Parenting Outside the Lines: Forget the Rules, Tap into Your Wisdom, and Connect with Your Child

ISBN-13: 9780593421420

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group

Publication Date: 02-08-2022

Pages: 256

Product Dimensions: 5.40(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.80(d)

Meghan Leahy is the On Parenting columnist for The Washington Post, and a certified parenting coach. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband, three school-age daughters, and her dog. Leahy has appeared on NPR and ABC, as well as in numerous other publications.

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Chapter 1

You Are Not Up to the Parenting Task, and You Never Were (and Other Lies Our Parenting Culture Will Tell You)

In much of America today, the parenting culture picks up speed early and never seems to slow down. As soon as you become pregnant . . . no, as soon as you couple up, it seems that the entire world rises up and sends you website after website of activities you and your child will need to do, ASAP. Oh, it begins innocuously enough when you are pregnant: You take one birthing class, but then comes Home Birth and Water Birth classes, then Breastfeeding, Baby Wearing, and Going Back to Work After Childbirth classes, and the next thing you know you're signed up for Knitting with Baby, Goat Yoga and Baby, Breastfeeding and Tequila Tasting, and Sleep Training Your Puppy and Baby classes. Taken alone, there is nothing wrong with any of these classes; it's just that all of these options begin to set the tone for what a "good" parent looks like in our modern culture, and that look is super jacked up.

For a long time (when I was blissfully childless), I really judged these activity-crazed parents. You know, the parents who relentlessly pursued every class and course; for whom self-improvement was a way of life. "What happened to you to make you this insecure?" I would muse as I watched these parents rush around the city. "These poor, poor parents . . ." My pity was more obnoxious than their insecurity, really, but I couldn't see it. (That's how obnoxious people are, right?) I simply could not understand why parents needed to spend their money and time on Mommy and Me Exercise and Baby and Bach and Swimming with Your Six-Month-Old and Baby Massage 101. Like, you don't know how to touch your baby? My snark was backed up by my childless friends and, like every non-parent who came before us, we would nod and smile to ourselves over our wine and crudités, accumulating our bad parenting karma. "We won't be like that as parents. Ever."

Ah, well.

Despite my laissez-faire attitude toward all things parenting when I wasn't actually a parent, as soon as my spouse and I decided to become pregnant, I found myself spiraling down dozens of "How to Conceive" websites. There were Chinese gender calendars, sex positions to guarantee a boy, analysis of monthly mucus (insert gross face here), and charts to track your temperature. My breezy "just have sex and see what happens" attitude was hijacked, and suddenly, I was part of the crowd. What crowd, you ask? The very crowd that I had made fun of, that's who. The crowd of people who tell you that you need tools and tricks and worksheets to get pregnant. I ate it up, and because every snarky person is actually a fearful person, my deep fear was that I could not get pregnant. There was zero evidence to support my thinking, mind you. By all accounts, I had a normal period and a normal ovulation and I had somehow escaped all versions of STIs and STDs in my teens and early twenties. I didn't have cysts or PCOS or endometriosis. My mother had easily conceived, as had her mother. I was in my mid-twenties and, true, I smoked cigarettes like it was my job and, yes, I drank enough alcohol to kill a horse . . . but otherwise, I was in good shape . . . right? None of those facts mattered. I was afraid I couldn't get pregnant because our culture told me I needed to make it a project, so into the interwebs I dove.

I love a project, so I began fastidiously tracking my temperature. Every morning, before my feet hit the floor, I would take my temperature and write it down on the sheet I had printed out. I was meticulous on the time and, as I went along, I noticed my temperature had begun to rise, if only slightly. Ah, good! I was ovulating! And as I went along, my temperature stayed slightly elevated. Hmmm, I thought, I got this wrong. Something is wrong with this thermometer; my temp is supposed to drop again . . . I was just trying to get a baseline going, and I had screwed that up. I showed my husband the chart, and he shrugged and suggested starting again after my period. I was discouraged. I had been off my pill for a month or two, and I guessed that the hormones were still messing with my system. I felt like I was already failing pregnancy school; it was just one simple and lousy worksheet with temperatures and dots on it, and I had already gotten it all wrong.

