To think the term Attachment Parenting.....

[Softlysoftly]

.....is offensive? Because the inference is if you don't follow that theory to the letter you are not attached, or as attached to your child?

I realise I said earlier 'they don't leave him to cry' I did mean, of course, in a CC sense.

I have let my son cry while I finish doing something (it's hard to tend to a crying child and finish having a dump for sure) and so even with just the one to look after I do know this does happen.

Might ot have been clear in my earlier posts that I was talking about non-attachmenty parenting things like CC/CIO specifically in an attempt to describe what I believe Attachment parenting to be - or not to be!

Any of the labels make me wince!

Free play is a term used by child carers to denote child led and child initiated play ( thats when i do as a cm, have a cuppa and mumsnet)as opposed to adult led activity like painting or music time. Yes daft I agree.

Agree Lequeen. Now what the fuck is UP. Got to investigate

There was a pisstakingthread years ago takeoff a link from an attachment parenting forum in which the op vented her anguish over MIL buying her a horror of horrors, a pram so she could push PFG in the park ( a fairly reasonable request you might think)

Op then test- drove pram and came back on to have the vapours about it. I think this was the same forum which referred to cots as 'baby prisons'

You wouldn't be unreasonable to find it wanky, but I don't see how you manage to be offended by it.

I don't own a pram and use a sling full-time, co-sleep and BF. We also use cloth nappies. DS1 was BLWed.

According to some people I have met, this means that I should also be "doing" a whole catalogue of other things like not vaccinating, unconditional parenting, elimination communication, homeschooling or steiner educating. Unfortunately, none of these things remotely appeal and I am a natural born shouter and waver of arms who has recently adopted "because I said so" as a sort of permanently-repeating mantra.

This means that for the majority of AP parents, I am not doing it properly, while a fair number of other parents think I am some kind of lentil-weaving hippy.

I think I need a bigger parenting box.....

Oops you go off to work without your dc and come back to 5 pages, pp I'm not the evil anti AP blog attacker promise!

I also absolutely don't think that being irritated by a term seemingly "owned" by a group of parents (and theorists) is the same as a reaction to the bf/ff argument. In fact in quite a few ways I have discovered through Mr google I may be sort of AP ing. I bf and I co-sleep now dd is older (mainly as it means dh goes in the spare bed and she farts and snores less than him ) I also explain my decisions to her and have never done cc. But I use childcare and have been known to explain my decision after forcing her into it.

The irritation comes from the fact that you have to bloody label it and in such a way that the alternative or not following it the whole way through means you aren't as attached. If you ask an AP why they do it the majority of the time it's because they feel they are more bonded with their dc, doesn't that mean that they think you are less?

I am not offended by the term but the term 'attachment theory' does make me inwardly smile. I've done a lot of research on attachment theory and when people say it's derived from Bowlby's theory, I nod and smile but disagree. It sounds like people are running with the idea that there is a well respected psychological theory behind it but it really has nothing to do with the theory.

Whatever people choose to do with their children is their choice. Why everything needs a label is beyond me but there we go!

It's not offensive, it's just totally misguided. The idea that you have to be physically right next to your child to be attached is so stupidly wrong.

baby led weaning is wierd imo.

like other people just force feed their children.

one poster asked what blw was and many other posters gave the most ridiculous responses such as: you give you baby's lots of different tastes.

and: you give them things they can hold.

Like no-one else had EVER done that!

Duellin OK, so with CC and CIO what is he difference between being unable to comfort your child for a few minutes and making a conscious decision not to? Surely if you are anti cc because leaving a child to cry for a few minutes will affect their development, you should ensure that this never happens whether it is voluntary or involuntary. The damaging effect will still be the same.

I remember clearly when DS2 was about 4 weeks old he was crying and we were at the supermarket. Everytime I put him down he started to scream again. Eventually I had no choice but to put him in the car and drive to collect DS1 from nursery. After about 10 mins he cried himself to sleep. I had no option there but to effectively do CIO. How would an AP parent have approached that differently?

Maryz you missed a trick there. I did the same with DS2 because he wouldn't be spoon fed. While with DS1 I did old fashioned weaning because he hated getting his hands dirty. I confess to feeling I had failed a tad as a mother with DS1 since all the trendy folk did BLW

all the AP live in cities and don't need to drive hence never having a screaming baby in the car scenario. They wear their babies everywhere. DOH

I dont think you can compare BLW with force feeding.

I BLW but it wasnt how I planned it. The Baby just hates mushed food of any kind. Which incidentally can be quite a big inconvenience at times (those pouches are great!). Its not weird at all, and its not like 'force feeding'. He likes food he can hold, hes eaten 'proper food' the same as the rest of the family, totally unmushed since he was 6 months old.

It has nothing to do with the baby, the mother decides what and when the baby will eat. There would be hell to pay if MIL offered something not authorised by mother-even more so if the baby decided to eat it!

or a skip found down the back of the sofa... wild blw

sory, 'free blw!'

LeQ that is just what I mean, and even if I had started out saying 'oh I am never going to put my baby down ^^ (see upthread), I am going to be a AP parent and NEVER let my baby cry' I fail to see how you could actually do that, what with having to drive a car and all and live life and go to the supermarket and drive home and stuff.

Really, tis a load of bollocks, not made better by a screaming baby in the back of the car!

And yes tis SS, the same troupe who are after me since I let DS2 screech 'Noooo, Daddy, up, up,< hyperventilate>, bwee bwee' all the way home tonight after 'Daddy' left said DS2 to go to karate with DS1 FFS

"Duellin OK, so with CC and CIO what is he difference between being unable to comfort your child for a few minutes and making a conscious decision not to? Surely if you are anti cc because leaving a child to cry for a few minutes will affect their development, you should ensure that this never happens whether it is voluntary or involuntary. The damaging effect will still be the same. "

I don't like CC/CIO because I couldn't leave my child crying for the lengths of time suggested by those methods and because I think it is damaging for a child of the ages suggested by those using those methods to be left to 'learn' no one will come to comfort them.

a few minutes infrequently is not the same as CC/CIO.

"I remember clearly when DS2 was about 4 weeks old he was crying and we were at the supermarket. Everytime I put him down he started to scream again. Eventually I had no choice but to put him in the car and drive to collect DS1 from nursery. After about 10 mins he cried himself to sleep. I had no option there but to effectively do CIO. How would an AP parent have approached that differently?"

I remember a similar thing with my ds in Asda. I abandoned my shopping and held him until he stopped crying. I don't know how other AP parents would approach it. when I have been in those situations I have stopped the car. I disagree that it's the same as CIO.