Best child counseling books according to redditors

Dad of a seven- and two-year-old here, and here's what works for me. It's based on three observations.


(1) Generally, children are able to pick-up for the number of minutes that equals their age. So my seven-year-old can clean for seven minutes, and my two-year-old for two.


(2) Children (especially very young children) are much more likely to pick-up toys if the toy receptacle is small and is can be moved to the spot of the mess. For example, our blocks go in a small basket; and picking up the basket, setting it next to the blocks, and saying "put the blocks in here," is much more effective than having a large, general all-toy bin sitting in the corner and saying "clean up your blocks."


(3) Children tend to play with one type of toy at a time, get bored, and move on to another type of toy without first cleaning up. This means that a messy room is usually a bunch of discrete messes.


So whenever my wife or I observe a discreet group of toys that is not currently being played with (e.g., cars), and whenever it will take the child less than "their number of minutes" to clean, my wife or I will say something like "carry the car box over to your cars and clean them up . . . good, now put the car box back on the shelf . . . okay, now, do the same with the blocks and the block basket, good, thank you." The child has to stop whatever they are doing and pick-up those toys immediately, and only then may they resume playing at whatever it was they were playing before.


Now, the catch is this: if the mess will take more than the child's "number" for the child to clean, my wife or I clean it ourselves without scolding the kids; we figure it was our fault for letting the mess grow beyond the point where the child can himself clean it, so now it's on us because we were being lazy about enforcing our own cleaning rule. We find that the problem usually isn't that kids won't clean; it's we as parents don't consistently enforce an easy-to-follow cleaning rule. With the rule I described above, the incentive is for the parents to make the kids clean bit-by-bit throughout the day, which helps the kids form a cleaning habit and helps the parents learn to enforce the rules consistently.


So if you allow your children to create havoc, and you allow that havoc to drive you to the point of dramatic gestures, I think that's on you, not the kids, and you need to check yourself before you wreck yourself.


Edit for grammar and this:

• 1-2-3 Magic - This book is great for discipline. Like if you tell your kids to pick up your toys, and they just refuse.
  
  
• Simplicity Parenting - My cleaning system is based (kind of) on what's in this book. This is especially good if you feel like you have a trillion toys.
  
  
• Children: The Challenge - My parenting philosophy comes from this book, which some may find offense because it's outdated and not PC—has some gems though
  

Seriously scary stuff. When further research is not encouraged in a certain area, then it's clear you are treading in dangerous waters.


I do think these debates are important, especially nowadays when people are crucified simply for bringing up the issue of possibly improving vaccines and not simply trusting corporations blindly.

As I usually say, vaccines do not need to be abolished, they can and should be improved. The issue is not as black and white as people portray it.

The amount of research that has sprung up connecting the usage of heavy metals as vaccine adjuvants to neurological problems, as well as autism is considerable, yet is rarely discussed.

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>In early December 2017, Dr. Chris Exley of Keele University in England and his colleagues published a paper that for the first time looked at the brain tissue of subjects with autism to determine the level of aluminum (note: they spell “aluminum” as “aluminium” in the United Kingdom) found within their brain tissue. For anyone trying to convince the world that “the science is settled and vaccines don’t cause autism,” the study’s findings are deeply contradictory to that statement. In a blog post written by Professor Exley on the day his study was published, he explained the groundbreaking results:

> “…while the aluminium content of each of the 5 brains [of people with autism] was shockingly high it was the location of the aluminium in the brain tissue which served as the standout observation…The new evidence strongly suggests that aluminium is entering the brain in ASD [autism spectrum disorders] via pro-inflammatory cells which have become loaded up with aluminium in the blood and/or lymph, much as has been demonstrated for monocytes at injection sites for vaccines including aluminium adjuvants.”


I strongly suggest anyone genuinely interested to read the following page, if you wish to see a very different view (filled with research of course) on the vaccine/aluminium link and its possible relation to autism:

-Aluminum in vaccines and the autism epidemic

The man behind this research is J.B.Handley. He has a child with autism and has dedicated his life to solving and researching the issue - and preventing the modern autism epidemic.

He even has a book on this issue, available here:

https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/
https://jbhandleyblog.com/home/2018/4/1/international2018

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Here is another link to a research paper (by Tomljenovic, Exley not involved here as far as I know) connecting the usage of aluminium adjuvants to the rise of autism:

Do aluminum vaccine adjuvants contribute to the rising prevalence of autism?

