So, Naomi Aldort always amazes and astounds me. She is Joy, Peace and Love to the fullest. A true teacher/wise-wombyn without judgment. I just wanted to post up the Reflections and an interview from her latest newsletter. The things she mentions about not relying on outside experts and information and “going inside” oneself are the very things that I try very hard to convey to clients and other people. Oh how clouded our minds and intuitions become when we worry about others and how they perceive us and ‘doing it right’. So, here the end of the newsletter in its entirety.
*********************************************************************************************
6) Reflections as a prologue to Tamara’s interview on baby’s crying:
Most modern parents believe what the doctors, media, schools and magazines tell them like it was truth. You are reading this newsletter, because you stopped believing these cherished ideas about letting babies cry, cribs, disciplining, telling children what to do, etc. You started listening to your inner voice of love instead.
One of the greatest core brainwashing themes we suffer from is the idea of “proof” and of being “scientific.” Since quantum physics, scientists themselves are starting to shy away from believing that the way we “prove” things has any merit, or that our “scientific” thinking and lab work is a proof at all. If anything it is one limiting way of thinking and often far from truth. It is only provable within its own rules. Yet most people are not able to see truth in front of their eyes if they look for “proof.”
A mother asked me, “how do I know that its all right for my baby to breastfeed and fall asleep on the breast?” Looking for evidence, she missed the proof. Thinking that the baby doesn’t know took this mother away from the loudest truth: reality. The baby is nursing and falling asleep. That’s how I know that this is what the baby should do. He does it.
Babies, birth and children existed before the idea of science and proofs. Children are raised best not by scientists but by mothers whose instincts are unharmed by science and who trust themselves and don’t look for approval or guidance outside. When we see the baby and child without layers of thoughts, the baby and child learns to do the same and become rooted inside.
There are so many ideas we have believed in the last century about health and sickness, food, viruses, bacteria. We only know what we hold as real from someone else and from linear thinking (unlike quantum thinking). These food and health “facts” are not facts, just like the fear that the baby will grow up sexually distorted if he sleeps with you is not true. When I don’t look to read someone else’s thesis and “proof” I live here and now. I don’t invent the wheel, but I also don’t build my life on verbal confusion. I always check with me and respond to my baby.
As you read the following interview with Tamara, keep in mind this cultural drive for evidence. Instead of looking for science, look for the greatest evidence on earth, you, your baby, reality, and the only time there is: Now.
7) Responding to your crying baby:
The following is an email dialogue that ended up like a sort of an interview. It is from Tamara, who is still working on editing and will have it on her site soon. The background is the same search for proofs instead of being with love and connection to what is in front of us.
Responding to Your Crying Baby
-An Interview with Naomi Aldort -
Responding to Your Crying Baby
-An Interview with Naomi Aldort -
Interviewer: Tamara Parnay
Tamara: How to respond to my crying baby? This is a question that comes up for many mothers. Do you consider the tender holding of one’s crying baby to be in and of itself a soothing maternal response?
Naomi: I avoid the word “soothing” as that creates the idea of rejecting the crying. Being in arms simply keeps the baby feeling safe, connected, and loved unconditional of his emotional expression.
If all the baby’s needs are met and if the mother knows clearly that the baby is unleashing emotions and needing a loving listener and a sense of rightness, then holding, validating, and connecting is a loving and supportive response.
The baby who is in arms does not usually need to resort to crying to communicate a need. A gentle cue gets the mother’s response. Therefore, when a baby in arms cries it is often not for a basic need but for a different reason, often to unleash emotions. Assuming the baby was in arms at all times, a mother knows quickly if there is a problem (pain, discomfort, medical, fear…). She even knows when her baby is going to cry before it happens.
T: Do you believe it’s possible at times for additional maternal responses, such as rocking or bouncing, to stifle or discourage a baby’s complete release of crying?
Naomi: Yes. The message becomes: You must stop crying. Instead it is better to stay connected emotionally, spiritually and physically to join where the baby is and be with her. When we panic and try every trick on earth to stop the crying, we tell the child in essence, “Your emotional expression is wrong, scary, unwanted and must be stopped.” In that case we are rejecting the baby’s feelings and self-expression.
