My daughter has started sleepwalking. Her urge to pee wakes her, but when she gets out of bed, she is clearly confused. You can talk to her, her eyes are open, but you can tell she is not fully present and the next day she will have no memory of it. She runs through the apartment with her pants down going from bathroom to bedroom to bathroom to living room to bedroom to bathroom to bedroom until my wife or I guides her to the toilet and then back to bed. It’s not common, but has happened a few times recently. Last night, she sat on the toilet in her undies and peed through them! The internet says it is a “normal” thing kids do. Maybe triggered by stress or lack of sleep? But my daughter gets plenty of sleep. Maybe she’s triggered by vicarious stress from her parents? My daughter also has a classmate whom she considers a close friend in the hospital. Maybe, that’s it?
This probably places further toward the heart-of-stone end of the spectrum, but I love frustrating my kids. I’m hoping that if they can learn to deal with disappointment early and well, they’ll have some hope of avoiding the various addictions rooted in instant gratification.
I realize this is not what you’re talking about at all. But I do have a similar impulse when it comes to gradually exposing them to the suffering endemic to being human in this world. Not to say, look kid, life’s a bitch and then you die. But rather, please notice how fortunate we are, respective to the horrors endured by our fellows. The effort will always be, for myself as well as for the kids I’m raising, to use this awareness to cultivate the twin virtues of gratitude and sympathy. And then maybe we can help mitigate just a little bit of all that sorrow, here and there.
I think they learn more by watching how you handle the pain and misfortunes of life than by being exposed to them directly. Rain falls on the righteous and unrighteous alike, and they'll find that out soon enough. When it does happen they'll look first to Dad. If you can share an example from your own life it helps them to know they're not alone. Sometimes I'll share with my kids when I'm anxious so they can see I'm vulnerable and that I got through the situation. It's better than me always trying to fix their problems.
When you described yourself as being an "unusually sensitive" kid, that made me sad. What's unusual about it? The world is pretty much run by hardened people who can't appreciate the suffering of others. And uh... how's that been going?
I was sensitive growing up, too, and I don't necessarily think it had to do with the parenting I received. My siblings and I all responded to stressors in different ways, so I think some people are just built with more pronounced empathy and a deeper well of emotion. I don't think that's bad. The fact that kids (boys especially, but also girls) are made to feel that emotional responses to difficult things are irrational or weak, is kind of awful in my opinion. Learning to process your emotions and put them toward something meaningful is a better path than forcing yourself not to have them to begin with.
The truth is, it's people who feel sad about the terrible things going on in the world that take action against those things. Hard-hearted people are more likely to tune them out and make excuses.
This next part is only one opinion (advice from a fellow softie): Your kids are already built a certain way. Reprogramming them is only going to make it harder for them to figure out how best to navigate the world with the tools they have. Talk to them. Hug them, definitely. Help them find ways to use their sensitive natures to do good things. And don't be afraid to tell them when you're scared, anxious, confused, sad, angry. Kids need to see that their grownups are just people with the same feelings they have, and that they aren't infallible.
Also... trust your instincts. Every time I read about how you're raising your kids I want to applaud.
As for your daughter's sleep walking ... be grateful she's waking up to pee in the first place. The alternative creates far more laundry for you and embarrassment for her. Speaking from experience.
I'm jealous of your cherry blossoms. It's snowing here right now.
As a kid, I did not sleepwalk, but I did have nightmares about drowning, and sometimes I would wake up thinking about death and feeling very sad/worried about the fact that my parents would someday die. Now, my oldest comes to me with the same worries, and I find myself repeating my dad's advice and hoping that he feels comforted. My dad was always the comforting one, the one who would take the time to listen. My mom, the pusher to do better-er. At the time it felt unfair to always be pushed so hard, but now I think my little lazy gene would have been much lazier had I not had that. My own parenting style is somewhat a mix, but the goal that's always in the back of my head is I just want my children to grow up to be kind and caring for others.
