A couple SROs that I’ve found personally frustrating:
- Leaving your kid to sleep in a public place or even in the car at all. There have been so many times I tried to run to the grocery store and my kid(s) fell asleep en route. All of a sudden the 30 min errand has to now take 2 hours because we have to wait.
- Parks without fencing to block kids from going into the street. It’s not unreasonable to have kids going to the playground to play by themselves (although this can get you a CPS call in many places), and older kids can keep an eye on younger ones within reason. But I also think it’s hard if you have kids in a range of ages when the design of a place requires hyper-vigilance to prevent tragedy.
- The household employee limit for tax filing being $2300. Let’s say I wanted to do something common in centuries past - hire a teenager to help me with household projects or simple tasks. I’m not talking a full blown maid. I’m saying like 10 hours a week of chores (dishes, so on). With minimum wage in our area of $16, I can only hire someone for 14 weeks before I have to report them for taxes. Now I have to get a payroll company, file with the EDD, and pay unemployment if I fire them (even with cause). We have basically stripped away a middle tier job option to allow teenagers to learn to work, and that would make child-rearing significantly easier. Given the increase in the cost of living and so on, it makes no sense to me that the limit for reporting to the IRS isn’t higher - say $10k. Call it a paperwork reduction act!
- Most controversially, car seats. It takes so long to get 3 small kids into car seats compared to the way they used to pile in. If you believe some economists, there’s little evidence that car seats do much to save lives after the first 1-2 years (maybe longer rear-facing). This is kind of related to 1, because it’s a lot more frustrating to pop out for a 5 min errand someplace when it’s going to be 10 min to load everyone in and out of the car.
Omg. So mych to say here. Im in the midst of going through the process to open a daycare and i've also built and managed affordable housing using section 8. I wrote a piece for Comment on raising density standards (and lowering standards overall) in housing and i could write a similar piece on childcare, but will wait until we've been open a year. so many hoops. We've already burnt through one employee who was helping us with the process because she couldn't handle the incessant webinars, trainings, and janky web interface ...but i think shed be a great child care worker.
That said we've visited centers that are rated 5 stars (our quality rating system) but the places are dark, kids are crying and workers are scrolling on phones. So its not lower standards i want, its less hoops and better check points.
On the topic of lower standards in parenting, i definitely did not go for any special vaccines schedule, though it was popular in my social circle. Public schools are where we started including free preschool (although we later changed to a Catholic Montessori for the sake our children having more joy in their lives) Also i was all in on medicated child birth and 6 months of breast feeding, as opposed to year(s). I typically only do 1 dentist appointment a year per kid, though 2 are recommended. Im pretty lax on screen time, though i can be convinced by anxious generation style arguments, and haven't allowed social media. Shared rooms, yes. One of my kids was in a closet for a while. Mostly used clothes. No sports before 3rd grade. Old mini vans. I gave up car seats at age 3. Ive appreciated Emily Osters guidance on the "what really matters" questions... And car seats are so so after the infant stage.
I do think, to change this parenting arns race, we have to stop crafting motherhood as a professional job for college educated women, who dedicate all of their ambition toward their children; left with this framing the bar is always rising and yes, younger onlookers are like "no way do i want this."
"Where have you made the choice to fall short of an ideal form of parenting for the sake of something you could sustain?"
... Everywhere?... Though I wouldn't call how things are going lately "sustaining" – it's not sustainable.
I agree in broad strokes with Ozy (I kinda hafta, if I deserve life).
The ideals it hurts my heart most to fall short of are in basic music education and basic literacy. All of my kids have *ability* to read that meets standards for their age, but none *like* reading. None will do it for pleasure – or even let me read to them very much for pleasure. Because I haven't trained them to. (I'm often too exhausted to put up with their shenanigans during bedtime reading.) My kids see me read plenty – but on a screen, and they don't think of screens as *for* reading. They also see their parents do *some* musical activities, and we joined a church that at least *has* children's choirs that they're joining as their age makes them eligible. But the kind of music literacy that permits music as at least a serious hobby – what my husband and I could take for granted in our own childhoods? Phphphththt!...
