But even when the child is ready, parents today are still declaring No Sleepovers! Their fears run the gamut– safety hazards in the other child’s home, permissions for blacklisted activities or foods, lack of proper supervision, and suspicions about the host’s older brother or even the family father.  I am not going to argue the possibility of these fears coming to fruition. The plane you are taking to  New York  just  might crash, too. And did you know that the majority of car accidents occur only a mile and a half from home?

Why am I such an advocate for sleepovers?  Here are just a few of the benefits:

• The child is exposed to difference. He gets to see that different families do things in different ways. And he see that they all reach the same goal, albeit differently.

• The child is taken out of his comfort zone and survives.  Learning to tolerate discomfort that results from unfamiliarity and emerge successfully on the other side is a life lesson. Life will present your child with much that makes him uncomfortable…at first.

• Risk-taking happens when the child is out of his comfort zone and has to deal with difference and unfamiliarity. Survival usually requires risk. Nothing stays the same for very long.

• Sleepovers require self-reliance, if only because the child is not as dependent away from home as he is with you. At the same time, the child practices his independence.

• Sleepovers necessarily encourage emotional growth.  Being able to tolerate the feeling of being all alone when the lights go out and your friend falls asleep first, is a big step toward emotional maturity.

• Children are often at their best when they are away from you. (Ask any school teacher!)  Staying at someone else’s house provides ample opportunity to be on “good behavior” and practice the manners seldom seen at home.

• And certainly, a night with one less child is a treat for you!

There is much to consider when thinking about sleepovers. While it will be different for every child, the age that sleepovers typically begin is somewhere around 7 years old. However, the most important question is whether or not your child is ready and eager. Among many considerations about your child are:

• Does your child speak up for himself?

• Does your child seek help from others besides you when needed?

• Does your child know and practice your family safety rules?

• Is your child usually reliable?

• Has your child ever spent the night away from you before…at a relative’s house or when you have gone away?”

Considering the host family raises a whole bevy of important questions—Do you  know the parents?  Who else is in the house? Will the parents be home all night?  What are their safety rules? Do they allow their child unlimited access to M & M’s? Will they be watching R rated movies? Some parents will surly drive themselves crazy trying to determine if their child will be safe enough out of their reach…ever.  

In the spirit of my favorite piece of advice, Prepare the Child for the Path and not the Path for the Child, perhaps it’s time to rethink the No Sleepovers rule. There just may be more to gain than the risk you are trying to avoid.

Tips for Managing Camp Separations

1.  Get your own emotions under control. Children are absorbent. If you are doubting your child’s (and your) decision to go, if you are feeling weepy at the thought of being apart for so long, if you are worried about his well-being, don’t let him know and don’t let it show!  Saying things like, “I am going to miss you so much” should be replaced with comments that reflect your confidence in him and in the great experience he is going to have. “I am so excited for you. You are going to have so many fantastic experiences!”  (And remember, when the time comes, no mommy tears at the bus! Just encouraging, happy waves, please!)
2.   Acknowledge his feelings. If you child expresses nervousness or trepidation about going, let him know how normal those feelings are. Saying “I can imagine that you are feeling uneasy. Most kids do feel nervous about their first time at sleep away camp” lets him know that he is no different from anyone else.
3.  Do not discount his feelings.  Comments such as, “Aw c’mon, you shouldn’t be worried” give the child the message that he shouldn’t trust his own feelings. Rather, assure him that after the first day or two, when he knows the ropes—his counselor, the program, has friends—then he will feel better. It takes time to feel comfortable. Remind him of other “firsts” he has mastered in his life (school, first sleep over,  new activites, etc…) Soon you’ll add sleep-away camp to that list. 
4.  Discuss a plan for dealing with feelings. Knowing what he can do “just in case” he feels unhappy or homesick, is comforting. Talking to a friend, writing a note home, and especially talking to his counselor are good ideas. Explain that the counselors and camp administration know very well that sometimes kids feel this way, so they know how to help them feel better.
 5.  Do write letters. (Who does that anymore? YOU should!)  It is absolutely thrilling to get a letter from home when a child is away. And start writing those short, unemotional letters a few days before the child leaves so that he’ll have one at the very first Mail Call. Try not to pepper your letters with cries of We miss you! and beware of descriptions of all the fun things you and his sister are doing at home.  Make your life sound dull and ordinary, in turn making him feel that he is not missing anything on the home front!
 6.  Do not offer a phone call.  Talking to you on the phone if he is homesick, will not help. In fact, it will only make things worse. Hearing your voice reminds him of what he is missing and communicates that he needs you to feel better. (You can, however, speak to the camp director to be assured the camp food really isn’t poisoning him.)
 7.  Coming home is not an option.  Doing so gives a strong message of failure no matter how it is couched. Only severe illness warrants throwing in the towel.  Even if your child hates camp—hates his friends, the counselors, the food, the works—he needs to finish his session. He’s sticking it out.  And upon his return, as you passively listen to his descriptions of the many horrors that befell him, you can say, “At least you gave it a try and stuck it out. You must be pretty proud of yourself.”  And slowly the stories of all the fun stuff will begin to surface, crowding out the memories of the bad.