So, I went back to life as normal: smoking and drinking and waiting for my period. Despite my screwup, I was determined to get this temp thing right, but in the meantime, I felt like crap. My breasts hurt. I felt crampy and tired, and not just hangover tired. Like, dead-on-my-feet tired. Every opportunity I had, I was in the supine position. And when I could not lie down, I would put my head in my hands and just shut my eyes. I was teaching English literature in an all-boys school at the time, and I can remember the feeling of resting my head on the cool wooden desk as I waited for the boys to filter in. I remember wondering, How many movies can I show them before the school fires me? And food began to taste, well, odd. It was either like heaven on earth, or total dirt. I couldn't even swallow some of my favorite foods. Must be getting the flu, I thought.

Driving home on a Friday, I complained to my friend Caitie (a new mother herself) and in her typical and direct fashion, Caitie suggested the obvious: "It sounds like you're pregnant, Meg." No, I assured her, that couldn't be. I had screwed up the temperature thing, and I was just waiting for my period. Wait, where was my period? I silently wondered. Caitie sounded confident, so I stopped at CVS and bought the cheapest pregnancy test I could find. There, I thought. I will take the damn thing, prove her wrong, and that will be that.

The next morning, I peed on the stick, lit a cigarette, and proceeded to watch a Real World: Paris marathon on MTV. For hours, I laid on a futon (oh, the humanity), smoked cigarettes, drank peach-flavored Snapple iced tea, and watched a TV show that I had already watched that year. When the four iced teas finally caught up to me, I returned to the bathroom and saw the pregnancy test perched innocently on the edge of the tub. It was now late into the afternoon; how had I forgotten that I had taken a pregnancy test? Two lines. Wait, what did that mean? I began to feel the bottom dropping out of my stomach and rummaged through the trash for the pregnancy test box and instructions.

"Two lines equals pregnant," said the box. Well, the second line was kind of faint. "A faint line indicates pregnancy. See your doctor."

I dropped the test on the floor and turned to leave the bathroom, promptly tripping over my jeans. As I hit the floor, my breasts aching and my stomach churning, I remember thinking, But I didn't do the temperature thing right . . . Yes, of course I was pregnant. And looking back, this was just the first in a long line of incidents where I would not listen to my body or my instincts when it came to parenthood.

What does my pregnancy story have to do with your children and your activities? My point is that when it comes to trusting our intuition and what we know about our own children, our culture keeps us, the parents, in a whipped frenzy of doubt. We feel like we have to follow a certain path, instructions, and add more to our lives to live up to society's expectations. The message is clear: You are not good enough to conceive, birth, and raise your own child. Our logical brain knows this isn't true, but our emotional brain (our limbic system) whispers, ÒBut what if you are wrong . . .? The stakes are too high . . . This is my kid we are talking about! I have one shot to get this right . . . I don't wanna mess it up.Ó Parents of all stripes and types are funneled into a tight cattle chute of choices and activities until our instincts are completely squeezed out of us.

The funny thing about the conception chart and the parenting activities I ended up throwing myself into with gusto? I never had these parenting doubts growing up. Oh, sure, I had lots of other things going on in my head that were irrational and unhealthy, but I never questioned my ability to parent. It sounds like a form of brainwashing, but I grew up knowing I was built to be a parent. When the time would come, I would simply know what to do. I was raised by and with confident, strong women; women who didn't dither around and wring their hands about small parenting decisions. And if they did dither? The kids sure didn't know about it. As a child, I assumed that parents knew what they were doing, and even though my mother has since disabused me of that thinking, there was a confidence that was unquestionably imprinted on me. I was going to be a strong mother. It was my birthright, my lineage, and my expected role.

So, how did I fall victim to both legitimate and cockamamie information on the web? How did I so quickly lose my mothering mojo? And why did you lose your mind and join a million things, most of which were a waste of time and money?

There seems to be a gap between our biological function as a parent (the unconscious hormonal and emotional mechanisms; the unconscious knowing of how to feed and burp and love a baby) and the confidence required to stand up, stand tall, and find the feeling of "I've got this" within ourselves.

This space, this threshold, this slight wrinkle in our humanity, this is where we lose it. This gap between our intuition and our fear, this is where the temperature charts, the birthing classes, the books, the blogs, the experts, the articles, and the doubts seep and sneak in. Without even noticing it, our unconscious brain silences our intuition and turns toward insecurity instead . . . all without us deciding if that is best. There wasn't a moment when I really asked myself why I couldn't just try to get pregnant without a worksheet; I just skipped right over giving my own biology a try and went straight to the websites. Over and over, I have asked parents, "Did you know you needed (fill in the activity or extra parenting enterprise) before you started it?" And over and over, most parents have said, "Hmmm, I don't recall ever thinking about it." Of course, many parents have said, "Yes, I am prone to depression and needed a community right away" or "I grew up with all sorts of ob-gyn issues that pointed me toward needing extra resources." But most parents shake their heads and say, "I don't know . . . my mother's group thought that Urban Farming and Baby classes would be fun, and I ended up really far away from who I am and what I really needed." I get it. We all get it.

