Crazy parenting advice

What is some of the craziest parenting advice you ever received?

(Question from “For my children, a mother’s journal of memories, wishes and wisdom” – compiled by Dionna Ford of  Code Name Mama)

The first four points are mine:

1. To stop breastfeeding before baby is able to talk. (Still breastfeeding at four years.)

2. To not spoil my baby by picking her up when she cries.

3. To start solids with rice cereal. (Which I did, regrettably!)

4. To not read any parenting magazines or information. So as not to be overwhelmed by all the information out there, and/or to get an inferior attitude with regards own parenting.

5. To not let your children sleep in your bed. (Added by Hubby!)


Did you receive any crazy advice?


Related post:

For my children - a keepsake

I don't have to contemplate my grey hair...

I know where it is coming from...

One hour on a Saturday morning, and I know!

The morning started very calm and peaceful with more watching of the Olympics, and a later breakfast at home... A perfect Saturday!

Then all hell broke loose!
The Toddler all of a sudden complained about her stomach, very low-down. Something was hurting her quite badly, or so it seemed judging by the screaming, and the whirling and curling around, AND THE CRYING!

It started just when we were beginning to get ready for the day and her Tiny Tumbles' classes...

We could not see any mark on her stomach, but we put on some cream.

We took off her panties just in case it might have irritated her.

We carried her upstairs to lie down in her bed.

We were trying by some questioning to get to the root of the problem. You know all those questions that immediately swirl through your brain when your child is in pain:

- Did she hurt herself at school/at home?
- Did she fall?
- Did somebody else hurt her?
- Did she hurt her vagina? (Especially just after reading Melinda's concerns this week about her greatest fear!)
- Does she have worms?
- Is she naughty?
- Is she trying to delay getting dressed and going to the gymnastics?

There were even some "exchanges" going on between the "elders" about the correct handling of the situation... (In terms of "Is she naughty?" or "Is there something really wrong?")

A final blood-curdling scream gave the answer! With the bed and the Toddler getting soaked in pee!

She forgot to go to the toilet! (We did not remind her!)

After a bath she announced she was feeling just fine , and we were just a little bit late for her gymnastics lesson on Saturday...


I do not have to wonder at all where my grey is coming from!

Three steps to handle those meltdowns - "She is not being difficult!"

Crying, tantrums, melt-downs...

That's what Toddlerville looks like now!

It gets very difficult for us to handle it!
We get the feeling that she is just being naughty difficult!

The immediate gut-reaction from our side is to label it (as being difficult!), to threaten her with some sort of punishment or to ignore...

The more I read about it, and the more I try to understand the outbursts, the more I know that she is  not being difficult!

- She wants to express something to us that she is not yet fully able to understand herself!

- The only way to express her feelings is through crying, tantrums and melt-downs!

- She wants us to understand what she is trying to express! She is having very strong feelings about it!


I heard a very sane way of handling it (on Groeipyne, on RSG, an Afrikaans radio station), and it can be done in 3 steps.

3  Steps to approach a meltdown (tantrum/crying):

1. Try to understand what the child is trying to say?

2. Reflect her emotions (that is lying underneath the behaviour) back to her!
"I can hear you are angry/upset/frustrated because you ...."

3. Allow her to have the emotions and scoop her up in your arms or stay very close. Be accepting of her feelings and emotions!
It does not mean you have to give in to all her demands.
She should be allowed to have those feelings and outbursts!

Our job is to learn them how to handle these outbursts and emotions.


Or else we will still have a door-slamming, swearing, raging individual when she grows up... (those Adult tantrums!)



Related posts: (I see I have quite a few ;-) I am still learning...)

How to survive the terrible tantrum

The t-dance: the toddler and tantrums

Symptoms of toddlerhood: the whistle and not sleeping

The evening WHINE

Movie Clip Monday #6 - Swinging into the sponge pit

Tiny Gymnastics again. The Toddler has so much fun there.
She was all smiles while swinging, but it seems it was a bit of a shock landing into the sponges!

Linking up with MumDrum with her Movie Clip Mondays.

Infant dyschezia translates into not sleeping

Mieka 4 days old (photo Debbie Rogers)

I remember those early days with our baby. From the first night she did not sleep for very long, and the crying was exhausting. Especially from suicide hour and later. Watching the clock goes from 12 to 1 to 2 to 3 to 4...
Friends of ours have got a little girl keeping them up now. They were lucky with their first-born, a boy. Not so with number two. Margot at Jou Ma se Blerrie Blog also has a Richie who goes into screaming marathons. I really feel for them.  I think we still feel the aftershocks of those early not sleeping...

Some calls it colicky babies! It’s definitely got something to do with the little stomachs. Because they wiggle and squirm while screaming at the top of their lungs. And there is not much we can do about it. Gripe water and rocking and breastfeeding and and...

Our paediatrician called Mieka’s "problem" infant dyschezia. A condition to do with the passing of wind, or before the passing of a soft bowel movement. It also gets diagnosed when the infant is healthy and has passed all of their milestones. We could see that Mieka was very uncomfortable after she had her meals. Wind and crying definitely went hand in hand. We called it the “poopies” and it kept us busy until she was about eight months old.

