The Attached Mother

I don’t usually follow celebrity gossip but The turn around of Nicole Richie and Joel Madden with the birth of their little girl has been something I’ve watched a bit. My interest was really sparked when Nicole mentioned breastfeeding during an interview. Her comments, taken out of context at the time that I read them, made breastfeeding out to be a horrible burden. It was only later when I read them again in the context of her child having food sensitivities that I stopped scowling when her name came up.

“There’s just so much I can’t eat because she’s sensitive”, Nicole states. “I eat really bland [food] – chicken noodle soup, vegetables, fish. I had to cut out milk, no tomatoes, no lettuce. You think you have to cut everything out when you’re pregnant, but you really have to cut everything out when you’re breastfeeding”

Then I found another interview with the happy parents has started another debate on parenting. According to Joel he and Nicole are very opposite in parenting. She keeps Harlow on a schedule, while he admits to being the one who gets her out of the crib when she is crying. The comments section of Celebrity Baby went alive with people adding their thoughts to the ideas of spoiling a baby, wants verses needs, and self soothing in young infants. Here are a few of the comments:

My personal opinion is that whatever a baby wants IS what they need — you can’t spoil a baby! I also believe in picking up a crying baby to give it what it wants — which is probably something fundamental like milk, a diaper, or love. Wants and needs are identical, and that’s not spoiling. - Nicole R

You cannot spoil a baby–that, I would agree with. But, you can overindulge a baby. And, if this overindulgence continues into childhood, the consequences may not be optimal. - Becky

You cannot spoil a young baby. Babies shouldn’t be left to self soothe until at least 5 months, when they start developing the ability to do so! - Beatrice

Fearing of “spoiling” a baby by picking him or her up too much is a common one. We often not only worry ourselves that we are spoiling our children but get comments from others when they view us picking up, carrying, or soothing our children. I myself feel that you cannot spoil a young child. When they are that young a want and a need are the same thing, there has not yet been that split between the two. Young children not only want to be held, carried, and cuddled they need it.

Or in the words of Dr. Sears:

New parents ask, “Won’t holding our baby a lot, responding to cries, nursing our baby on cue, and even sleeping with our baby create an overly dependent manipulative child?” Our answer is an emphatic no. In fact, both experience and research have shown the opposite. Attachment fosters independence. Attachment parenting implies responding appropriately to your baby; spoiling suggests responding inappropriately. The spoiling theory began in the early part of this century when parents turned over their intuitive childrearing to “experts”; unfortunately, the childcare thinkers at the time advocated restraint and detachment (i.e., formulas for childcare), along with scientifically produced artificial baby milk – “formula” for feeding babies. They felt that if you held your baby a lot, fed on cue, and responded to cries, you would spoil and create a clingy, dependent baby. There was no scientific basis to this spoiling theory, just unwarranted fears and opinions. We would like to put the spoiling theory on the shelf – to spoil forever.

spoiling, Nicole Richie, Joel Madden, parenting, wants, needs, attachment parenting, children, infants