I am not saying every activity for a new parent is "bad." I am not blasting natural birth or baby massage or sleep training classes. These classes are tools and as such they are neutral, and assuming that the instructor is knowledgeable and kind, the classes are fine. In fact, if you are out pounding the parental pavement, looking for connection and other like-minded parents, then kudos to you. The books and activities and experts aren't the issue. The true issue is this: Have you asked yourself if you need these tools? Are you aware of your own shortcomings and strengths? And . . . are you comfortable with the knowledge that you just won't know what you are doing for much of your parenting life?

After the humbling experience of having children and signing up for all of the parenting classes, and after coaching hundreds and hundreds of parents, one thing is perfectly clear: We are not as damaged and insecure as we think we are! We just aren't aware of how our brains work, and we have stopped trusting ourselves. Because we are highly susceptible to panic and fear, and because there is nothing in nature that makes us more panicky and fearful than having a child, we have created a cultural loop of fear and reaction, reaction and fear. Without meaning to, parenting has been turned into a business, and that business is monetizing our parental fear.

If you are a typical parent and you ask yourself what you think is really true when it comes to parenting, you will likely swing from one extreme to another:

I am in too many "self-improvement" parenting activities.

I have too many books about parenting.

I am always an insecure mess and cannot change.

I worry too much.

Everything extra is getting thrown out. I am on my own from now on. I can do this.

I don't need anyone or anything.

Hold on . . . no, no, no!

I am 100 percent not interested in you giving up everything you are doing to enrich your parenting life. As much as it isn't healthy to go wherever the parenting trends are blowing you, it isn't healthy to eschew every activity or group or class that comes your way, either. Remember what I said in the introduction? We humans need community, we cannot live without it.

When I signed up for my first parenting class, I desperately wanted to be told what to do and when to do it. Just give me the answers was the message that ran through my mind as I wrote the check. Just tell me how to get my daughter dressed for school. Just tell me how to stop screaming all the time.

But the true skills and wisdom that I learned came from listening to my gut, the other parents, as well as the nuggets of wisdom from my teachers. Over time I learned how to take what I needed and leave the rest. My hope is that you read this book, take what you need or want, and disregard the rest. Just believe you are up to this parenting challenge. You can do this.

Table of Contents

Foreword to the Paperback Edition xiii

Introduction xvii

Chapter 1 You Are Not Up to the Parenting Task, and You Never Were (and Other Lies Our Parenting Culture Will Tell You) 1

Chapter 2 Sometimes You Need to Abandon a Full Grocery Cart in the Middle of the Aisle 11

Chapter 3 Just Let Them Wear the Pajamas! And Other Lessons I've Learned 20

Chapter 4 Your Children Are Going to Fight and Yes, It Is Hard, and Yes, We Can Make It Better 33

Chapter 4.5 Disrupting the Patterns of Sibling Drama 45

Chapter 5 Are You Pushing Your Children to the Proverbial Edge? 58

Chapter 6 When You Are Falling Out of the Pose, Look Like You Meant to Do It 76

Chapter 7 Drive-By Parenting Feels Good and Completely Works … Until It Doesn't 90

Chapter 8 Your Child Doesn't Give a Shit About Your Organic Salmon 107

Chapter 8.5 Seven Ways to Make Dinner with Kids Easier: Pick One (Any One) 122

Chapter 9 Is It Your Child Who Is Addicted to Technology and Turning into a Zombie in Front of Your Eyes … or Is It You? 125

Chapter 9.5 How Do You Know If Both You and Your Child Have Screen Problems? 136

Chapter 10 Your Child Doesn't Have to Be a Spoiled Bully, I Promise 144

Chapter 11 Forcing Feelings onto Your Children Is Never Going to Work 163

Chapter 12 Is It Too Late Now to Say Sorry? 172

Chapter 13 Your Parenting Techniques Aren't Working, Are They? 183

Chapter 14 The Invisible Work of Parenting 194

Conclusion Easier Said Than Done 205

Recommended Reading 209

Acknowledgments 213