Poll for the Armchair Psychologists

[human]

I still say its a crap shoot.

Some are born, some are created. Some can be helped and some refuse to conform. Human beings have free will. Jodi was taught & raised better than many ...she knew right from wrong, she just didn't care.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

My former neighbor's kids were taught right from wrong. Two boys ,one girl.

They were super religious and strict.

The girl became a drug addict, although she has straightened out in her 30's. The one boy, I think, is all right. The other boy who is almost 40 has been in prison several times.

We took the girl in when she was in high school as she was my daughter's friend. We live in the country with few neighbors and this girl was about 1 block away from our house.

She did not want to conform to the parent's rules which were ridiculous. A senior in high school who could not go anywhere during the week and had to be in by 10 on Sat night, the one night she was allowed to to out.

Church activities all of the time. Family camping. Parents were nice, I felt.

I asked my kids who were the ages of those children, why they turned out so badly.

My kids told me that you cannot raise kids so strictly. They go crazy .

Anyway, we have no idea what went on in Jodi's home.

People can say whatever they want about their home life. But the reality may be far far different.

As to nurture, how about that teacher in LA that I think was portrayed by Jimmy Smits. He got his students to pass AP calculus when people said, "no way."

How abut Helen Keller?

How about the study where they told someone some kids were stupid, when they really weren't and some kids were brilliant, but they really weren't. The smart kids did poorly and the kids not so smart, did great

 

[MeeBee]

Trying to relate these very successful world baby-raising norms (and several here in the US ) to JA and the whole nurture/nature thing, are you all saying that it's basically nurture?

I think it's often a combination of things. I think mostly it has to do with nature. The way a child reacts to and responds to home life and nurture depends largely on nature, the unique way they were born. Two children raised in the same home with the same parents can turn out totally different. The way they respond to their parenting is largely based on nature.

There are also times, I believe when it is one or the other. It's really hard to say. I don't even think psychologists can say for sure. I agree with Linda, it's a crap shoot.

In Jodi's case, I really don't know how she came to be the way she is. We simply don't know enough. But it's sad either way. Very sad. She is pretty, intelligent, creative. She really could have been quite a person with so much more to offer than destruction and chaos and sadness if she wasn't disordered. I think about her sitting in her cell for the rest of her life and it does sadden me. What a waste.

But I get even sadder thinking about Travis. He didn't deserve it, at all. Jodi could have chosen another way. She decided to hop in her car with weapons and gas cans and end a life. Heartbreaking.

 

[human]

I think it's often a combination of things. I think mostly it has to do with nature. The way a child reacts to and responds to home life and nurture depends largely on nature, the unique way they were born. Two children raised in the same home with the same parents can turn out totally different. The way they respond to their parenting is largely based on nature.

There are also times, I believe when it is one or the other. It's really hard to say. I don't even think psychologists can say for sure. I agree with Linda, it's a crap shoot.

In Jodi's case, I really don't know how she came to be the way she is. We simply don't know enough. But it's sad either way. Very sad. She is pretty, intelligent, creative. She really could have been quite a person with so much more to offer than destruction and chaos and sadness if she wasn't disordered. I think about her sitting in her cell for the rest of her life and it does sadden me. What a waste.

But I get even sadder thinking about Travis. He didn't deserve it, at all. Jodi could have chosen another way. She decided to hop in her car with weapons and gas cans and end a life. Heartbreaking.

There are a lot of studies done on how mainly the mother reacts to an infant. The eye contact, vocalizations, the child's temperament.
A lot is known about the effects of a mother's inappropriate responses. Some because of mental illness on the part of the mother , some because of the mother's temperament. People can be upset because the mother is usually singled out, but often in the US, it is the mother who is home with the infant in the beginning.

Then as life goes on, there are issues with parent's need for power and control, for one thing. Really, there is a lot of info out there



Unfortunately, parenting is not a required subject in school. It should be.

 

[ynotdivein]

Gentle reminder to keep it impersonal here, folks. Agree to disagree and... well, you have all heard it many times.

(Also a gentle reminder to have a good weekend, and if you are getting Weather from tropical storm Andrea, stay high and dry and warm and safe!)