T: What are your views about the advice to maintain a search for solutions (looking to uncover the unmet needs) to the baby’s crying, rather than taking a moment to hold the baby, breathe deeply, get in touch with one’s love for the baby and oneself, and feel acceptance for the crying?
Naomi: Initially: respond to the need when it is clear; nurse, change diaper, move, sleep, food, hug.
T: Sometimes I automatically knew that there wasn’t a need for nursing, diaper change, motion, sleep, etc. So, it seemed to me that I went straight to holding and being with my babies in order to give them a safe and loving place to cry. However, when I think about it, I did do an almost instant, assessment, often in my head.
On occasion, when I was feeling stressed and unaccepting of my baby’s crying, I would simply hold him even just for a moment, breathe deeply, get in touch with my love for him, and find acceptance for him just as he was, tears and all. Sometimes that helped calm us both. And sometimes, in this state of stillness and peace, answers appeared.
Naomi: Yes. I always am careful to mention first responding… because I have actually observed mothers whose intuition is buried so deep, that they don’t notice that there is a need. I see in public mothers holding a baby who CLEARLY asks to breastfeed, and they don’t seem to notice it. I sometimes say, “I think she wants to nurse,” and the mother is surprised… So, we cannot assume that mothers have their intuition up front, unfortunately.
A mother who has a healthy connection with her baby knows when he has a need to cry, can stay present, loving and honoring his needs, need not search for solutions because there is no problem, or you may say, she found the solution. We all would love to sometimes cry in the arms of a loving mother/friend who lets us fall apart and does not fall apart by our agony. The baby counts on you for this unconditionally loving support. If he needs to cry and mother seems shaken and disturbed it is very unsettling and scary for the baby.
However, it is not always this easy for mothers. We have been working hard in the AP community to help mothers be responsive. We moved away from letting the baby cry, to realizing that crying is his way to communicate. So the message is confusing at times. Most attachment parenting mothers go for the medal in a baby who never cries. So this means that they meet all the needs but sometimes may stifle the baby’s need to cry.
Learning to distinguish crying for a need, from the need to cry is not always easy and I for one am big on helping mothers find the wisdom inside of them to make this distinction.
T: How might the baby interpret continuing efforts to search out solutions to his crying? Does he continue to sense his mother’s unconditional love for him? And what is the impact on the mother?
Naomi: When crying does not seem to point to a tangible need, it is important to stop the search for a fix so the baby knows that crying is fine and that mother stays content, peaceful and supportive. When we are busy trying to stop his crying, the baby has no idea why we try to stop him and learns to suppress his own feelings, please us, detach from himself, and more.
T: It seems to me there can be a fine line between discouraging crying and using soothing responses while searching for causes for the crying. How do you feel about this? Do you believe it is common for mothers distinguish between soothing their babies during an outpouring of emotion and trying to stop the crying?
Naomi: With the way most modern mothers have been raised, many do not make this distinction. They may soothe and not realize that they are rejecting the child’s emotional expression, or, they might think they are supporting crying while the baby actually has a need. So, as you see, with my many years of counseling parents world wide, I don’t see any rights and wrongs, only mothers and babies; one at a time.
T: Regarding the idea of the mother-baby unit, “mamatoto,” and how the mother and baby’s needs are inextricably linked, would taking this special relationship into account affect the way you suggest how mothers might go about responding to their babies’ crying?
This differs from mother to mother in our society. Remember that most mothers were raised with one degree or another of disconnection when they were babies and children. We do need to take this fact into account with compassion. A mother’s ability to be one with the baby varies with the amount of pain she has experienced through her life.
This beautiful connection, when present, is the best guide. But, our society’s confusing messages are hard to escape even when doing AP fully. Ideally, yes. If the mother listens only to her baby and herself, free of needing approval and from the voices of others, she would respond optimally.
T: Can you point me to any articles or books you know of that deal with this topic?
Yes: My new 4 CD set, Raising Competent Children Through Attachment Parenting, It is an interview that covers this issue among many other themes, from babies though young children. In addition the 2CD set, Babies and Toddlers to Tame or to Trust is an attachment parenting class, and, my book, Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves, answer this question as well.