   Don’t be surprised when the December camp reunion notice arrives and your sleep-away-camp-hating-child is all ready to go!  For some kids, sleep-away camp homesickness is like child birth: He just doesn’t remember the pain.

“Who do you love the most?”  No matter how it comes out, every child who has a sibling wonders and worries about which child plays the starring role in his parent’s heart.

Favorites are tricky business, and the topic has a lot of press recently. In both a study published in April 2010 in the Journal or Marriage and the Family and in a new book, The Favorite Child, the issue is addressed. They conclude that both the child who is perceived as the favorite and the one who is not can suffer.  The perceived favored child is vulnerable to developing unhealthy personality traits, including the need to please, (be it the parent, the teacher, or the boss), and a sense of entitlement. He can also feel tremendous guilt for being the one chosen as the favorite.

The unfavored child can work overtime trying to please the adults in his life, desperate to make it to the favored son status anywhere he can. He works to the exclusion of experiencing true enjoyment, intimate relationships, and more. And sometimes this child decides he might as well excel at being “bad” since he’ll never be the “good” one. That role is already filled.

Let’s face it. Every parent who has more than one child actually does favor one child over the other(s) at some point, if only for a fleeting moment. Admitting that, however, generates oceans of guilt, as everyone knows it’s downright illegal!  What’s a parent to do?

Perhaps the first step is accepting that there will be days and times, long periods and short, that you do have a favorite child. But that does not mean you love that child more. It means that on that day, at that time, that child is in the pole position. Perhaps he was more cooperative; maybe he woke up on the right side of the bed; maybe he was the child who remembered to call you, who carried in the groceries, who hung up his jacket. But he is only the favorite at that moment.  Then your other child is the life of the party at the dinner table. You marvel at his sense of humor; you admire his powers of observations. You fall in love, and today he is your favorite. In most families, children float in and out of the favored son status

Here are a few more suggestions for avoiding pitfalls of playing favorites

• Actively look for the characteristics that make each of your children different. Call them out, appreciate them,  and share them with the world.
• Let your child hear you talking about him positively and proudly, not for something he accomplished but for something he is.
• Make time to spend with each child alone regularly, (Yes, even if you have 5 children!), and nurture the special relationship you have with each.
• Work hard to cultivate one of each of your child’s separate interests. If he loves baseball, ask him to explain the box scores to you. If she loves princesses, ask her to introduce you to each one and learn their names!
• Be careful not to pigeon hole your child. He is the artist; she is the athlete. Doing so can actually undermine the child’s desire to give something new a try.  After all, it isn’t his role.
• Do not ever hold one child up to the other. “Why can’t you just get your homework done like your brother does?”  Speak to him about him only.
• When you hear your children squabbling, take pains not to call out one child’s name, even if you know he is the perpetrator. Instead of saying, “Seymour, what are you doing?” try “What’s going on in there, boys?”
• Stop trying to make life “fair” for each child. Most parents confuse “fair” with “equal.”  It will never be fair enough for your children, and someone will be perceived as the one you like best because he got new shoes. Fair means giving each child what he needs at the moment. Preach it and practice it.
• When your child asks you whom you love the most, put on your most twinkly smile and say “You are my most favorite Jessie in the whole world!”