This research is sadly not freely available, but if you wish to read it anyway, you can get around that with a page like www.sci-hub.tw

In which case it becomes more readily available:

https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0162013411002212


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Recently, even a respected (now smeared and his reputation destroyed of course) vaccine medical expert, employed and tasked to destroy the autism-vaccine connection has come out with info that the link undoubtedly exists. There is an interview with him on Shirley Attkinsson that can be found on YouTube.

Full Measure with Sharyl Attkisson: January 6, 2019 - The Vaccination Debate

James Corbett: Vaxx Propaganda in Overdrive as Vaccine/Autism Link Confirmed

------------------------------------------------

For an absurdly high amount of research papers, check out this comment here.

Obligatory link to /r/daddit

Grab some books, man, and just don't stress. There may be times when she has a mood swing or three, just forgive those instantly and ride it out. Foot massages, body pillows, healthy food, and books should take care of most things. Congrats.

This is a great book that will help you with literally everything baby related until age 2. Get it now though because it's lengthy.

There's a chapter in Nurture Shock about why kids lie and what can be done about it. The authors suggest that the typical strategies to promote truth-telling backfire.

This part struck me as maybe related to what's going on for you:

>Lying also becomes a way to increase a child's power and sense of control -- by manipulating friends with teasing, by bragging to assert his status, and by learning that he can fool his parents.

>Thrown into elementary school, many kids begin lying to their peers as a coping mechanism: it's a way to vent frustration or get attention. They might be attempting to compensate, feeling that they're slipping behind their peers. Any sudden spate of lying or dramatic increase in lying is a sign that something has changed in that child's life, in a way that troubles him: 'Lying is a symptom -- often of a bigger problem behavior,' explained Talwar. 'It's a strategy to keep themselves afloat,' (82-83).

The lying about mundane stuff strikes me as your daughter trying to assert some control in her life.

So what do?

You know the fable The Boy Who Cried Wolf? And you know the story of George Washington cutting down the cherry tree? There were studies done to see which would prevent/reduce lies. It's the cherry tree story.

>The shepard boy ends up suffering the ultimate punishment [he gets eaten by the wolf for his lying], but that lies get punished is not news to children. When asked if lies are always wrong, 92% of five year olds say yes. And when asked why lies are wrong, most say the problem with lying is that you get in trouble for it. In that sense, young kids process the risk of lying by considering only their own self-protection. It takes years for the children to understand lying on a more sophisticated moral ground. It isn't until age eleven that the majority demonstrate awareness of its harm to others; at that point, 48% say the problem with lying is that it destroys trust, and 22% say it carries guilt. Even then, a third still say the problem with lying is being punished.

[...]

>Increasing the threat of punishment for lying only makes children hyperaware of the potential personal cost. It distracts the child from learning how his lies impact others.

Even if you say, "I won't be upset if you lied, just tell me the truth," the child is still wary. They don't trust your promise and want to get back in your good graces. They don't want to make themselves happy, they want to make you happy.

So you say, "I will not be upset with you if you [did whatever], and if you tell the truth I will be really happy," (86).

It's both immunity from the lie and a clear route back to your good graces. This is why the cherry tree story works better than the wolf one at reducing lying. Little George Washington receive both immunity and praise for telling the truth.

Finally, you should try avoiding putting your daughter in no-win situations. "Did you brush your teeth?" You know she didn't. "Did you leave the bread out?" You know she did. The only way out of this is for her to lie to you (in her mind at least). The book describes this as testing the child's honesty unnecessarily.

So in those situations, rather than test her honesty, just tell her again to brush her teeth or put the bread away. Essentially, you're not giving her the chance to lie.

Then you're going to have to address the avoiding toothbrushing and the leaving the bread open. But at least she won't be lying about it.

TL;DR: Stop setting her up to lie to you. Don't ask questions you know the answer to. You know she didn't brush her teeth. Don't bother asking. She's lying to avoid punishment and to get back in your good graces because she wants to please you/mom/dad/whoever.

It's a little early as you don't even have your kid yet, but there are a couple books I found really helpful as a new dad:

No-Drama Discipline for helping frame frustrating situations and to give me some tools to deal with them in positive and productive ways.

Parentspeak: What's wrong with how we talk to our children because I really needed to be more aware of how the things I say shape the developing mind of my kid. I'm not saying this one is for everyone, and some people reject it out of hand because they don't believe that seemingly innocuous words impact their kids, but I found it gave me a lot of things to think about.