I do not hear it getting mentioned when talking about colicky babies. It is definitely something to consider when the little one screams and you can see that it has something to do with a bowel movement. Especially when it is soft bowel movements...

After we knew what the problem was, we had more sympathy and understanding for our little one. We used to jump on an exercise ball with her, and many a times she fell asleep on her dad’s shoulder... Somehow we made it through those nights. (Big smile!) I now can make lists of sleep tactics!

“This too has passed!”

The Shriek!

Alas! I thought we were not going to see it. (Margot called it “the era of the one loud shriek”). But here it is. At nearly one year of age. The baby shrieks for EVERY THING! It is not even the hurt cry anymore. It is the unhappy shrieking when something is not going her way. At this stage she is only contented being carried and showed stuff, or walking with her where she wants to go. The rest of the time we have to be very creative to keep the little mind occupied. The Manipulator wants to have it her way!
The question is: How far do we let her get her way? For the outside observer it looks like THE TANTRUM. Maybe it is the tantrum already? This weekend Dries and I said to each other this is a very difficult stage. Not even the constant crying and being awake of the beginning feels as taxing as this. How long does this last? Or will we get immune to it? Is this the battle to win in the power of the wills?
SHRIEEEEK!!!! We are trying to go with the flow, taking it moment by moment… BUT we are too exhausted (because of a lack of sleep, thanks to baby as well) to jump to every demand.
Sorry, Mieka, my girl, we are not able to follow all your commands! Now is the time you are going to learn about boundaries… It is going to be very difficult on you, but on your parents as well…

Manipulating the parents

The baby starts screaming, all of a sudden, at the top of her lungs. It is the scream of being hurt. A scream that makes you jump up immediately to grab the baby to see what is wrong. It is not the Shriek that Margot or LK spoke about.
“THE SCREAM!!”
Stop everything! The baby is hurt!
Rush and pick up the baby.
The baby stops her screaming. The baby smiles!
What the ….? We are being taken for a ride already. The baby is eleven months old, and she fakes a hurt scream to get us to pick her up, or to change her scenery when she is not satisfied with it anymore.
But we can’t ignore the scream, even if it is “Wolf, Wolf”, because the possibility exists that it could be a hurt cream. For real!
The little manipulator! What do we do with this type of behaviour?

Expression and lactations

I am still breastfeeding at seven and a half months. Great! I think so! I think so?
From the beginning I said I would see for how long I could carry on. Arnia (the 16-year old) did not want anything to do with a bottle while she was breastfeeding, and at 4 months I had to put her on bottle only. That was extremely traumatic (for me mostly) at the time.
When I went back to work in May this year (2009), I took my breast pump with me, and closed my studio twice during the day to express milk. I am still doing it, and sending two bottles with Mieka to the daycare.
(One of my biggest fears still is that I will walk out of my studio with my boobs still hanging out.)
The rest of the time she is still breastfeeding – at night, during the night (red eye syndrome for me), and in the mornings before I drop her off at daycare.
At seven months I am still trying to get used to the breastfeeding thing. In the beginning it felt like she was hanging on my breasts 24/7. I could not do anything else. And it was extremely sore. They tell you it is not supposed to be sore, because you are doing something wrong. Like latching… When I was hospital, I tried to ask for somebody to help me with the latching, but nobody ever pitched up. Is it worth it to complain now? And when I complained to the doctor that she latches very strongly, and I can’t get her off, he just shrugged and said that I must time her… Yeah, right!
Luckily we are past the extremely trying first few weeks. Dries, my husband, said he was not used to seeing boobs all the time. And he did not say it as if it was a good thing, or a treat to him.
And my boobs are still not my boobs. I miss my B-boobies which could fit into any top. I hope I hope I get them back.
I still don’t know when I am going to stop. When Mieka is one years, or two years? It is stated on the Purity baby food jars that it is good to continue breastfeeding until they are two years of age. (A very long time…)
The other thing that is sometimes very trying is when you are expressing at work, and the milk does not “come in”, or you don’t get the letdown reflex. I give myself 15 minutes in the morning, and again in the afternoon. Maybe it is stress, but sometimes I can sit with the electric pump running, and nothing is happening. I have also noticed that when I do not stick to a precise time-frame with regards to the expression of the milk, I do not get the desired amount. Mostly I do not get more than 100ml of milk at a time. I know it is supposed to be more, but I have decided that it is still better to give that, than nothing at all.
But all in all, it is a wonderful feeling to have the little one drinking from you. They are so completely dependent, and there is nothing that makes her go to sleep as putting her on the breast. Maybe that is why I am still doing the nightly rounds?
I have asked Dries to stand in for me. We are going to arm him with bottles tonight, and I am going to SLEEP! He always says that he is also not sleeping, but I bet you that it is much better to stay just where you are, than to get up every hour, or on a two-hourly basis. I can’t wait to hit the cushion tonight!

Photo by Patrick Pretorius.