These are really interesting ideas. One idea that I’m wrestling with right now is that of “attachment.” I’m reading a book called Hold On to Your Kids with the subtitle “Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers.”
Essentially, the thesis of the book is that societal changes have caused each subsequent generation since the industrial revolution to become more detached from their parents. Obviously in a certain sense the ultimate goal of parenting is to have your child successfully detach, but when it happens too early, the result is not an “independent” child, but one that becomes “attached” to peers.
Why this is significant is because a child has a fundamental need to orient and anchor themselves in relation to others (you could argue that adults have this too, just to a lesser degree and we’re generally more mature at managing it). If a parent is precluded by the social environment from forming a healthy attachment with their kids, their kids will look to peers to make up the deficit.
Now, I have now way of knowing if this thesis is true, but if it is, it’s possible that a fully attached parent (and bear in mind here, I’m not criticizing anyone as a parent, successful attachment is more about social environment than parenting strategies) will be one that the child looks to for praise and affirmation.
I think we see this when we look at the world. Children under five live for their parents approval, but then sometime around going to school they start caring less and less until eventually they’d rather not be seen in public with their parents. I’ve always believed that this was “normal” or “natural,” a function of human nature and a normal expression of human development. But what if it’s not?
What if it’s a product of our culture, not human nature? What if there was a time where teens and preteens were happy to spend time with adults, especially with their parents and grandparents?
Obviously I’m biased here and there might be some wishful thinking as I hope that my homeschooled kids won’t lose their current thirst for learning, but it does seem like you’ll be more excited to do something if the person whose approval you crave most is saying “learning is so exciting” as opposed to “man, homework sucks bro.”
Again, I might be way off with all of this. But this lens of attachment is so far proving to be a helpful way of thinking about how to best raise my kids. Right now I work and my wife stays home and homeschools the kids. If I can replace my salary with my income from writing, I would love to work from home and help out more with the education. I also think that working from home would allow me to spend more time with my kids (from my perspective, I spend a lot of time with them for a working dad, it’s that “for a working dad” bit that I want to tackle) which would in theory help with my attachment relationship with them. Right now I would say they are very attached to me, but not nearly to the extent that they are to my wife. Historically I would have chalked this up to “because she’s the mom” and that might be true, but it might also partly be because I’m gone from 9–6.
As I wrap up I just wanted to say, thanks for sharing about your experience with you parents. I appreciate the perspective