:tyou:

 

[MeeBee]

There are a lot of studies done on how mainly the mother reacts to an infant. The eye contact, vocalizations, the child's temperament.
A lot is known about the effects of a mother's inappropriate responses. Some because of mental illness on the part of the mother , some because of the mother's temperament. People can be upset because the mother is usually singled out, but often in the US, it is the mother who is home with the infant in the beginning.

Then as life goes on, there are issues with parent's need for power and control, for one thing. Really, there is a lot of info out there



Unfortunately, parenting is not a required subject in school. It should be.

Maybe that can be one part of it. I have also read of infants who later grow to become sociopaths whose parents became exasperated with their babies and toddlers because they would try and hug and cuddle them but they would just cry or push the mother or father away. No matter how much affection they would show the child would not reciprocate. They would not seek their parents out for hugs and kisses or show any kind of child/parent affection. I find that sad. Waking up next to my daughter and kissing her is the highlight of my life.

But my point is it's not always so black and white. That's something I learned to accept reading this thread.

Sociopaths can be born, made, or both. You can have a child born a sociopath who, through great parenting and re-directing, grows to be an empathetic and productive member of society. You can have another born a sociopath who, even through guidance and love and affection and therapy just ends up a full blown sociopath anyways. They are simply hard wired. You have a child, possibly created that way, where sociopathic tendencies are created through a lack of good parenting or lack of nurturing and affection.

Then that of course raises the question of whether they are a true sociopath. I look at someone like, say Richard Ramirez, who just died today, and wonder: is he a true sociopath? Or did his life experiences make him one? I listen to his interviews and he just sounds like a poseur to me. But he had some traumatic things happen to him in his teenage years, I believe that possibly borned this unhealthy lust and fetish for violence. But I am no expert.

But I digress. It's not so black and white. You can't say that all killers and sociopaths are the products of bad parenting. You just can't. You can't say that everyone who goes on to be a sociopath or who kills or who has a proclivity toward sexual deviance was abused, sexually or otherwise, and that's why they are the way they are. It's not always so simple. We are complex things.

I truly believe there are people who are born wired wrong, for whatever reason, and nothing can change it. It's just their nature and no amount of nurture can change that. It's just there.

I think there is so much pressure on parents. I wonder, is there a perfect way to parent? Is there a definite wrong way or right way? How do you know which was is right? And how do we prevent our own life experiences from affecting our parenting choices and methods, if those experiences happen to be negative ones?

 

[SMK]

But I digress. It's not so black and white. You can't say that all killers and sociopaths are the products of bad parenting. You just can't. You can't say that everyone who goes on to be a sociopath or who kills or who has a proclivity toward sexual deviance was abused, sexually or otherwise, and that's why they are the way they are. It's not always so simple. We are complex things.

I truly believe there are people who are born wired wrong, for whatever reason, and nothing can change it. It's just their nature and no amount of nurture can change that. It's just there.

I think there is so much pressure on parents. I wonder, is there a perfect way to parent? Is there a definite wrong way or right way? How do you know which was is right? And how do we prevent our own life experiences from affecting our parenting choices and methods, if those experiences happen to be negative ones?

Yes, we can pass on our own negative experiences, which then become worse with each generation (I have seen this go from my maternal grandmother, to my mother, to myself and siblings- it seems to have worsened and grown more complex)-

Insofar as someone like Richard Ramirez, at first you think, "There at last is a born sociopath" (because of the vile nature of his horrific crimes). But then, one reads that he had an extremely troubled childhood, and was influenced by an older cousin, who had been damaged by serving in Viet Nam, and shared stories of torture and killing with the boy. Suppose it had been a cousin who loved classical music, and taught the boy how to master an instrument?

I have not yet seen a "bad seed" who had an idyllic childhood.

The closest I have seen to the "bad seed" prototype is Karla Homolka. Cannot seem to find any reason for her vileness.

 

[MeeBee]

Yes, we can pass on our own negative experiences, which then become worse with each generation (I have seen this go from my maternal grandmother, to my mother, to myself and siblings- it seems to have worsened and grown more complex)-

Insofar as someone like Richard Ramirez, at first you think, "There at last is a born sociopath" (because of the vile nature of his horrific crimes). But then, one reads that he had an extremely troubled childhood, and was influenced by an older cousin, who had been damaged by serving in Viet Nam, and shared stories of torture and killing with the boy. Suppose it had been a cousin who loved classical music, and taught the boy how to master an instrument?

I have not yet seen a "bad seed" who had an idyllic childhood.