Whether it’s leaving your infant with a baby sitter, watching your four year old go off on a playdate (without you), helping your six year old to pack for a sleepover…whether it’s going off to nursery school, starting kindergarten, or going off to college, over and over again, life is full of separations.

At first the focus is on the child. Will he be okay? Will he be too homesick to have fun at camp? Will the teacher kiss his boo boo at preschool? With whom will he have lunch on the school playground?  Will he even think to wash his sheets in the dorm?  Then the dust settles, all is well, and a new reality emerges.  My child is fine; he can take care of himself. I’m a mess. Look who is having trouble with separation!

Going to sleep away camp or to a friend’s house for the night are such valuable separations. Not only does your child learn how to take care of his own physical and emotional needs, becoming self reliant and independent, but you get to practice letting go.  All of the little separations in your child’s life pave the way for the big separation. There will come a time when your little guy, now big, kisses you goodbye, and that kiss has to last all the way until his next visit home.

Jessie came home last month to pack up her wedding gifts and drive them to her new home in San Francisco. “Mom, where is my birth certificate? I need it for work.” she asked as she and Michael were about to leave. Of course I had it. It was in the important papers file, its permanent, safe home. “Are you sure you should take it, Jess? It’s the only copy. Shouldn’t we keep it?”  Can you hear the eye roll I got?

Jessie hasn’t really lived at home, not full time, since she went off to college fourteen years ago. She has come and gone,  vacationed on Greentree Road, but this is still the place called “home.”  But it wasn’t until I handed Jessie her very own birth certificate, that it really hit me. We’ve  separated.

On the next trip,  she promised she would unload the attic and take the rest of her memorabilia to her home.  I waited to cry until the UHaul was at the end of the block.

But the cute is not what stuck with me. Several days later, I am thinking about the stark contrast in the way the Japanese and the American babies were parented compared to the African and Mongolian babies.  The African baby was gnawing on a fat stick he plucked out of the dirt. Splinters, dirt, ants, fungus…yuck! Obviously teething, he chewed away. Flash to the sanitized environment of the American baby in his Parent and Me class, daddy swaying to the song about Mother Earth, as they sat on their acrylic carpet squares.

Then there was the Mongolian baby who appeared to have more animals than adults in his life. Like self rising flour, he seemed to be raising himself amidst the raw life on the plain.  He crawls through the obstacle course provided by the legs of  a herd of calves, and the audience waits for him to be trampled.  Contrast that scene to the Japanese baby who is under the constant eye of her mommy or daddy or Gymboree teacher, getting her prescribed movement experience.

In the past weeks as I have launched my new book, I have been speaking to parents all over the country. Among the many points I aim to make, is the need for parents to let go of their death grip.  How can young children ever cultivate independence and self reliance if parents are holding on so tightly? Children need to struggle and fall in order to learn how to pick themselves up and survive.  Dr. Spock said, “A child who has not been well bandaged has not been well parented.”

I am not suggesting that you place your children’s dinner of mush down on the floor and let them all go for it in a giant feeding frenzy, including smushing the white goo on the youngest sibling’s head. Nor am I condoning a child sharing his bath water with the family goat. I am abundantly grateful for all that we, in our disease free, safety precaution filled America, are able to offer our children. But Babies sure made me think twice about the good parts of what children learn when they are sometimes left alone.

Most parents know that they are fighting a losing battle if they are too orthodox about their restrictions.  Never allow your child sugar, and he will begin to crave it or sneak it. Never allow your child even to pretend that his Tinker Toy is a gun, and everything will become a gun (including graham crackers chewed into just the right shape!).