Catching up on those was supposed to be this summer's project, but so far I'm stuck indoors, at home sick. And when we do go make it to the municipal library, the first thing I'll hafta do is pay to replace a DVD that's just about the only thing my kids have checked out of the bookmobile, and which they say they returned, but the library says they haven't...
I was with him on the general idea except for a few outrageous points that I hope were provocative on purpose. No, "sex workers" should not have children, that's ridiculous and most likely is going to hit some of the other problem points, like no heroin. Women who have chosen that path need support to leave it.
Spanking vs hitting seems to be purposefully hidden under hitting. Don't beat your kid with anything. However, without the recourse to a simple spank in response to danger or someone being hurt, helicopter parenting will never end.
A child running in the road was a real life example of this was published at one time in The Atlantic magazine. The young child ran in the road once, got a stern talking to, and just a few minutes later did it again, got a spank, and stopped. The author conceded this as a necessity against their own desire not to spank, as the author was a city dweller.
It doesn't matter if "the child doesn't learn from spanking" folks say that. It matters that sometimes toddlers can be dissuaded from real harm.
I love this idea. The idea the kids need the best of everything, everything new, the best sports teams, etc, make parenting seem very daunting.
PS. My three kids all share a room. It’s the compromise we make to live in a neighborhood that we love. And for a long time we had 5 family members and a 5 person car. You don’t need a big car to be a happy family!
We started ours sharing at around age 2-2.5. We have kept the youngest with adults for longer to keep the peace.
Our best parenting investment so far has been the Cradlewise crib. It’s like the snoo but they can stay in it until age 2 (on paper… in practice it’s still going OK at 2.5). It cost a pretty penny but has paid for itself in terms of our ability to function / do paid work.
Ours started sharing at age 2-3 as well. They’re getting older now, but for many years either my husband or I stayed with them until the more restless kids were asleep. Bedtime took a long time!
A couple SROs that I’ve found personally frustrating:
- Leaving your kid to sleep in a public place or even in the car at all. There have been so many times I tried to run to the grocery store and my kid(s) fell asleep en route. All of a sudden the 30 min errand has to now take 2 hours because we have to wait.
- Parks without fencing to block kids from going into the street. It’s not unreasonable to have kids going to the playground to play by themselves (although this can get you a CPS call in many places), and older kids can keep an eye on younger ones within reason. But I also think it’s hard if you have kids in a range of ages when the design of a place requires hyper-vigilance to prevent tragedy.
- The household employee limit for tax filing being $2300. Let’s say I wanted to do something common in centuries past - hire a teenager to help me with household projects or simple tasks. I’m not talking a full blown maid. I’m saying like 10 hours a week of chores (dishes, so on). With minimum wage in our area of $16, I can only hire someone for 14 weeks before I have to report them for taxes. Now I have to get a payroll company, file with the EDD, and pay unemployment if I fire them (even with cause). We have basically stripped away a middle tier job option to allow teenagers to learn to work, and that would make child-rearing significantly easier. Given the increase in the cost of living and so on, it makes no sense to me that the limit for reporting to the IRS isn’t higher - say $10k. Call it a paperwork reduction act!
- Most controversially, car seats. It takes so long to get 3 small kids into car seats compared to the way they used to pile in. If you believe some economists, there’s little evidence that car seats do much to save lives after the first 1-2 years (maybe longer rear-facing). This is kind of related to 1, because it’s a lot more frustrating to pop out for a 5 min errand someplace when it’s going to be 10 min to load everyone in and out of the car.
Omg. So mych to say here. Im in the midst of going through the process to open a daycare and i've also built and managed affordable housing using section 8. I wrote a piece for Comment on raising density standards (and lowering standards overall) in housing and i could write a similar piece on childcare, but will wait until we've been open a year. so many hoops. We've already burnt through one employee who was helping us with the process because she couldn't handle the incessant webinars, trainings, and janky web interface ...but i think shed be a great child care worker.
