Our alternative A-Z guide to first-time parenthood continues with 'G'. G is for Google, Gallic parenting aka give less of a crap, Giggles and Good enough.
G is for Google...
DON'T Google anything. Then after you do, DON'T pay any attention to the outcome of your googling. And if you insist on taking heed of the Internet than for god's sake DON'T pay attention to ANY .com sites. The Americans are a different strain of parent to us Europeans (that's right we've gone continental). They are liable to frighten you out of cuddling your baby too much. Or not enough. Or else we'll discover we've been cuddling them wrong for years.
Go Gallic aka Give less of a crap...
Much blog inches are devoted to the French 'method' of parenting. After some research we can pretty much boil it down to five words. Give. Less. Of. A. Crap. The French, it seems, have mastered the art of giving less of a crap and their children are among some of the best behaved children in the world. Apparently. The French do seem to adopt an impressively no-nonsense approach to educating their children. The French parenting method has perhaps have fallen victim to bad marketing. The various tomes (often penned by non-French authors funnily enough) extol the virtues of Gallic methods but seem to have an undeniably superior tone running through them. For further reading on the subject we direct you to the infuriatingly entitled parenting guides French Children Don't Get Fat and Why French Children Don't Talk Back. Of paramount importance in the French parenting method is the idea of a happy mother equals a happy family. So far so good. If a child falls they do not intervene "unless there is blood" according to Catherine Crawford, author of Why French Children Don't Talk Back. Seems harsh but then maman can continue to drink her wine and the child learns a valuable lesson: wine trumps whinging.
G is also for Giggles...
Take heart first-time parents. The smiles and giggles are imminent. The first weeks of parenthood are spent searching, in vain, for signs of that elusive first smile and chortle. But newborns are crafty they'll withhold the giggles until a key strategic moment. The giggle is the newborns trump card and they won't play it until exactly the right time. They'll dangle the carrot sure. For weeks you'll think you are seeing a smile only to realise that it is in fact just wind. Then when sleep deprivation, cluster feeding and soul destruction has reached its zenith, then and only then will they smile, reminding you why you would give your life to protect them. It must be some evolutionary thing.
G is for Good Enough...
In the depths of new parent despair I was saved by the words of a man, a psychoanalyst to be exact, called Donald Winnicott. In 1953, he developed a theory called the Good Enough Mother which a friend emailed me about one day, perhaps hoping to save me the bother of worrying needlessly about how I would ever be the perfect mother to my little Sparrow-man (the baby). And his words set me free. It may seem obvious to anyone not in the grip of brand new absolutely terrifying first-time parenthood but to suddenly realise that my ambitions to the perfect mother were completely unrealistic and unachievable was the best news I'd ever had. I had a kind of head slapping moment there and then. Of course I can't be the perfect mother... that doesn't exist. Fantastic. Now I wouldn't claim to be the perfect Good Enough mother either by any stretch. I do still occasionally become overcome by fear that I'm not doing enough for my son but then I utter the "it's good enough" mantra and head off to work or bookclub or whatever knowing that my baby is fine, I've cracked a window and left food out for him.