The closest I have seen to the "bad seed" prototype is Karla Homolka. Cannot seem to find any reason for her vileness.

But it's really hard to know isn't it? Because a lot of times the stories come from the killer themselves and we know sociopaths can have a tendency to make themselves the victims at all aspects for sympathy. So it's hard to separate the reality of the matter from their stories.

I already talked about Ramirez. He also witnessed the cousin kill his wife. My point about Ramirez is I have my doubts on whether he was a true sociopath. Sure, he killed. But that doesn't always mean the person is a sociopath.

How do you know Jodi's childhood wasn't "idyllic?" She herself said it was at one point until she changed to her self serving abuse stories. That is one killer, IMO, who didn't seem to have any trauma or abuse in her history, at least that we know of. Her family seemed quite normal. Until we hear legitimate stories otherwise (not from Jodi), then I am inclined to believe Jodi, for the most part, just happened.

 

[MeeBee]

The other danger to this it's the parents fault mentality is that no one is perfect. No parent is perfect. We could scrutinize every single a person does and find flaws and mistakes. With some the parental mistakes are bigger. With others they are not so marked but every single person makes a mistake as a parent.

We have Jodi who grew into a killer and sociopath. We say it must be the parents and we look for things. Things that may not even be there. We scrutinize their every move and mistake. It MUST be the parents fault even though there have been no clear or apparent stories of real abuse or neglect. We take the story of the wooden spoon and decide that must have something to do with it. We've decided the dad and mom must have been emotionally neglectful even though we have seen no evidence of that either. Jodi has talked of being knocked around as a teen by her dad, again, if the story is to be believed.

But I think with every sociopath you can look at the parents and pick apart their efforts and find flaws. I am sure if my daughter turned into a sociopath that there would be things to pick out as being the reason for her. If my daughter grows to be a successful and productive member of society I'm a great mother. It's a slippery slope.

I don't really care how Jodi came to be. I care about what she did.

Yes, everyone should be a good parent. But, again, what is a good parent? Is it really so simple?

 

[Gecko100]

Respectfully snipped for brevity.

I think there is so much pressure on parents. I wonder, is there a perfect way to parent? Is there a definite wrong way or right way? How do you know which was is right? And how do we prevent our own life experiences from affecting our parenting choices and methods, if those experiences happen to be negative ones?[/QUOTE]

It's my belief that we parent in the same way as we were parented. The values that are instilled in the parents are instilled in the child. What those values might look like varies from family to family. Some families may value closeness and gentleness, some might think of it as permissive and value clear strict boundaries, it depends on family of origin. What we value is all important in parenting. It influences how we might discipline and what we think is important in creating functional members of society.
Each parent brings their own set of values into the relationship, and they may even conflict, creating confusion for a child.
What changes in each generation is our need to not do as our parents did, we all hated some of things our parents did. So we either repeat it or seek outside resources to change it.
How many of have said 'Oh no, I've turned into my mother/father'?
Parental values are key to childhood development.
Some parents pay attention to important developmental cues in children, and some don't. Some parents are even threatened by childhood development especially around areas of childlike curiosity independence and mastery, and punish children for seeking them out.
It depends on what we value most.

 

[SMK]

The other danger to this it's the parents fault mentality is that no one is perfect. No parent is perfect. We could scrutinize every single a person does and find flaws and mistakes. With some the parental mistakes are bigger. With others they are not so marked but every single person makes a mistake as a parent.

We have Jodi who grew into a killer and sociopath. We say it must be the parents and we look for things. Things that may not even be there. We scrutinize their every move and mistake. It MUST be the parents fault even though there have been no clear or apparent stories of real abuse or neglect. We take the story of the wooden spoon and decide that must have something to do with it. We've decided the dad and mom must have been emotionally neglectful even though we have seen no evidence of that either. Jodi has talked of being knocked around as a teen by her dad, again, if the story is to be believed.

But I think with every sociopath you can look at the parents and pick apart their efforts and find flaws. I am sure if my daughter turned into a sociopath that there would be things to pick out as being the reason for her. If my daughter grows to be a successful and productive member of society I'm a great mother. It's a slippery slope.

I don't really care how Jodi came to be. I care about what she did.

Yes, everyone should be a good parent. But, again, what is a good parent? Is it really so simple?