That said we've visited centers that are rated 5 stars (our quality rating system) but the places are dark, kids are crying and workers are scrolling on phones. So its not lower standards i want, its less hoops and better check points.
On the topic of lower standards in parenting, i definitely did not go for any special vaccines schedule, though it was popular in my social circle. Public schools are where we started including free preschool (although we later changed to a Catholic Montessori for the sake our children having more joy in their lives) Also i was all in on medicated child birth and 6 months of breast feeding, as opposed to year(s). I typically only do 1 dentist appointment a year per kid, though 2 are recommended. Im pretty lax on screen time, though i can be convinced by anxious generation style arguments, and haven't allowed social media. Shared rooms, yes. One of my kids was in a closet for a while. Mostly used clothes. No sports before 3rd grade. Old mini vans. I gave up car seats at age 3. Ive appreciated Emily Osters guidance on the "what really matters" questions... And car seats are so so after the infant stage.
I do think, to change this parenting arns race, we have to stop crafting motherhood as a professional job for college educated women, who dedicate all of their ambition toward their children; left with this framing the bar is always rising and yes, younger onlookers are like "no way do i want this."
"Where have you made the choice to fall short of an ideal form of parenting for the sake of something you could sustain?"
... Everywhere?... Though I wouldn't call how things are going lately "sustaining" – it's not sustainable.
I agree in broad strokes with Ozy (I kinda hafta, if I deserve life).
The ideals it hurts my heart most to fall short of are in basic music education and basic literacy. All of my kids have *ability* to read that meets standards for their age, but none *like* reading. None will do it for pleasure – or even let me read to them very much for pleasure. Because I haven't trained them to. (I'm often too exhausted to put up with their shenanigans during bedtime reading.) My kids see me read plenty – but on a screen, and they don't think of screens as *for* reading. They also see their parents do *some* musical activities, and we joined a church that at least *has* children's choirs that they're joining as their age makes them eligible. But the kind of music literacy that permits music as at least a serious hobby – what my husband and I could take for granted in our own childhoods? Phphphththt!...
Catching up on those was supposed to be this summer's project, but so far I'm stuck indoors, at home sick. And when we do go make it to the municipal library, the first thing I'll hafta do is pay to replace a DVD that's just about the only thing my kids have checked out of the bookmobile, and which they say they returned, but the library says they haven't...
I was with him on the general idea except for a few outrageous points that I hope were provocative on purpose. No, "sex workers" should not have children, that's ridiculous and most likely is going to hit some of the other problem points, like no heroin. Women who have chosen that path need support to leave it.
Spanking vs hitting seems to be purposefully hidden under hitting. Don't beat your kid with anything. However, without the recourse to a simple spank in response to danger or someone being hurt, helicopter parenting will never end.
A child running in the road was a real life example of this was published at one time in The Atlantic magazine. The young child ran in the road once, got a stern talking to, and just a few minutes later did it again, got a spank, and stopped. The author conceded this as a necessity against their own desire not to spank, as the author was a city dweller.
It doesn't matter if "the child doesn't learn from spanking" folks say that. It matters that sometimes toddlers can be dissuaded from real harm.
I love this idea. The idea the kids need the best of everything, everything new, the best sports teams, etc, make parenting seem very daunting.
PS. My three kids all share a room. It’s the compromise we make to live in a neighborhood that we love. And for a long time we had 5 family members and a 5 person car. You don’t need a big car to be a happy family!
We've got three across in a compact car, too.
What age did they start sharing a room? I'm a little worried about getting the big girls to be quiet for the baby to sleep.
We started ours sharing at around age 2-2.5. We have kept the youngest with adults for longer to keep the peace.
Our best parenting investment so far has been the Cradlewise crib. It’s like the snoo but they can stay in it until age 2 (on paper… in practice it’s still going OK at 2.5). It cost a pretty penny but has paid for itself in terms of our ability to function / do paid work.
Ours started sharing at age 2-3 as well. They’re getting older now, but for many years either my husband or I stayed with them until the more restless kids were asleep. Bedtime took a long time!