AP

Attachment Parenting

According to Dr. Bill and Martha Sears, attachment parenting has three goals that are important :
* to know your child
* to help your child feel right
* to enjoy parenting

There are five concepts of attachment parenting
to help achieve these goals. These are:

1. Connect with your baby early.

Have a birth plan established which allows for immediate and direct contact with your baby following birth. Early closeness allows the natural process of attachment to begin and helps the mother to develop the natural nurturing tendencies.

2. Read and respond to your baby's cues.

Be open and responsive to your baby's cues. Holding your baby and responding to his cues will help you to be more intuitive to his needs, and your baby will develop trust in the relationship that his needs will be met. It is our hope that you will read this to understand the problems with using a "cry it out" method.

3. Breastfeed your baby.

Breast is best. We all KNOW that. But not only are the effects for baby immeasurably excellent, it helps to release "mothering hormones" (prolactin and oxytocin) which help make mothering easier. Go here to find a list of breastfeeding links that you may find helpful.

4. Wear your baby.

Mothers in other cultures wear their babies. The babies are content and the mothers are attentive. Carried babies cry less and develop better. They learn much in their mother's arms and it allows mother to take baby everywhere she goes. Go here to find babywearing links that can help you put this into practice!

Share sleep with your baby.

This was a natural custom for many ages, and has only lately (relatively speaking) been deemed "wrong" for families. Children need nighttime closeness and the time spent in the parents' bed may be short or long, depending upon the needs of the child. Go here to find links related to the family bed.

Not "moved" by that information? Well, try this excerpt from The Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff.

"It is standard practice in the "advanced" countries to buy a book on baby care the moment a new arrival is expected. It may be the current fashion to let the baby cry until its heart is broken and it gives up, goes numb, and becomes a "good baby"; or to pick it up when the mother feels like it and has nothing else to do at that moment, or, as one recent school of thought had it, to leave the baby in an emotional vacuum, untouched except for the absolute necessity and then shown no facial expression, no pleasure, no smiles, no admiration, only a blank stare. Whatever it is, the young mothers read and obey, untrusting of their innate ability, untrusting of the baby's "motives" in giving the still perfectly clear signals. Babies have, indeed, become a sort of enemy to be vanquished by the mother. Crying must be ignored so as to show the baby who is boss, and the basic premise in the relationship is that every effort should be made to force the baby to conform to the mother's wishes. Displeasure, disapproval, or some other sign of a withdrawal of love is shown when the baby's behavior causes "work", "wastes" time, or is otherwise deemed inconvenient. The notion is that catering to the desires of a baby will "spoil" him and going counter to them will serve to tame, or socialize, him. In reality, the opposite effect is obtained in either case."

If you are at all interested in AP and have not read this book, you must get it! Go to to get a copy. This book was a source of much inspiration for us. It caused a paradigm shift like I hadn't known before... it immediately influenced the way we parented and we have been much better off for it.

For other must-read books about Attachment Parenting and its related aspects, please visit my Links Page!