I truly know of nothing else that is clear of full primal mother child connection while at the same time values emotional power, self-expression, and self-realization. It seems everyone is still reacting to the pain of letting babies cry themselves to sleep, with the reactive panic to stop the crying, even when the crying is the actual need.
T: There seems to be an increasing reliance on scientific research-based advice used in attachment parenting education to back attachment parenting as the “right” way to parent. I personally think the research is useful for doctors and other specialists, and I find it interesting to read, but I do not use it as advice on how to parent.
I think of it as external advice, and I believe it is so important for us mothers to be encouraged to get in touch with our internal “advice,” meaning our intuition, our maternal wisdom, and especially our love for our children. I sense that much, if not all, of the parenting knowledge we need resides within us, and I worry that parents, especially us mothers, aren’t being empowered. Seems we need most of all to get in touch with our love, and be free to respond to our children from that place of love within us. Love so often provides us with the answers we need.
Naomi: Well said. Go inside is my song of the milenium. It is the song of Byron Katie and other spiritually awake leaders. It is the song of love and connection. When I counsel, I take the mother back to herself. She has the answers, only she didn’t see them. If I only give answers, she is dependent on external source again. When I facilitate her ability to go inside for answers, she has the wise master within her at all times.
It is my main teaching, to look inside, not outside. I have noticed this problem with AP, making it yet another outside guide for mothers. And I already see the results daily. Most of my clients are mothers who followed this advice and call me with the question: Why is my child so aggressive and unable to feel or have things not go her way?
T: So, you are saying that there is a way to respond to the need to cry such that the baby gains emotional strength?
Yes. We have been supportive of feelings, which is good. Raising powerful people is the next step. We always respond to crying, but responding does not always mean stopping it. A powerful person can have sadness and stay powerful precisely because he is not afraid to feel, and he knows that he is loved while being sad.
In a way, our fear of crying as self-expression has caused some mothers to go against the baby. We must now learn to go with the baby and child. But, always respond to needs first. Why give a loving ear to the crying if the reason for it can be eliminated? And, on the other side, why reject the baby’s crying if that’s what he needs to do?
This is the reason I like to guide mother contextually rather than in content. I like to help mothers gain clarity from the inside rather than giving information and tricks. Telling the mother what to do is like giving food to the hungry. It is good, but even better is teaching the hungry to grow food or hunt. I teach mothers to trust themselves and their babies. I help them remove the clutter of thoughts from childhood, media and culture, that prevent them from being clear about their baby’s crying and other needs.
T: To summarize, in responding from a place of love for her baby, and acceptance for his crying, a mother will often intuitively know what her baby needs?
The love toward a baby and child does not lie. When a mother comes from that context of love and trust, she will know the reason for the crying very quickly and without a manual of instructions. I don’t want to add to the mental the clutter of yet another instruction of the “right” way to do things as I will just create another dependency on external voices.
Our society has strayed away from nature, intuition and trust because of too much reliance on external guidance. When the child watches us following external direction, he will grow up to do the same. That’s how we created a society of followers, consumers, peer addicted people. When I help mothers to go inside for answers, the babies and children end up learning the same thing. Instead of growing up dependent on proofs and on others’ opinions, they grow up to be rooted in themselves. Instead of relating through seeking approval, they become able to freely create authentic and deep human connections.
T: Thank you, Naomi, for sharing your maternal wisdom with us, and for supporting us in getting in touch with ours.
Tamara Parnay is a freelance writer and mother to two of our Earth family’s children, daughter Nairie (b. 2002), and son Ahri (b. 2004). She enjoys reading, creative writing, gardening, painting, bicycling, and playing with her children and husband. Originally from the US and New Zealand, her family is living in The Netherlands.
Interview took place in January, 2009
©Copyright Naomi Aldort
Naomi Aldort Ph.D.
Author, Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves
http://naomialdort.com/book.html
Parenting counseling and workshops
Facilitator of The Work of Byron Katie
(360)376-3777
POB 1719 Eastsound, WA 98245, USA
naomi@aldort.com
Transforming parent-child relationships from reaction and struggle to Freedom, Power and Joy.
