Do you want your child to survive?
If you grow up with secure attachment, you learn that life is about connection.
If you do not grow up in a secure attached environment you learn life is about survival
I saw this on Instagram recently and took note because I wanted to write about it…
The title said, "Do you want your child to survive?" What I mean by this is, do you want your child to constantly feel like they’re just surviving, or do you want them to feel like they’re in charge of their decisions and living a fulfilled life?
The answer is obvious. We all want our children to feel empowered, capable, and connected. But here’s a more personal question: How did you feel as a child? Did you feel safe and confident, or were you often stuck in fight-or-flight mode, trying to survive emotionally?
I was in fight, flight, or freeze mode most of the time, and school made this sensation worse because I had little opportunity to build confidence, practice decision-making, or do things that fulfilled me. It got worse over the years… my teenage years were horrible. All that "socializing" that unschooling opponents talk about—supposedly necessary to be part of the "real world" (what a bunch of BS, seriously!)—only gave me more social anxiety and made me feel like I didn’t fit in.
I know this isn’t the case for everyone who went to school, but most people didn’t enjoy their time there. If we’re honest, the type of social lessons we learned weren’t all that positive, and there are far better ways to learn socializing.
If you often experienced survival mode in your upbringing, then there’s a good chance you overreact when dealing with challenging moments with your kids’ behavior. I know this is a broad description of an example, but there are so many ways you could be overreacting that I’m not going to get into them all.
What I’d like to do is start a little thought process in you—if you’re open to it—that the way you respond to your children’s actions, words, emotions, and inactions has a lot to do with how you felt as a child.
Especially because the first years of our lives shape the way we think and feel about the world and people. I’d bet that your parents didn’t always get the attachment thing right when you were a baby and toddler. No hard feelings—this isn’t about criticism or blame. It’s just the reality in most cases.
We can let the past be the past anyway. All we need to do is be present.
By doing this, we can discover a lot about ourselves, which ultimately means looking at our past, because we’re kind of stuck in those early years. I was born in 1984, so I’m stuck in the late ‘80s mentally, emotionally, and psychologically…
My show in 2024 is being run by my inner child of four years old in 1988, lol.
Not all the time, not even most of the time, because I’ve managed to undo a lot of the conditioning I was put through since birth, but whenever I overreact, I’m aware that it’s little Sylvia, about four years old, tapping into survival mode. That doesn’t serve me well now in 2024 with my 4-year-old daughter Bo, especially when she’s screaming her head off for some legit 4-year-old reason. What Bo needs is a mature, calm, and loving 40-year-old mom to teach her that life is about connection, not survival.
So in that moment, what’s best to do is be present, as I said. To feel what little Sylvia felt in 1988, reassure her that everything is okay, that she’s safe, and wait until the feeling passes.
Feel it, and let it go.
If I don’t manage to do this and I do overreact, I can always apologize to Bo (and little Sylvia) and explain that my reaction had nothing to do with her. Because it doesn’t. It has to do with my 4-year-old self, who’s stuck in survival mode.
The more you practice this, the better you’ll get at it, I promise. Practice makes progress. ;-)
So, What Does Unschooling Have to Do With This?
Unschooling doesn’t start when we’re at the age when school begins—usually around the age of six. But let’s not kid ourselves—if we look at the people around us who are deeply in the system, they call nurseries for 12-month-old babies "school." Unschooling simply means living and learning without school, which is the case from the moment of birth until we die, if you choose this lifestyle from day one for your baby. If not, unschooling is what happens before you send your child to an institution and after they’re finished with it. You just don’t know it’s called unschooling…
Therefore, if you let your baby learn freely by your side—not in a room with 10 other babies and a few strangers who feed, change, etc.—and continue for as long as she lives in your home to give her the opportunity to develop in her own way, pace, and time, letting her choose when and how to create distance from you and her other primary caregivers because she feels safe to do so (secure attachment), then this is simply unschooling in a secure attachment environment.
What a powerful mix—secure attachment and unschooling! Of course, you could choose to provide a secure attachment environment from day one until you send her to kindergarten or school, but imagine granting this connection for as long as your child wants and needs it!
You could also have chosen the non-secure attachment route in the beginning, but then decide to unschool at a later age, which can heal the wounds created in your child’s early childhood, deepening your connection.
Which way have you chosen so far, and how will you proceed from now on?
I’d love to hear your thoughts and personal story… you can send me an email or just leave a comment below.