It is not so simple: But rest assured, IF (and it remains a big if) Arias' parents are to blame, it would not be any little things they did, nor anything just careless or accidental.

It would be pervasive, pernicious, and something which invaded or totally neglected the child in major ways. No innocent parent who was just a bit naiive is going to produce real trauma or so negative an outcome. Those of us who lay blame on our parents know that those things they did or neglected to do were huge things: There were huge betrayals, mind-boggling acts of psychological neglect, unbelievable negligence, near-criminal scapegoating, massive abandonment and psychological torture. (Even if none of this was obvious to the neighbors; it was real behind closed doors, and not open to interpretation).

No one is going to blame a kindly, well-meaning but somewhat ignorant parent.

 

[SMK]

The other danger to this it's the parents fault mentality is that no one is perfect. No parent is perfect. We could scrutinize every single a person does and find flaws and mistakes. With some the parental mistakes are bigger. With others they are not so marked but every single person makes a mistake as a parent.

We have Jodi who grew into a killer and sociopath. We say it must be the parents and we look for things. Things that may not even be there. We scrutinize their every move and mistake. It MUST be the parents fault even though there have been no clear or apparent stories of real abuse or neglect. We take the story of the wooden spoon and decide that must have something to do with it. We've decided the dad and mom must have been emotionally neglectful even though we have seen no evidence of that either. Jodi has talked of being knocked around as a teen by her dad, again, if the story is to be believed.

But I think with every sociopath you can look at the parents and pick apart their efforts and find flaws. I am sure if my daughter turned into a sociopath that there would be things to pick out as being the reason for her. If my daughter grows to be a successful and productive member of society I'm a great mother. It's a slippery slope.

I don't really care how Jodi came to be. I care about what she did.

Yes, everyone should be a good parent. But, again, what is a good parent? Is it really so simple?

We have to care. We have to care because causality and etiology are the most important things to understand, in changing and transforming culture and society.

 

[MeeBee]

Respectfully snipped for brevity.

I think there is so much pressure on parents. I wonder, is there a perfect way to parent? Is there a definite wrong way or right way? How do you know which was is right? And how do we prevent our own life experiences from affecting our parenting choices and methods, if those experiences happen to be negative ones?

It's my belief that we parent in the same way as we were parented. The values that are instilled in the parents are instilled in the child. What those values might look like varies from family to family. Some families may value closeness and gentleness, some might think of it as permissive and value clear strict boundaries, it depends on family of origin. What we value is all important in parenting. It influences how we might discipline and what we think is important in creating functional members of society.
Each parent brings their own set of values into the relationship, and they may even conflict, creating confusion for a child.
What changes in each generation is our need to not do as our parents did, we all hated some of things our parents did. So we either repeat it or seek outside resources to change it.
How many of have said 'Oh no, I've turned into my mother/father'?
Parental values are key to childhood development.
Some parents pay attention to important developmental cues in children, and some don't. Some parents are even threatened by childhood development especially around areas of childlike curiosity independence and mastery, and punish children for seeking them out.
It depends on what we value most.[/QUOTE]

Good response.

BBM: not that this has to do with anything, but my MIL did this to my husband. This was in Poland in the 80s and she's a very VERY cautious woman. She got some odd advice from her doctor. She discouraged him sitting and standing and one day when he was like a year he finally pulled himself to a standing position. He never crawled, he never cruised, he never rolled over. Just stood one day. And from that day on, despite my MIL's best efforts he just blossomed. He figured it out anyway. He climbed fences at the age of 3 so he could pick flowers for his mother from a tree. He taught himself to ride bikes and all sorts of things. Very different from what we learn about how to raise children in the US today but he still developed just fine and after that first year, faster than most kids.

Have you ever seen that movie Babies? About different babies from different parts of the world? I thought that was really fascinating. You had the mom from the US who was kind of a helicopter parent and took her kid to yoga classes and did what we American moms do: over parent, if you will, lol. She sort of developed...I wouldn't say slowly. But, IDK.

And you had the parents from China who seemed to barely ineract or talk to the baby yet he still figured it all out anyway.

You had the child from Africa whose mom left her to her own devices and was allowed to play alone a lot. She was so bright and smart and grew beautifully.

A lot of times children just figure it out.

That's why I say it's so hard to know the right way and wrong way. All of those parents had vastly different parenting styles but the children still figured out how to play and speak and walk anyway. Who's to say what right and what's wrong?