In general, boys' academic performance is struggling compared to girls'. The War Against Boys goes into it quite deeply.

Don't get too used to that! :) The first few weeks are a fake-out. They sleep all the time and then they flip it on you!

Seriously though - buy this book. Personal anecdote is that this was a life changer for our two kids.

Good luck and enjoy every second. My oldest is already three and I know that will turn around and tomorrow he will be 20.

/https://www.amazon.ca/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427

Good read Christina Hoff Sommers the War on Boys:

https://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427

I understand not wanting to buy a book just to read it's content particularly when it's of a disagreeing political nature (I'm not made of money either) but I'd gladly buy you a copy if you're interested.

Another good read.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lori-day/why-boys-are-failing-in-a_b_884262.html

Lack of role models, male teachers go where the pay is and many fear claims of being a pedophile (It's a pretty widespread and harmful narrative and one that is openly voiced see: https://www.veooz.com/news/ALDvUG4.html)

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/opinion/letters/story/2012-08-19/male-teachers-elementary-school/57145422/1

The educational system used to use Phonics based learning but Whole-language learning replaced it during the Feminization of education. (i.e. In order for girls to learn better it was acceptable for boys to learn less and the method by which girls better learned was brought in)

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/boys-do-better-than-girls-when-taught-under-traditional-reading-methods-7184547.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHe9UJTte-M

We've also stepped away from physical (recess anyone?) and competitive learning which boys tend to very well at.

There's more that goes into this (i.e. Loss of fathers in the home, lack of default parenting, etc.) but it's undoubtedly not as efficient for boys as it used to be leading many to argue that sex-separated class rooms should be considered.

http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cha.asp

Women continue to receive affirmative action and gendered scholarships despite this fact.

You can gift back How We Know What Isn't So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday Life, by Thomas Gilovich.

Free PDF version

Since this was front-paged I'm gonna hijack the top post and link to the work of Karen Straughan. She posts here occasionally and will hopefully chime in on this thread.

Me a feminist? No way:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqEeCCuFFO8

Is Feminism hate? [skip to the 20 min. mark]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDYAVROaIcs

How Feminism conned society

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RozEFVPDxeg

Benevolent sexism?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VupEC0cAWo

The Tyranny of Female Hypoagency

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBgcjtE0xrE

Feminism and the Disposable Male.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vp8tToFv-bA

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A few good videos by Lindy Beige on female power in history:

Women power in the past

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrgovSZ32Yg

Sex Power: when women were different and men were disposable

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSX7iT0n65Q

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Nice summary of Issues here: Why we need a men's rights movement

http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/2xmm3p/i_cant_believe_people_think_we_dont_need_a_mens/

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Good reading:

The Myth of Male Power

http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Male-Power-Warren-Farrell-ebook/dp/B00IDHV5EM

The Privileged Sex

http://www.amazon.com/Privileged-Sex-Martin-van-Creveld-ebook/dp/B00EX5PJC2/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1427403378&sr=1-1-spell&keywords=privilged+sex

No More Sex War

http://www.amazon.com/More-Sex-War-Neil-Lyndon/dp/1856191915/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1427403395&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=no+more+sex+war

The Second Sexism

http://www.amazon.com/Second-Sexism-Discrimination-Against-Boys/dp/0470674512/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427403501&sr=1-1&keywords=second+sexism

The War Against Boys

http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1451644183/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427403440&sr=1-1&keywords=war+against+boys

Anti-vaxxers enrage me. That shit is dangerous, ignorant nonsense.

>Liza Greve, president of Oklahomans for Vaccine and Health Choice, which advocates for parental choice, said Oklahomans should take the opt-out statistics with a grain of salt.

Do you know what i take with a grain of salt, Liza? You, because your facebook page is a whole box of cat scratch crazy:

1. You shouldn't send your kids to school on flu shot day because children are being forced to get it.
   
2. That autism is caused by vaccines (see all her posts touting the book "how to end the autism epidemic"
   
3. That the DOJ cancelled expert testimony to conceal "critical material evidence of how vaccines can cause autism in some children"
   
4. Vaccines cause cancer.
   
   This is all within the 5 posts on her page.

A great source of information on this topic is The War Against Boys: How Misguided Policies are Harming Our Young Men by Christina Hoff Summers.
Some excerpts:

Although many educators recognize that boys have fallen far behind girls in school, few address the problem in a serious way. Schools that try to stop the trend, through boy-friendly pedagogy, literacy interventions, vocational training, or same-sex classes, are often thwarted. Women’s lobbying groups still call such projects evidence of a “backlash” against girls’ achievements and believe they are part of a campaign to slow further female progress.