That was so lovely how you connected the grand dilemmas of parenting- perhaps one of the very fundamental ones of how to teach them to care but not so much that they taken on undue suffering - with finding joy in the small and sweet routines, all in one post. Every day as a parent is a good one if we find at least one such joyful moment in the day... too much parenting otherwise simply becomes transactional.
Thank you also for the generous mention. It’s been sucha delight being and becoming part of this community!
This probably places further toward the heart-of-stone end of the spectrum, but I love frustrating my kids. I’m hoping that if they can learn to deal with disappointment early and well, they’ll have some hope of avoiding the various addictions rooted in instant gratification.
I realize this is not what you’re talking about at all. But I do have a similar impulse when it comes to gradually exposing them to the suffering endemic to being human in this world. Not to say, look kid, life’s a bitch and then you die. But rather, please notice how fortunate we are, respective to the horrors endured by our fellows. The effort will always be, for myself as well as for the kids I’m raising, to use this awareness to cultivate the twin virtues of gratitude and sympathy. And then maybe we can help mitigate just a little bit of all that sorrow, here and there.
Hard lessons stick.
I think they learn more by watching how you handle the pain and misfortunes of life than by being exposed to them directly. Rain falls on the righteous and unrighteous alike, and they'll find that out soon enough. When it does happen they'll look first to Dad. If you can share an example from your own life it helps them to know they're not alone. Sometimes I'll share with my kids when I'm anxious so they can see I'm vulnerable and that I got through the situation. It's better than me always trying to fix their problems.
When you described yourself as being an "unusually sensitive" kid, that made me sad. What's unusual about it? The world is pretty much run by hardened people who can't appreciate the suffering of others. And uh... how's that been going?
I was sensitive growing up, too, and I don't necessarily think it had to do with the parenting I received. My siblings and I all responded to stressors in different ways, so I think some people are just built with more pronounced empathy and a deeper well of emotion. I don't think that's bad. The fact that kids (boys especially, but also girls) are made to feel that emotional responses to difficult things are irrational or weak, is kind of awful in my opinion. Learning to process your emotions and put them toward something meaningful is a better path than forcing yourself not to have them to begin with.
The truth is, it's people who feel sad about the terrible things going on in the world that take action against those things. Hard-hearted people are more likely to tune them out and make excuses.
This next part is only one opinion (advice from a fellow softie): Your kids are already built a certain way. Reprogramming them is only going to make it harder for them to figure out how best to navigate the world with the tools they have. Talk to them. Hug them, definitely. Help them find ways to use their sensitive natures to do good things. And don't be afraid to tell them when you're scared, anxious, confused, sad, angry. Kids need to see that their grownups are just people with the same feelings they have, and that they aren't infallible.
Also... trust your instincts. Every time I read about how you're raising your kids I want to applaud.
As for your daughter's sleep walking ... be grateful she's waking up to pee in the first place. The alternative creates far more laundry for you and embarrassment for her. Speaking from experience.
I'm jealous of your cherry blossoms. It's snowing here right now.
As a kid, I did not sleepwalk, but I did have nightmares about drowning, and sometimes I would wake up thinking about death and feeling very sad/worried about the fact that my parents would someday die. Now, my oldest comes to me with the same worries, and I find myself repeating my dad's advice and hoping that he feels comforted. My dad was always the comforting one, the one who would take the time to listen. My mom, the pusher to do better-er. At the time it felt unfair to always be pushed so hard, but now I think my little lazy gene would have been much lazier had I not had that. My own parenting style is somewhat a mix, but the goal that's always in the back of my head is I just want my children to grow up to be kind and caring for others.
That was so lovely how you connected the grand dilemmas of parenting- perhaps one of the very fundamental ones of how to teach them to care but not so much that they taken on undue suffering - with finding joy in the small and sweet routines, all in one post. Every day as a parent is a good one if we find at least one such joyful moment in the day... too much parenting otherwise simply becomes transactional.
Thank you also for the generous mention. It’s been sucha delight being and becoming part of this community!