Nothing is certain-Lately, I have had the luxury of being able to study my son pretty much 24 hours a day. I think it’s fair to say I’m tying to analyze his movements to see if he is on track with his developmental age and decide his personality all at once. He is still in the stage where almost every day he is completely different, but It is so fun to see as he develops his likes and dislikes and is starting to tell us consistently what those things are. I know he loves to be diaper free, he loves to float during bath time, he loves to move and explore his surroundings with his vision, and he definitely loves to eat. I watch him reciprocally kick his little arms and legs all over the place during bath time and I love it. He is just so happy when he gets to move. But then he does these crazy movements while eating and I wonder what this may be telling me. Bekytt has always been a noisy nurser. The noise used to worry me though because it sounded like he was drowning in my milk. Since he has learned to release and reattach frequently throughout his nursing session, I am no longer worried about him choking and gagging on my milk. I think he actually developed a great strategy for controlling the fast flow, but his whole body moves all around when nursing and he makes the cutest noises that seem to tell me he is happy to be eating. I do wonder if all this movement means we will have a messy eater on hand and a crawler we cannot catch. Will we have the boy of all boys who is just full of energy and chaos? Or will he learn to control these movements and be more gentle and sensitive? As I start to read the book The Scientist in the Crib lent to us by a friend, I am starting to realize nurture can only shape a child so much. There are going to be some things in Bekytt we just cannot control. His personality will be his and it may not have anything to do with how we raised him.
Before I had him and I was living in Minnesota, I attended Eaglebrook Church pretty regularly. I loved it there. It was the first church I got excited to go to and even watched online when I couldn’t attend. I was baptized there as an adult and it was a huge turning point in my life. Minnesota was the first place I feel like I truly grew up and really discovered who I was. I guess this is why I miss it so much sometimes. I went through a lot when I first moved there and ended up working through it instead of avoiding it and I came out on top. It signifies independence to me and the friends I made there I know will be friends for life. The lessons I learned at Eaglebrook are some I’ll never forget, but I especially remember the series How to Raise Amazing Kids. I remember it because I knew I wanted to do that one day. Raise amazing kids. I purchased the series on DVD to help my dad out as well though. During that time he was raising my little brother and my step brother and they were going through some tough behavior times. I felt the series would help my dad create some structure and sanity and help him get through those rough days. I’m not sure if they helped or if he was able to have time to even watch the entire series, but I find myself wondering if I can do the things it suggests as Bekytt grows. Create boundaries, structure, be consistent. I see my brother doing an amazing job with his kids. I am truly impressed with his skills as a father and I believe he and his wife are indeed raising amazing kids, but there is not always consistency there. Sometimes my nephew is asked to just give the toy he is playing with to his younger sister so they don’t have to deal with a meltdown. Sometimes the younger sister is told to wait her turn and that her brother had it first. Not at all a big deal in terms of what you need to stay consistent with, but how does he know when one strategy will work over another? How can we know if the decisions we make in the moments of parenting will help create amazing kids or kids who resent their parents? I am interested in decoding Bekytt. I’m interested in learning his cues and recognizing if he may indeed be a highly sensitive child just like his mom is an HSP. I want to parent to his needs and not just what is taught to parents as a general lesson. I feel my brother knows each of his child’s traits and personalities well enough to know that what is fair is not always equal. Each child needs the rules to be slightly different now and again to be able to succeed in making good choices, because each child is completely different. I am excited to be learning about Bekytt and anxious for his future. I imagine these next 4 months will bring about way more change than the first 4 months and I couldn’t be more ready for them! We just have to baby proof the house first! -Kathryn Kraft, MPT
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