#18. Random Recovery Moment

Random recovery moments, RRM, are little summaries of good advice that are honest enough and funny enough to help you out while I am on vacation. Just not so helpful that these experts, who might actually have the advantage of being qualified, will be able to replace me in your affections.

Today’s RRM comes from Penelope Leach, who in many ways is our mother’s mothering advice guru. Her first book, Your Baby and Child (image link above) was considered revolutionary when it was first published in 1977 and remains a classic today. This excerpt comes from an interview in which Leach was asked what role parents play in teaching their children to acquire emotional intelligence. Her answer illustrates the connection between a mother’s ability to express her emotions and receive comfort and her child’s right to do so too.

• It’s very important for children from the beginning, even very small babies, to be allowed to experience and express emotion. “Don’t cry” isn’t a helpful thing to say to a kid who’s hurt himself. Why shouldn’t he cry if that’s what he feels like doing? And avoiding crying, say, by sneaking out of the house without your nine-month-old baby seeing you go, isn’t helpful either. If your going makes her feel like crying, it’s better for her to cry and find comfort from the other parent or the caregiver she’s been left with.
  
• We want to – and should – comfort distressed children (all distressed people, come to that!), but not by hiding the bad feelings away or covering them with a Hershey bar. You only learn that feelings are survivable by experiencing them and surviving – and seeing parents and other significant people do that, too. If you aren’t allowed to feel and express feelings, and nobody helps you understand them, express them and recover from them, you cannot grow to feel confident of your own ability to manage yourself.