Medford mail tribune., August 04, 1963, Image 36

Family Weekly August 4, 1963
YOU SHOULD BE A
SELFISH
PARENT!
Are you a selfish parent?
If not, you ought to be!
The statement may surprise, per
haps even shock you. But as a psycholo
gist who has practiced for many years,
I believe it is high time to puncture the
widely held myth that parents must be
totally unselfish when it comes to their
children and that the best parents are
those who neglect their own happiness
and welfare for their children's sake.
For the most part, these ideas are dangerous
nonsense.
In the first place, being complete! unselfish
when it comes to children is not only cheating
yourself but seriously handicapping the young
sters for their coming battle with life.
And secondly, the parent who exhibits the
right kind of selfishness in bringing up children
is showing a deeper and more real love than self
sacrificing mothers and fathers.
In my files is the case of a two-year marriage
that appears headed for destruction because the
young wife's parents have martyred themselves
for her. The father and mother are now piteously
dependent upon their daughter, for whom they
"gave up everything" including themselves.
In turn, the young wife is unable to break her
reliance upon them and runs to Mom and Dad
with all her problems. She forced her husband
to give up a fine business opportunity in another
state because she couldn't bear to leave her par
ents. She visits them several nights a week and
is now urging her husband to sell their home
and buy another one that is closer to them.
Naturally, the young husband has become in
creasingly resentful, and bitter quarrels have
erupted. It is painfully clear that the "all-sacrificing"
parents have succeeded only in snaring
their daughter into a permanent dependency re
lationship. The outlook for this young couple
is gloomy.
Now let me focus sharply and clearly upon the
heart of the problem:
Why, exactly, am I warning against the haz
ards of all-sacrificing parenthood?
Students of human behavior agree that one of
the basic influences in the development of any
individual centers around his need for security.
Certainly, this is the key to emotional health.
Every person must develop within himself a feel
ing of importance, of worth-whileness. He must
grow up with confidence in himself and in his
ability to face and handle the problems of living.
But if a child has a parent who is always giv
ing and giving, that child never gets the chance
to handle his own affairs and obtain crucially
important experience in overcoming problems.
The result? A lifelong dependence.
The consequences can be tragic. Here are some
of the possible aftermaths of all-out parental
unselfishness :
The child may develop a
'school phobia."
Each fall, nearly every neighborhood has a
number of children who refuse to start school
unless accompanied each day by their mothers.
I know one woman who sat patiently in kinder
garten for months. Finally, her child permitted
her to leave but only if she would be waiting
when school ended.
This pattern can continue through the third
or fourth grade, until the youngster becomes
acutely embarrassed over it. But, the insecurity
feelings will still remain within the child and
can crop out in many ways.
Other youngsters may have headaches or stomach-aches
in the morning that disappear miracu
lously if they are permitted to stay home. Many
parents mistakenly believe these youngsters fear
school. But that is not so they fear separation
from their mothers.
The child may be unable to perform
any project that takes a little initiative.
A youngster brought up to believe he comes
first lacks a self-starter mechanism. He can only
operate on a push given him by his parents. For
example, he might not even be able to do home
work by himself unless his parents help or start
him off.
When he approaches a schooling level where
parents can no longer help, he must sink or swim
and often sinks. Unable to get going, he fails
to develop to his fullest intellectual capacity.
The youngster may become
a social outcast.
If a child is not emancipated from his parents,
he is a prime candidate for unpopularity. He
wants other children to behave as generously to
ward him as his mother and father, but they
have no intention of doing so. His bewilderment
turns to frustration and then to anger. "If I
can't have my way," he says (and often in so
many words), "I won't play."
So he doesn't play and the other children
really couldn't care less.
I know a boy, now 12, whose mother has de
voted her life to him. As a result, he has failed
in every single social experience. Already, he has
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Family Weekly, Anoint 4, 19SJ