Attachment or non-attachment?

Baby led or parent led?

Gentle parenting or tough love?

There's so many different ways of doing it. Most of us do it to the best of our abilities and that's all you can do. I'm not perfect but I'm trying and my daughter is amazing.

 

[human]

Maybe that can be one part of it. I have also read of infants who later grow to become sociopaths whose parents became exasperated with their babies and toddlers because they would try and hug and cuddle them but they would just cry or push the mother or father away. No matter how much affection they would show the child would not reciprocate. They would not seek their parents out for hugs and kisses or show any kind of child/parent affection. I find that sad. Waking up next to my daughter and kissing her is the highlight of my life.

But my point is it's not always so black and white. That's something I learned to accept reading this thread.

Sociopaths can be born, made, or both. You can have a child born a sociopath who, through great parenting and re-directing, grows to be an empathetic and productive member of society. You can have another born a sociopath who, even through guidance and love and affection and therapy just ends up a full blown sociopath anyways. They are simply hard wired. You have a child, possibly created that way, where sociopathic tendencies are created through a lack of good parenting or lack of nurturing and affection.

Then that of course raises the question of whether they are a true sociopath. I look at someone like, say Richard Ramirez, who just died today, and wonder: is he a true sociopath? Or did his life experiences make him one? I listen to his interviews and he just sounds like a poseur to me. But he had some traumatic things happen to him in his teenage years, I believe that possibly borned this unhealthy lust and fetish for violence. But I am no expert.

But I digress. It's not so black and white. You can't say that all killers and sociopaths are the products of bad parenting. You just can't. You can't say that everyone who goes on to be a sociopath or who kills or who has a proclivity toward sexual deviance was abused, sexually or otherwise, and that's why they are the way they are. It's not always so simple. We are complex things.

I truly believe there are people who are born wired wrong, for whatever reason, and nothing can change it. It's just their nature and no amount of nurture can change that. It's just there.

I think there is so much pressure on parents. I wonder, is there a perfect way to parent? Is there a definite wrong way or right way? How do you know which was is right? And how do we prevent our own life experiences from affecting our parenting choices and methods, if those experiences happen to be negative ones?

I am interested in seeing one person who was raised in a loving home who became a killer. And not someone with a mental illness such as schizophrenia.

I think there is only one way to parent your child. That is with love and respect for your child and for yourself.

I had a friend who was incredibly beautiful and smart.

Her husband abused her horribly. They moved away and I wonder what ever happened to her,

I asked a therapist once why such an amazing woman would be with such a horrifying man.

Her father was an alcoholic, but a professional man who was kind to his children.

The therapist sad, " You cannot give your children what you do not have yourself."

So, as parents, we have to clean up our own act if we want to do a vreat job as parents.

None of us is perfect. None of us does not make mistakes.

As we grow and develop as humans, we learn that sticking a baby in front of a TV is not educational. We learn that talking and reading to your baby is super important. We know that propping a bottle is not OK.

We have learned that swaddling is important for infants.

We know that belittling, calling names, harsh punishments, locking kids in closets, burning them with cigarettes, using them sexually, and lots of things, are going to cause problems.

I have never heard of sociopaths being hard to cuddle, etc.

I know that about autistic children. But autistic children are not sociopaths.

 

[Gecko100]

It is not so simple: But rest assured, IF (if, if) Arias' parents are to blame, it would not be any little things they did, nor anything just careless or accidental.

It would be pervasive, pernicious, and something which invaded or totally neglected the child in major ways. No innocent parent who was just a bit naiive is going to produce real trauma or so negative an outcome. Those of us who lay blame on our parents know that those things they did or neglected to do were huge things: There were huge betrayals, mind-boggling acts of psychological neglect, unbelievable negligence, near-criminal scapegoating, massive abandonment and psychological torture. (Even if none of this was obvious to the neighbors; it was real behind closed doors, and not open to interpretation).

No one is going to blame a kindly, well-meaning but somewhat ignorant parent.

What some parents do too is often reserved for their children behind closed doors (as with my parents). The front presented to the world never saw that. But a child like I was, definitely knew if 'boundaries' had been crossed publicly just by a mere 'look', not necessarily observable by anyone at all. That's remote emotional violence, especially if you knew as I did that I would get the 'silent treatment' for weeks on end until she felt sufficiently appeased by my Cinderella acts of 'please love me'.

