Hannah and I were discussing the other day how our parenting style, philosophy, strategy, and tactics changed when we went from one child to two to three. I don’t mean that experience teaches you the right way to do it — I mean that some choices seem reasonable when there’s only one, not so great when there are several children.
I home-pre-schooled my first toddler "Montessori" style: I set up low shelves of ready-laid-out work trays and allowed him to choose his work freely whenever he wished. Worked great until the second baby learned to crawl. Nowadays I keep all the school and art supplies inside two tall metal cabinets with padlocks on the door. Not very Montessori anymore.
Hannah used to lift her first toddler up onto the kitchen counter (she stayed near and taught him well how to keep safe near the edge) where he could easily help out with cooking and other projects. Worked great for a while, but that practice had to end when three children all wanted to be up there at once.
Another friend didn’t mind interrupting errands to retrieve a forgotten doll for her first little girl. If it was MY forgotten thing, I’d go back for it — why not do the same for her? But when the car held a new baby who needed to nurse NOW, extra driving to get a doll suddenly made no sense.
We parents who want to treat our children as real human beings with real needs give and give and give to the little one, and we get used to considering her needs and her wants as equal to our own. I remember well that I used to think that I ought to respond to a request from my child the same way that I ought to respond to a similar request from my husband. I still think that, but today I understand that requests don’t come one at a time, and no matter who’s asking, I have to prioritize.
We are adults and able to give quite a lot, able to defer our own satisfaction until naptime! We can be so selfless: we believe we should never put off meeting a child’s needs, and that we should generously help her to get what they want when it’s reasonable. And so many requests are "reasonable!" And then when another one comes along we find out — sometimes they both need something "reasonable" at the same time, and despite our best efforts one of them is going to have to wait. That sometimes in a family needs and wants have to balance as best they can. And everybody learns something. And we all grow a little.
What’s the answer for parents of a single child? Maybe it’s to be a little "selfish," selectively so, once in a while. But I know from experience (back when I had only one) that it’s hard to do that in a way that feels natural and right, not capricious and — well — unreasonable.
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