It always bothers me to see adults jumping around and waving toys in front of a crying child in a ridiculous attempt to provide a distraction so the kid stops bawling.
Crying makes us human. It's one of our defining characteristics. Think of another mammal on Earth that has the capacity to cry. Drawing a blank? Me too. So why does our society have such an issue with it?
This member of society has no problem with crying and I had no intentions of conditioning my boys to suppress such an important characteristic of our human nature. I saw no point in it. How could I tell them not to cry without sending the message that their pain was not important? They hurt, so they cry, but Mommy says don't cry, so Mommy doesn't care that they hurt? That's the reasoning I would take and I'm a lot older than 3.
Crying is such an effective means of communication that I would argue we spend a large part of our adult life trying to find socially acceptable words to replace it. A baby cries. Any Mother who has spent more than 24 hours with her child will easily name 3 to 4 different types of cries and in seconds she will know exactly what her baby is saying: I'm hungry; I have a stomach pain; I'm uncomfortable; I'm tired. Perfect communication in one crying sound.
Even though the type of crying and the reasons for it has changed over time, my response to the boys hasn't altered that much.
- if they are upset enough to cry, then in their mind it's justified. Whether I'd be laughing on the inside or not, I always took their emotions seriously. I can't count the number of times the younger one came into the house holding his head and tell me he'd hit is eye on the van....
- acknowledge their reason for crying. Talk about it. Help them work through their emotions. Sometimes the tears were caused by physical pain and I'd tell them I knew how much it hurt, and sometimes it was emotional and we'd talk about their behaviour that lead to the crying. Whatever their reason, talking about it as the tears flowed let them know that I knew their pain was important to me and by extension, they were important to me.
- give them time. I always let them cry sitting on my lap while I wiped their face. I'd give them as long as they needed. And usually it wasn't long. They wanted comfort and validation and they got it. They would calm down and we'd talk about what happened. They would recover quickly then be off and running again, all upset forgotten.
When the boys were young I didn't react to their 100s of falls and when they saw that Mommy wasn't going to come running at every little bump, they'd just pick themselves up without a peep and continue playing. Even at the ages of 6 and 7 they will have some wipe outs that make me cringe but they think nothing of it.
When they cry though, I'm not telling them Shush Shush. I'm not bouncing them on my knee. I'm not trying to get them to talk or think about something else. I'm not running off for a favourite toy to jingle in their face. I'm not offering them a cookie or the chance to watch tv.
They want my time and attention and they've got it.
