Independence by Judy Lyden

Independence is a key word for very young children, and adults can determine just how well a child is developing or maturing by a child's desire for independence. The whole project from crawling to the final launch into adulthood is the desire and the actuality of doing all by themselves.

The biggest snag in a child's desire for independence is the parent, and that begins early with the play pen, walkers and toys that limit a child's movement. Now agreed, there are times when a crawling infant needs to be confined, but many children are confined most of their waking hours in contrivances like swings, walkers, and infant seats that only mimic movement. Crawling, after all, is a dirty business, and keeping baby clean is the primary job of parents, right?

Crawling is crucial for discovery and for the side to side motion that will later promote reading. Parents who retard a child's active crawling are not promoting the idea of independence from the very beginning. Children are washable and so are clothes, but the loss of discovery does not equal out in the end - the loss is a loss forever.

Walking is another early childhood independence factor. Children who are carried constantly or who sit in strollers year after year are not being given the opportunity to go and see, and those missed years of discovery will take a toll on the child's personality. Infantalizing children creates monsters. "I want; go get; give me; do for me," are the cries of children who have never done it by themselves. Then suddenly, they won't want to.

Take a "do it for me" child anywhere, and the response is a constant stream of tears, constant badgering, constant work for the parent. Children will howl, scream, cry or just sulk because mom or dad is not doing it for them, not carrying them, not involved with every second of their lives, every movement, every visit to the toilet, every apple that needs to be sliced, diced, pealed with the sugar spots removed, and then begged to eat the prepared apple even holding it for the three year old to take a bite.

And then there is school. The infant child starts preschool and the world looks really really big. Mom is not there to give me a toy, to tell me I need to go to the bathroom, to fight my battles, to play for me, to make friends for me, to carry me from one thing to another. No matter how much a parent encourages at this point, the child is sure to be lost because the discovery of crawling and walking and doing what he or she can do from infancy has been done for him or her, and now, the platform that should have been created that amounts to steps down to the public pool are not there, and the child has to jump from a very very high place, and it's just a nightmare.

What are some of the signals that a child is being held back by a loving adult?

Tattling. Children who tattle are looking for an adult to solve their problems. Tattling amounts to reporting the behavior of another child to make an adult to take over and subdue the offending situation because little Mr. or Miss Dependent can't solve his or her problems. Incessant tattlers, tattlers who disrupt their parents more than a couple of times a day are showing signs of deep dependence.

Chronic tears. Children who cry all day are children who are emotionally lost. Bursting into tears for the slightest thing that's gone wrong is a terrible way to spend a day. Tears are a call to rescue, and at the preschool age, they should be saved for real hurt. When a child bursts into tears because they are told to do something or not to do something, is a sign that they can't direct themselves.

Crying without tears or tantrums. Children who are angry are children who cry without tears. Anger is going to be a big part of a child's life who is not becoming independent. He or she is angry and frustrated because he or she is not growing up and a child knows it. A child wants desperately to do it all by himself, but on one hand, he doesn't have to because mommy or daddy will do it for him. On the other hand, he doesn't think he can, so he cries.

The Spoiled Child. The spoiled child has come to believe she doesn't have to. She doesn't have to so she won't. Not me, not now, not ever because my mother or father will. The rules, after all, don't apply to me. They are for all the children around me, but I don't have to. Then, when Miss Dependence is dumped into the public arena, she crumbles because her safety zone is gone.

Most children want to be independent from their parents because that's what they are supposed to do. By the end of the first year, most children understand that they are different and separate human entities from their parents and that is a good thing. So children who are allowed, begin to explore the world on their terms. When parents interfere with this, alter it, and repress the desire to explore, a child will see the displeasure in the parent and come to believe that independence is a bad thing.

The tragedy is that well intended parents are failing at early childhood out of the best possible motives. They are controlling the outcome of their children's lives to make those lives picture perfect, but lives aren't picture perfect. We learn from our OWN failings, from falling down, from getting in trouble - not someone else's.

Let kids fall down; let them stretch; let them get dirty; let them fail once in a while; let them get in trouble without racing to their defense; let them figure out their own problems and solve them themselves because that's what they are supposed to do, and that's what they really want to do. It's called growing up.