and contrast it with his previous way of existence. That way, as he grows into adolescence, he'll be able to say what he thinks of the system and if he'd like to choose another method of school for middle or high school. Middle school can probably be completely avoided. Maybe i'll go out on a long roadtrip for two years during those years.

Who liked middle school, anyway? A roadtrip seems in order, with lots of unsheltering and experiencing the world, and growing into adulthood and maturity and understanding of the universe in all its abstract and concrete forms. Oooo that will be an exciting time!!!

And high school? Oh gosh... Besides the intense socialization that most people encounter, of being in such close proximity with so many people their own age and getting involved in meaningless, existentially questionable dramas, i think high school and clumping all those teens together like that is detrimental to their sense of belonging to society. High school creates its own mini-society with practically no relation to elders or youngers unless as an extracurricular volunteer activity. This may be a really great time to live in some form of community of all ages and really experiencing the different seasons.

Did i just plan out my sons life? It looks like i did. But plans get knocked off course by various effects and i'm open to that.

This was a really long post, and my initial intention of convincing the reader of my reasonable point of view went missing along the way of my fantasizing of the ultimate life-span for my growing teen. But maybe the point came across somehow... I need to test this on someone. Reader?