 But what happens when allowing your child to do the very thing you have restricted compromises your values?  Video games are a case in point.  There are parents, many in my practice, who have done a yeoman’s job of keeping screen time out of their children’s growing years, knowing that children thrive on interactive, creative play and social activities. Now they are faced with their child being “the only one of his friends who doesn’t have video games.”  This is a real tough one.  I assure you that there is no perfect, one-size-fits-all answer to this dilemma.

 If you are a parent who has managed to keep X Box, DS, Wii and the like out of your child’s life, I applaud you!  There is absolutely no reason that is good enough to have such entertainment in your child’s life before he is elementary school age. That said, I am not sure how long it will last or should last. A big part of growing up and developing social intelligence has to do with fitting in, speaking the language of peers. For most kids that is somewhere around 7 or 8 years old.

 When my children were in 4^th or 5^th grade, and I had successfully kept network television out of their lives, they complained that they were the only ones on the lunch benches who didn’t watch The Cosby Show. They felt out-of-it and couldn’t participate in the Friday reviews of the Thursday night show. “Well,” I said, “then let’s figure out how to make this work for you.”  And after homework and chores, Bill Cosby and his television family became part of our family once a week.

 Deciding if you should let video games into your child’s life (and yours by extension) has to do with several things, specific questions you need to consider about your child and yourself.

 About your child:

•  Is he able to entertain himself?
• Does he get his homework and chores done without much urging?
• Is he able to follow family rules?
• Does he try to negotiate his way out of limits?
• Does he tend to become an addict?
• What will not having video games mean for him?

 About you:

• Are you able to set parameters and limits around various privileges?
• Are you able to withstand your child’s budding debate and negotiation skills?
• Can you tolerate his complaining and whining?
• Can you create reasonable, appropriate, and therefore effective consequences?
• Are you able to follow through on those consequences for limit infractions?
• Do you know why video games are an issue for you?
• Is this really about your child, or is it about you?

  You need to consider carefully what having and not having video games in your child’s life will mean for your child and for your whole family.

I believe in most things in moderation.  When the time comes to introduce into your child’s life something that has previously been withheld, think about taking very, very small bites. It is kind of like introducing new foods to an infant. Then watch how your child handles it, how it affects him and the family.  If the use or non-use takes over his life and yours, then likely your child is not ready.  Modulating is a skill that grows over time.

There is one bit of reassurance I will share. Your children will pick up your true values and beliefs regardless of the extent to which you allow things such as TV, video games, war toys into his life.  Your child watches you, notices your facial expressions, hears you talk to others. Your messages are being transmitted and received all the time. Your discussions around the dinner table, in the car, at tuck time communicate your values, and your child is taking it in. He may not be able to agree with you; his is job is to fight you like the dickens, as he becomes an individual. But he gets it.   You may not see the result now, but when he is a father, you will see it and smile!

Kids are exposed to the word the moment the cord is cut in the delivery room.  And it is reinforced and expanded over and over throughout their growing years   Daddy loves you.  See you after school…remember, I love you.

But truth be told, love is a complicated concept. It’s just not as easy as it sounds. When I work with parents who are separating or divorcing, I am always struck by this reality.  There are lots of different kinds of love.

• The love a mommy and daddy have for their child
• The love one has for his puppy
• The love a child has for his teacher
• The love you have for chocolate
• The love a grown couple has for one another

Some love lasts a long long time. But some kinds of love change, it comes and goes.  You can love chocolate, so much that you want to shoot it into your veins, and then wake up one day to realize you don’t really love it all that much anymore; vanilla isn’t half bad.    You can have a best best friend with whom you love to spend all your time, and then you grow apart…new friends, new interests, not so much love.  And there’s grown up love, the love that a woman and man (or whatever the gender combination) feel for each other.  The dream is that this kind of adult love will last forever, through thick and thin.  It can change colors, but it lasts. It evoles from wild, crazy, mad-about-you-love to deep, abiding we’ve-been-together-forever-familiar love. But that kind of love, too, can fade and sometimes dissolve.

Even the forever stamp isn’t really forever.

