Three Books on Parenting: Listening, Identity, and Simple Living

I used to write a book blog -- now I write a blog on parenting. When people hear this they put the two things together and usually ask pretty quickly for my recommendations for parenting books. I get the question a lot but in truth, I don't really have an answer for it because I don't read a lot of the "how-to with kids" genre. I have one well-worn copy of the Dr. Sears Baby Book that I page through whenever I have a specific question, but that's about it. I find that reading too many books on what to do/what not to do tend to make me feel a little anxious and muddled about my own parenting philosophy, so I basically stay away for fear of complicating things.

However, in the last few months I've come across some really good reads on topics having to do with the raising of children -- so good and so useful that not only did I break my own rule and read them, but I'm urging every parent I know to give them a go.

How to Talk So Kids Will Listen... was recommended on Modern Parents Messy Kids, who had it as a recent virtual book club pick. As Anouk's vocabulary expands (but isn't quite fully there yet), I find that we sometimes run into communication difficulties, and reading How to Talk seemed like a good way to get some insight on how to handle them. The worksheets and the 1980s cartoons sometimes seem corny and a little facile, but there's no denying the information is still sound and dang if they don't help the philosophies stick with you. While the techniques for listening and questioning are mostly geared toward older kids and teens, there are definitely some strategies for dealing with antsy toddlers that can work right now, and the rest make me feel more confident in building good habits for the future.

You rock those skorts, Cartoon Mom.

(You can follow along with MPMK's book club discussion here.) 

In the subconscious fantasies that make conception look so alluring, it is often ourselves that we would like to see live forever, not someone with a personality of his own. Having anticipated the onward march of our selfish genes, many of us are unprepared for children who present unfamiliar needs. Parenthood abruptly catapults us into a permanent relationship with a stranger, and the more alien the stranger, the stronger the whiff of negativity...we must love [our children] for themselves, and not for the best of us in them, and that is a great deal harder to do.  

In writing Far From the Tree, Andrew Solomon conducted 300+ interviews with parents whose children had Down Syndrome, dwarfism, mental illness and deafness, as well as parents of child prodigies, children born of rape, and with the parents of transgendered children. His aim was to draw parallels between typical and extraordinary parenting circumstances; he finds connections between the experience of parenting Deaf children with the struggle of parenting gay children, between the burdens of educating child prodigies and the intricacies of educating kids with autism and other learning disabilities. The result is a completely empathetic realization that we are more alike than we are different, and that there is a very fine line between accepting children for who they are and helping kids become their best selves.

At over 900 pages, the book will probably be a bit difficult for the busy parent to tackle (it was for me), but it's worth picking up from the library if only to read Solomon's essay at the start of the book, about how his homosexuality put a wedge between him and his otherwise doting parents, and his closing piece, about how his experiences have shaped the way he parents his own son.

So Zero Waste Home isn't technically a book on parenting -- readers without kids will get as much out of it as readers with -- but I am including it because I think it's a topic especially near and dear to those of us who find our houses taken over with all of these little pieces of plastic: toys, diapers, the works. Zero Waste Home was just incredible for me to read. It's the story of a family of four who, by implementing novel ways to cut down on waste, managed to produce just one quart of garbage between them over the course of a year.  Johnson shares the tricks that helped her manage this: bringing her own packaging to the grocery store and buying only bulk foods, purchasing goods secondhand, and focusing on experiences as gifts (foot rubs, day trips) instead of tangible things, composting everything. 

But more inspiring than the challenge of cutting down on waste is the larger one that Johnson extolls, which is to live simply, without accumulating things you don't need, cherishing only things that you find enriching or useful or beautiful. 

I have to admit that after I finished this book I felt a little nauseated for a few days at the amount of stuff  we have in our house. But also, after reading it, a simpler life seems more accessible, too. I doubt we'll ever get as extreme as the family in this book, but there are definitely ways to tighten up. 

What have you been reading lately?