Dear Editor,
Just a quick note to question your comment in the opening article of the April 2009 issue of The Attached Family Ezine that Attachment Parenting is an alternative to “traditional” parenting. Perhaps the term “mainstream” would be better; it all depends on the tradition to which you are referring.
I gravitated to Attachment Parenting in 1998 by instinct long before I knew there was such a thing. I came to think of my way as the old-fashioned way — the way my grandmother did things. I think of that as more traditional. The “go to your room” or time-out approach I see as more of a modern-day approach coming from the 1960s and ’70s when the Me Generation started parenting and through the ’80s when greed was good and selfishness reached an all-time high.
Perhaps the book clarifies this point but it just caught my eye.
~ Kelly Anne Thomson, Virginia USA
ORIGINAL ARTICLE from The Attached Family Ezine
As a parent, you are doing the most important job in the world — raising the next generation of our society. API wishes to thank you for your extraordinary dedication to your families and children by practicing Attachment Parenting.
It is for you that API Co-founders Barbara Nicholson and Lysa Parker wrote their book, Attached at the Heart. They want you to know why you’re making the best choice possible for your children — and the world — by consciously choosing to promote attachment rather than conforming to traditional ideas of parenting. Barbara and Lysa also want to encourage you through their book, which details all of API’s Eight Principles of Parenting — clarifying such points on whether time-outs are ever considered AP tools and what really makes an AP birth. The book is an amazing encouragement to parents to look to their instincts on how to raise their children, instead of looking to so-called experts. There really is no book available like Attached at the Heart.
RESPONSE
Thank you, Kelly Anne, for your letter. You bring up a great point. As the API Publications Team was putting this issue of the Ezine together, we debated about the terms “traditional” vs. “mainstream.” Our decision was based on not wanting to offend mainstream parents, but through your letter, I can see that we have misconstrued exactly how most people view Attachment Parenting — that it is as traditional as parenting can get.
I thank you for your correction to this term, and I would like to clarify that we actually meant “mainstream.” I hope this snaffoo won’t affect your view of the book. It is an excellent handbook for attachment parents.
Thanks again for your professionalism in bringing this matter to our attention.
~ Rita Brhel, editor of The Attached Family publications