Have you got similar fears like me of addressing your child’s teacher when something challenging comes up?
My journey with my child has taken me to a whole new level this week.
You may have seen a previous blog where I shared my concerns about movement breaks for children who struggle with the sitting still all day.
What I observed from working in co-operations for over two decades was that western medicine has had a great influence on the well-being of employees.
My previous employer went as far as installing moveable standing desks for everyone in the company.
We all know that sitting for long periods of time makes us feel lethargic and our body starts aching.
What overriding your physical needs can do is not a strange phenomenon to office workers.
In my career, I have seen many people who needed to go on long-term sick leave due to injuries caused by prolonged sitting.
Would you agree?
The reason why I am so outspoken about our children being trained to sit down is because I believe our children are the generation who will be the first to no longer live a 9-5 lifestyle.
What I experience with a number of other parents is that we are completely helpless trying to change an outdated system that won’t consider the long-term vision of what it is doing short-term.
For the teachers amongst you, of whom a couple are, this is not an attack against you.
I come from a family of teachers myself.
What I observed was that my family and friends who chose to become a teacher went into college and hoped to change things for the better after qualifying.
You want more from life than repeating the way it was always done before, at least that’s how I understand evolution.
So what I needed to ask my child’s teacher was for my child to be taken out of class more frequently because this child refused to keep going to school.
What I heard my child say was that it was not fair for children with a diagnosis from a psychologist to receive additional breaks to play football in the yard.
What would you have said to them as a parent?
Your young child has no ability to understand why their school allows the diagnosis-only children to move freely as their young bodies demand and others have to sit still and not talk.
What are we teaching these young boys and girls?
What I have observed is that children are so much better able to accept differences these days than my generation was brought up to accept.
This results in them not judging their peers the way we were when somebody was not in line with the others.
It gives me great hope for earth’s future as I will be challenged with the behaviour pattern of comparing myself to others - until I die.
There seems to have been something reset with this next wave of children coming in whereby they were born with more compassion for one another.
Or maybe it is my attempt in parenting differently to traditional ways?
By no means am I saying my children are special, I am just in awe when my child says things like:
“We are ok with children being different, we are not like your generation.”
This is not to insult my generation, this is to say to worry less about our children needing to fit it so desperately.
My children have and are becoming such capable people, that I am willing to face all my fears and speak up for the betterment of our current school system.
Teachers are working so hard and seem to be hitting walls when it comes to going with the times.
All you need to do is listen to how teachers keep control of classrooms:
since my children started school, they were rewarded for not speaking and deducted points for acting out.
What does that teach long-term?
In my opinion, we learn to not speak and comply because we are no longer fitting in when we are assertive about our needs.
And yet, what most parents and teachers want for children is to be outspoken and stand up when they see injustice such as bulling or other.
One of my skills is to see how what we do now, impacts us later in life.
This may come through years of struggling of not fitting in myself and years of unpacking patterns of what I believed as a young child and what action I took as a result as an adult.
One of these examples is my early belief of needing to be less sensitive so I am like the majority.
As a teenager this resulted in an eating disorder as the only way to control my emotions when feeling so strongly about everything was to push them back down with food.
You are in great company if you are having some challenges when your child doesn’t comply to the way it was always done here.
I set up camp here.
We are all in this world to make a difference and I wish we could allow our children to not fit in just so we have an easier life.
Sometimes I wonder why I picked the topic of parenting to feel so passionate about, to make a living from…?
However, when I achieve for my child to be allowed to be themselves more and not have to suppress their need to move to feel content in their body, I release all doubt about being different.
It drops off my shoulders like a ton shield.
I would love to hear from you how you are different and have spoken up to feel better:
Email me at effortlessparenting@gmail.com and let me know why you felt better after speaking up for being different.