But it’s not so with parent-child love. Children need to know that the kind of love that a parent has for a child is different. Mommy love, Daddy love never ever changes; it is forever and ever and ever love. It never fades; it is full- strength forever.

With all the uncertainty in the world, with all the change that happens, isn’t Valentine’s Day a good time to share the wonder of the forever and ever love you feel for your child?  I think you’d better.  He needs to know it.

Forever, the mother-child bond has been  depicted, portrayed, discussed, filmed, written about, but it just never ceases to amaze me.  Mother nature does such an incredible job of attaching us to our offspring, embedding the instincts that enable us to care for our children from the moment of birth. It is  true with all  of her creatures. Perhaps that’s the most amazing part!

Recently, I received the  link to a video clip of the birth of an elephant. (It is graphic, be forewarned!)  I watched it with my jaw down to my knees. Share it with the people you love, who will appreicate its magnificence.  Watch it with your child (perhaps six years old and beyond, depending upon his development and maturity.)  Talk about it. Use it as a spring board for discussions of birth,  where babies come from, animal instincts, of mommy and daddy love. Be brave and let your child lead the conversation, even going in “those” directions. Be the mommy who answers all questions honestly and openly. That’s part of your mommy job   Celebrate the miracle of the mother-child bond. It is my gift to you on Thanksgiving.

Last month, staff at the Elephant Safari Park in Taro, Bali, filmed one of its elephants giving birth. The footage is jaw-dropping remarkable, not just because of the birth, but because the videographer captured the mother desperately trying, over and over again, to save her apparently still-born infant. (It does have a happy ending.)

Happy Thanksgiving.

Click below or cut and paste.

http://www.dumpert.nl/mediabase/656611/d1dfcfee/

Of all the press this story has gotten, of all the horror stories that continue to surface, of all the details that are being revealed, of all the insights that mental health workers have shared, none has impacted me as much as ones that addressed what people might expect from Jaycee as she relaigns her hideously broken life. Here’s the thought that knocked me down: It would not be surprising, experts said, for Jaycee to express sympathy for her captors. I read this and felt total revulsion. How could Jaycee feel for sympathy for that highly disturbed and, yes, evil human being?

But then I saw it: attachment. Jaycee Dugard actually grew feelings of attachment with her captors. So powerful is the human creature’s need for attachment that even in the most warped of cases, it can still develop. Whether you are one year or eleven, attachment happens. It is a need.

Many years ago I worked with a child who had been continuously sexually abused by her own mother. Awful, hideous, horrific would be the understatement of the century. A while after I was done with my internship, I ran into the child, seven years old. For the sake of idle chit chat, I asked about her mother. The abused child replied, “Oh my mom is great!” Great? That abusive, evil woman was great? There it was. Children attach to whatever they can grab, so powerful is the need.

One day, hopefully, this little girl will be able to face and detest the abuse to which she was subjected by her own mother. And one day, and likely after a long time, after having had tremendous support and having rekindled her mother’s endless love, Jaycee will relaign her attachment to where it belongs.

There is nothing so powerful as the attachment of child with parent. It is as basic a need as drinking water. It is a cord of amazing strength and durability, but it must be nurtured, massaged, and highly respected. It is parent-child attachment that forms the foundation that enables the child’s to trust, to go forth in the world, to take risks, and to form other attachments. Let’s hope that all of our children’s attachments are healthy ones.

Sarah lives in a TV free house. (Okay, her husband, also a professor like Sarah, wrote a book about the effects of television viewing on children and how to make it work for your family.) But here’s the thing of it, those little boys don’t miss it, and they don’t ask for it.  What was more remarkable to me was how  well the boys are able to entertain themselves. The whole time I was there, they were busy in their playroom. Yes, there was a small episode of tattling and maybe even an argument or two. But neither Sarah nor Fred got involved, and whatever it was passed quickly. The boys really played together. No computer, no TV, no Wii…just plain, old fashioned play.

I am sure there are days when Sarah would love to have an electronic babysitter, but that isn’t an option in their house.  They have learned to play together because that’s how they entertain themselves.   Do you think TV is robbing some children of the chance to learn to get along?