 

[MeeBee]

It is not so simple: But rest assured, IF (and it remains a big if) Arias' parents are to blame, it would not be any little things they did, nor anything just careless or accidental.

It would be pervasive, pernicious, and something which invaded or totally neglected the child in major ways. No innocent parent who was just a bit naiive is going to produce real trauma or so negative an outcome. Those of us who lay blame on our parents know that those things they did or neglected to do were huge things: There were huge betrayals, mind-boggling acts of psychological neglect, unbelievable negligence, near-criminal scapegoating, massive abandonment and psychological torture. (Even if none of this was obvious to the neighbors; it was real behind closed doors, and not open to interpretation).

No one is going to blame a kindly, well-meaning but somewhat ignorant parent.

But what is mind boggling acts of psychological neglect to Jodi? What is so big to her that she feels she is being neglected or abused?

She already talks about getting grounded and being busted for pot and being convicted of murder as massive betrayals and she was deserving of those punishments. She talks about her mother turning her attention to her infant children as abandonment. Maybe to Jodi, this was big and it's hard for parents to balance their attention when a new child enters the family. I'm not saying that wouldn't have an impact on her. But would that really turn a normal person into a killer? Whose eyes should we look through? A normal person's or Jodi's?

She talks about Travis not calling her for three days as if it's abandonment too, even though she was a grown woman. Did this abandonment fears come about because of something her parents did or because Jodi was predisposed from birth to interpret little things as big slights?

BBM: How do you know this is always the case? How can you possibly know this? You don't. You can't.

 

[human]

This is long, but excellent.

It talks about what we know about children and what they need and why.

http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2004/924159134X.pdf

 

[MeeBee]

I am interested in seeing one person who was raised in a loving home who became a killer. And not someone with a mental illness such as schizophrenia.

I think there is only one way to parent your child. That is with love and respect for your child and for yourself.

I had a friend who was incredibly beautiful and smart.

Her husband abused her horribly. They moved away and I wonder what ever happened to her,

I asked a therapist once why such an amazing woman would be with such a horrifying man.

Her father was an alcoholic, but a professional man who was kind to his children.

The therapist sad, " You cannot give your children what you do not have yourself."

So, as parents, we have to clean up our own act if we want to do a vreat job as parents.

None of us is perfect. None of us does not make mistakes.

As we grow and develop as humans, we learn that sticking a baby in front of a TV is not educational. We learn that talking and reading to your baby is super important. We know that propping a bottle is not OK.

We have learned that swaddling is important for infants.

We know that belittling, calling names, harsh punishments, locking kids in closets, burning them with cigarettes, using them sexually, and lots of things, are going to cause problems.

I have never heard of sociopaths being hard to cuddle, etc.

I know that about autistic children. But autistic children are not sociopaths.

BBM:

I have. It can be an early indicator that a child is a sociopath.

Good parenting is: parenting with love and kindness.

Bad parenting is: not abusing them, name calling, burning them with cigarettes.

That's a bit of a gap isn't it? That's a little too easy. It's black and white. It's common sense. I'm talking about the nuances of parenting. The little things with no easy answers.

For instance, you said no harsh punishments. What is a harsh punishment to you? Is it a universal idea? Is a swat on the butt a harsh punishment? Is raising your voice a harsh punishment? Is giving time outs a harsh punishment? I am part of a group on facebook called the way of the peaceful parent that believes that timeouts are too harsh a punishment for a child. Would you agree?

There's no easy answer to this question. You may think it's possible to be a perfect parent every time and raise a perfect child but it isn't always. There are so many factors that contribute to who the person will be become and who they are. Some think vaccines and chemicals in food and yeast overgrowth can cause behavior problems in children and that it can have nothing to do with parenting.

There's too much judgment and monday morning quarterbacking. We can be very unfair to the people who are doing the best they can to love and support their child.

I'll say it again: sometimes the child turns out that way anyway. You can say you have never seen a "bad seed" that didn't have a bad childhood but I have. I have KNOWN kids like this.

