I was raised by a mother whose approach was to be very firm about what I did all the while she could see me, and turn a wise blind eye when she could not. So my upbringing was both very disciplined and very free. I also knew beyond doubting that I was loved: my mother, my father, my sister – always in every moment I could feel their unswerving and unfailing love. It has given me a core of confidence and strength, a bulwark against the inevitable adversities of life’s journey.
In my teenage years, we had moved to a house with a big garden – five acres. It had a wood and a river, an orchard, a walled garden for vegetables, and a big field for sheep and hens.
We had dogs and cats too.
I learned a lot about raising children by watching dogs and sheep with their young. A ewe and a bitch have almost infinite patience. When a puppy oversteps the mark, mother will signal her displeasure with flattened ears and an unhappy expression. She will get up and walk away. If the puppy continues to bother her, she will get up again and walk away. She puts up with it, but she signals that this is not great.
A ewe will put up with a lot from a lamb. She will let it stand on her back, feed on demand – do most everything it wants. But if it’s really irritating her, she kicks it.
Later, as an adult with a family of my own living in a manse, I watched an urban vixen bringing her cubs through the streets in the early morning, before the cars and people were about. She had two cubs, one bold and adventurous, wanting to run ahead the way they always went, the other inquisitive, wanting to tarry at every interesting scent. I watched her sitting on the street corner, one eye to the laggard, then turning her head to check the enthusiast, and alert all the time to the three roads that ran towards the corner where she was sitting.
I remember a badger mother taking her youngsters out foraging in the woods. One of her children had strayed to some distance, and came to rest at our feet, gazing wonderingly up through myopic and beady black eyes at the unfamiliar beings it had found. We stayed as still as statues – but suddenly mother knew. Her head jerked up from the roots where she was snuffling, a sharp call, and the little one obediently returned to her and the rest of the family.
So from my own experience I learned that little ones need love but also boundaries, discipline and also freedom; they need authenticity of response, and they need to be able to believe in you – not endless dreary rules, but the sharp call that means ‘Danger now!’ They need patience, but also to understand the concept of ‘Enough!’ They need the security of a world that seems infinitely kind, but is guarded by a parent who is definitely in charge; it is not fair to ask a four-year-old or even a ten-year-old to rule the world. Boundaries are comforting.
I am not in favour of punishment ever, at all; but I am in favour of consequences. The child who makes a mess is not punished, but the child who makes a mess (within reason) clears it up. The child who shouts at other children and shoves them about is not deprived of sweets; but that child cannot be taken to the party until she has learnt better ways.
I am not in favour of beating children, or the ‘Wait until your father gets home’ threat. I would never hit a child to bruise it. But I am not against some slaps on the nether end to a child who has exhausted my patience.
I am in favour of respect: each one of us holds equal place in the family circle from the day we are born. No-one’s needs are of greater importance than anyone else’s, and each of us has different, unique needs – and those are to be respected.
In my reading, I learned from Frederick Leboyer, from Ina May Gaskin, from Sheila Kitzinger, from A.S.Neill, from John Holt (especially How Children Fail and Teach Your Own) and from Rudolf Steiner.
And I learned a huge amount from watching the place in community of the children in the Plain community we knew and loved to spend time with.
They held childhood innocence in very high esteem. One of their founders, coming from a background of the strict and austere German society of his day, had made a radical departure from the traditions he knew by reversing the order in which people were served at table. In his childhood, Father came first, because he was the head of the family, the most important. This was changed in that Plain community: the children were to be served first, because they were the ones least able to wait.
Those children were not indulged. They were spoken to in sensible, quiet voices. No-one wound them up until they were hyper and silly. They had space to play and big toys – swings, climbing frames – to exercise their muscles and expend their energy. If they were loud or inappropriate (I never saw this) I think they would have been removed quietly and without fuss from the gathering. They had songs and stories, they had the attention of both parents, they were loved and accepted by the whole community, they had a welcome of unconditional love. They also had chores to do and a contribution to make.
I learned with my own children to expect something of them, not to do everything for them. They were expected from a very young age (four, maybe?) to make their own sandwiches, get their own drinks, dress themselves – and to help each other.
I learned from the Plain mothers to speak to them very directly and seriously – not to be too smiley and cutesy with them; very clear about what I wanted and what was allowed. I learned to speak quietly and expect them to listen, not to ask more of them than they were capable of; but having asked something of them, to expect, and see to it, that it was done.
Children have a honoured place in the Plain way – abortion and abandonment are not Plain options. Every child is welcome, every child is known to be God’s blessing, the miracle of life with all its uncertainty, all its responsibility.
I thank God for those who have taught me about raising children. I thank God that the teaching came early enough: there have been things I did that I regretted, but the essential things – natural birth, breastfeeding, wholesome diet, letting them play with earth air fire and water, giving them freedom and giving them boundaries – these I had discovered before they arrived.
And I am glad for the teaching that gave me to understand, when each one arrives, yes, they have to learn language, learn to walk, learn how we do things here, learn motor control and what things are – what is hot, what is dangerous, what is and is not safe to eat; but the soul of the child, the core being, comes fully fledged from the world of light. I am honoured with the trust of walking alongside that soul, but it is not mine. It is neither my possession nor my responsibility. The soul of the child is free and belongs only to God.
My children had the great blessing to have in our family a special aunt - Auntie Bean, their grandmother's sister. While I was busy feeding them and bathing them and generally ordering them about, Auntie Bean was praying for them, and for us. She never stopped.
Auntie Bean died about ten years ago. After she died, I remembered her praying for us all. I don't do it every day, but I still keep faith with her, and pray through every one of the family - her children and their children, her nephews and nieces and their children (which includes my children and their father and his new family - the list expands!), and the new generation of which my grandson is the first little sprout! And by this means I can still hold hands with Auntie Bean in Heaven.