This book may not apply to many of my fellow Cannonballers’ lives, but if it does, wow. Run, do not walk, to Amazon and buy it.
My fifteen month old daughter is not like a lot of other toddlers her age. I’ve always felt strongly about applying negative labels to her. The best way I can really describe her is that she’s a lot. She’s just…a lot. Not always in a bad way. But she’s a lot more sensitive, a lot more stubborn, a lot more intense, a lot more energetic than the rest of her peer group. There are a lot of ways to describe this. High needs. Spirited. The temperament definitely has a lot of overlap with the autistic spectrum and sensory processing issues, but it’s not exactly that. It’s hard but rewarding to parent a child like that. You second guess yourself constantly. Am I being too harsh? Am I being too soft? Did I make her this way? Even when you know that she’s been like this since the minute she left your uterus, and even the hospital nurses had no idea what to do with her.
Dr. Sears wrote a book on kids like this, and it was okay, but lacking, for me. This one is awesome. It starts with a chapter on labels and how we think about our kids. Then it spends a lot of time on how to work with individual personality traits. Then it has some chapters on specific problem areas (mealtime, holidays, travel, sleep). It is awesome. I started it at the end of a day exhausted by parenting this girl all day, and after a few chapters I felt so energized and excited to try some of this stuff the next day. It meshes well with my own instinctive parenting style (attachment parenting with the crazy turned down several notches) but definitely added some practical solutions and gave specific language to how to put things. A lot of it won’t get through a toddler’s head, but some of it does, and approaching things this way is a great way to form a habit and clarify your own parenting intentions in the trenches.
An unexpected bonus was that I really noticed a difference in how I related to others (and even myself) after reading this. It’s absolutely improved by interpersonal skills with my husband and family members, and I’ve found myself instinctively viewing conflict as two sets of needs that might be able to be met in an outside the box way if we define them and go from there. I avoided a spat with my mother in law today entirely using skills from this book. I wasn’t expecting that, but it’s a great side benefit!
I believe I read the 1998 version, and the language did feel really dated. It’s been updated in 2015, and I’d like to read that one and see if that’s changed. Otherwise, I wholeheartedly recommend this book.
[No content warning needed.]
Most of my friends are rather intense people. It follows that I know a lot of kids who are a lot. I was a nanny for a toddler who I still consider one of the smartest and most intense people I will ever meet. She has turned out to be a wonderful young woman, but I think her parents and all of the adults in her life would have benefited from more guidance on how to help her grow up.
I just wanted to tell you it gets better! And also, it isn’t all in your head. My son, who is now 6.5 years old has always been exactly that: a lot. He’s never been naughty or tantrum-y, but can exhaust everyone around him with the endless stream of words, thoughts, ideas, plans, emotions, and movement. Most people probably wouldn’t believe me but he’s been like this since the day he was born. I confessed to a teacher friend of mine that I thought he maybe had ADHD or similar, but she shut that down quickly. She said this is what a gifted child looks like. Anyway, just wanted to give you a bit of encouragement and commiseration. Thanks for the recommendation, I’m going to give this a read!
A dear friend of mine with not a lot of child experience had a daughter. This child was wonderful but challenging, and my friend would often ask my advice because I have lots of child knowledge and experience, and also because her child was my spiritual twin. Mom would ask me to interpret her child’s behaviours, because I was able to see her perspective so clearly when her parents were flummoxed. When friend found this book, and the idea of the Spirited Child, it changed everything for them as a family.
It gave me some perspective on my own childhood, too, I have to admit. It helps Spirited adults too, is my point. :)