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RE: The Entitlement Epidemic 1 - Our Unschooling Journey - Part 5
Well said!
Even babies who are worn and children who were attachment patented become adolescents seeking independence at some point. When they start having sleepovers with friends, you start getting adult time. It's not like parenting is 18 solid years of constant interaction with your child...unless you've set it up to be that way. I'd say unschoolers and homeschoolers would run the highest risk of needing date night on account of parenting exhaustion, yet I know lots of people who unschool and none of them feel like dedicated adult time was needed for a healthy family dynamic. Did they enjoy the heck out of their time when the kids spent the day at their grandparents? You'd better believe it.
Kids change phases so fast it is difficult to get perspective unless you have a few separated in age, which I don't. Sometimes I feel like I had more adult time when my daughter was a baby than now when she is 7. It didn't seem so at the time, but I don't think I'm just being nostalgic. One spends two years waiting to stop changing diapers and mixing formula only to realize babies are way more portable that way! I've come to accept things don't get easier or harder exactly. They just change. One chore goes away and another takes it's place, but the same is true of the unique experiences each age brings.
Mine is an only. She just turned 11, and suddenly EVERYONE is cooler than me. And I'm the cool, fun mom according to her friends. I've always been a single mom, so we're exceptionally close...to the point that I've sometimes worried that it would set her up for social failure later in life. But based on the blocks of kid-free time I get when she goes to play at friends' houses, she's going to do just fine.
I know what you mean. If we aren't beating ourselves up about not giving our kids enough attention, we're worried about giving them too much! I was an only parent of an only child for awhile, and I think she actually became more social than many other kids her age! Probably got tired of only seeing Dad's face day after day. My wife and her daughter were definitely in the same boat. The two girls, who are similar in age, are now inseparable. When they are getting along, they inhabit their own world where no adult may enter. And I guess I'm fine with that!
Yeah, that's how our boys are now. They are practically a two-person island.
"Sometimes I feel like I had more adult time when my daughter was a baby than now when she is 7."
My daughter (youngest) is 10. She never slept in my bed once she stopped nursing. Then all of a sudden like three months ago she started wanting to "have sleepover girl's nights" and has practically moved in, lol. Dad has taken to the couch most nights because she's just in this very 'clingy' phase. But it will pass and then I'll likely miss it. The boys are so independent now, I'm overjoyed if one of them LET'S me do something for him let alone ASKS for it.
My step daughter comes in most nights, usually after midnight when she's slept in her own bed for a few hours. Then she has to be pried out with a crow bar when it's time for school :-) I often head to the couch to, but that is more often due to cats than kids. My bio daughter has slept through the night in her own room since 4 months. I found myself missing the quiet times in the middle of the night when I would feed her a bottle and watch star trek reruns. Kid could sleep through nuclear war these days. When she is sick though she asks if I can sleep in her room and I'm like "um... Yes!"