 

[SMK]

What some parents do too is often reserved for their children behind closed doors (as with my parents). The front presented to the world never saw that. But a child like I was, definitely knew if 'boundaries' had been crossed publicly just by a mere 'look', not necessarily observable by anyone at all. That's remote emotional violence, especially if you knew as I did that I would get the 'silent treatment' for weeks on end until she felt sufficiently appeased by my Cinderella acts of 'please love me'.

I hear you, sister.

 

[Gecko100]

It's my belief that we parent in the same way as we were parented. The values that are instilled in the parents are instilled in the child. What those values might look like varies from family to family. Some families may value closeness and gentleness, some might think of it as permissive and value clear strict boundaries, it depends on family of origin. What we value is all important in parenting. It influences how we might discipline and what we think is important in creating functional members of society.
Each parent brings their own set of values into the relationship, and they may even conflict, creating confusion for a child.
What changes in each generation is our need to not do as our parents did, we all hated some of things our parents did. So we either repeat it or seek outside resources to change it.
How many of have said 'Oh no, I've turned into my mother/father'?
Parental values are key to childhood development.
Some parents pay attention to important developmental cues in children, and some don't. Some parents are even threatened by childhood development especially around areas of childlike curiosity independence and mastery, and punish children for seeking them out.
It depends on what we value most.

Good response.

BBM: not that this has to do with anything, but my MIL did this to my husband. This was in Poland in the 80s and she's a very VERY cautious woman. She got some odd advice from her doctor. She discouraged him sitting and standing and one day when he was like a year he finally pulled himself to a standing position. He never crawled, he never cruised, he never rolled over. Just stood one day. And from that day on, despite my MIL's best efforts he just blossomed. He figured it out anyway. He climbed fences at the age of 3 so he could pick flowers for his mother from a tree. He taught himself to ride bikes and all sorts of things. Very different from what we learn about how to raise children in the US today but he still developed just fine and after that first year, faster than most kids.

Have you ever seen that movie Babies? About different babies from different parts of the world? I thought that was really fascinating. You had the mom from the US who was kind of a helicopter parent and took her kid to yoga classes and did what we American moms do: over parent, if you will, lol. She sort of developed...I wouldn't say slowly. But, IDK.

And you had the parents from China who seemed to barely ineract or talk to the baby yet he still figured it all out anyway.

You had the child from Africa whose mom left her to her own devices and was allowed to play alone a lot. She was so bright and smart and grew beautifully.

A lot of times children just figure it out.

That's why I say it's so hard to know the right way and wrong way. All of those parents had vastly different parenting styles but the children still figured out how to play and speak and walk anyway. Who's to say what right and what's wrong?

Attachment or non-attachment?

Baby led or parent led?

Gentle parenting or tough love?

There's so many different ways of doing it. Most of us do it to the best of our abilities and that's all you can do. I'm not perfect but I'm trying and my daughter is amazing.[/QUOTE]



Yes, I have seen those programs they were good! What is interesting to me though, is that 3rd world parenting still includes the benefits of extended family which may make a huge difference to a child. Western models of parenting are less concerned with those values which have been eroded over time. It's often hard to be clear about our native Aboriginals because of the lineage of maternal caring, where all the mother's sisters are also considered to be the mother of the child, and vice versa.

Look like I rudely jumped into you quote Meebee sorry

 

[SMK]

But what is mind boggling acts of psychological neglect to Jodi? What is so big to her that she feels she is being neglected or abused?

She already talks about getting grounded and being busted for pot and being convicted of murder as massive betrayals and she was deserving of those punishments. She talks about her mother turning her attention to her infant children as abandonment. Maybe to Jodi, this was big and it's hard for parents to balance their attention when a new child enters the family. I'm not saying that wouldn't have an impact on her. But would that really turn a normal person into a killer? Whose eyes should we look through? A normal person's or Jodi's?

She talks about Travis not calling her for three days as if it's abandonment too, even though she was a grown woman. Did this abandonment fears come about because of something her parents did or because Jodi was predisposed from birth to interpret little things as big slights?

BBM: How do you know this is always the case? How can you possibly know this? You don't. You can't.

I think I can know this, because when I compare all the people I have known who were damaged by parents (siblings, cousins, people in groups) with people who were not;

the former group had huge things done wrong, the latter, little things (in the midst of good things). I think using our reason and logic we can know that pervasive problems lead to big issues, and little conflicts would not.

I am assuming IF the Arias parents damaged Jodi, we did not hear the real issues (and there would be a good reason for that).