This book explains how it became fashionable to pathologize the behavior of millions of healthy male children. We have turned against boys and forgotten a simple truth: the energy, competitiveness, and corporal daring of normal males are responsible for much of what is right in the world. No one denies that boys’ aggressive tendencies must be mitigated and channeled toward constructive ends. Boys need (and crave) discipline, respect, and moral guidance. Boys need love and tolerant understanding. But being a boy is not a social disease.

How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and The Explosive Child (the title is a bit misleading, I think it applies here!). Playful Parenting is also great IMO but less specifically applicable here.

You say you've "tried everything" but that's rather vague. The things you do mention don't seem to take her input into account at all (you are going to reorganize her room without her there; you are going to make up a schedule). Kids, like all people, are more inclined to participate in things they have input and interest in. "Here's your schedule, this is how you will do things" is going to generate resistance and be harder to enforce than "We need to be ready to walk out the door at 7:30 in the morning in order to get to school on time. Let's figure out what we need to do to achieve that."

> Could she be clinically depressed or bipolar at 17 months?

No. You're not describing symptoms of either.

I have a cousin whose daughter sounds EXACTLY like yours. She's never content, always screaming/crying/fussing. She's developmentally delayed (I'm not saying yours is) as she isn't really talking at all at 2.5 years old.

Have you spoken to your pediatrician about these concerns? Have you requested an evaluation to determine if it's something medically concerning?

Edit: I also highly recommend The Whole Brain Child, it talks about how to parent by catering towards your kid's brain development level.

A Reference book of men's issues is probably your best bet for finding relevant studies.

[MRRef] (https://www.reddit.com/r/MRRef/) is more extensive but will require more digging.

Videos:

The Red Pill (NYA)

Everything by Karen Straughan

Everything by Janice Fiamengo

Books:

[Is There Anything Good About Men?] (https://gendertruce.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/baumeister-roy-is-there-anything-good-about-men.pdf) (full book online) by Roy Baumeister

The Myth of Male Power: Why Men are the Disposable Sex by Warren Farrell

The Privileged Sex by Martin Van Creveld

The Second Sexism: Discrimination Against Men and Boys by David Benetar

The Fraud of Feminism (full book online) by Earnest Belford Bax

Who Stole Feminism? by Christina Hoff Sommers

The War Against Boys by Christina Hoff Sommers

Spreading Misandry: The Teaching of Contempt for Men in Popular Culture by Paul Nathanson and Katherine Young

Legalizing Misandry: From Public Shame to Systemic Discrimination Against Men by Paul Nathanson and Katherine Young

Sanctifying Misandry: Goddess Ideology and the Fall of Man by Paul Nathanson and Katherine Young

Replacing Misandry: A Revolutionary History of Men by Paul Nathanson and Katherine Young

No More Sex War by Neil Lyndon

A few works that I think deserve more attention. Some are directly related to Men's Rights, others tangentially.

Hierarchy in the Forest: The Evolution of Egalitarian Behavior by Christopher Boehm

War, Peace, Human Nature: Converging Evolutionary & Cultural Views by Douglas Fry et. al

Female Forms of Power and the Myth of Male Dominance: A Model of Female/Male Interaction in Peasant Society (paper online) by Susan Carol Rogers

Favoured or oppressed? Married women, property and ‘coverture’ in England, 1660–1800 (paper online) by J. Bailey

The Mothers: A Study of the Origins of Sentiments and Institutions (full book online) by Robert Briffault

Gynocentrism: From Feudalism to the Modern Disney Princess by Peter Wright

Sex and Culture (full book online) by J.D. Unwin

The Manipulated Man (full book online) by Esther Villar

Unknown Misandry (website)

Real Sexism (website)

My anecdotal experience contradicts this. I live in Berkeley, near the Oakland border. I see the little black dolls being just as coveted and fought over as any other, by my child and others.

One of the chapters in Nuture Shock had to do with racial education. The studies they discuss had a surprising result: because race makes many white parents uncomfortable, they simply do not discuss it. Children note the absence, and they fill it in with imaginings of their own.

Part of the recommended strategy, which I follow with my child, is simply to compliment the looks of black people. You occasionally note differences with a light touch, but you don't avoid discussing them out of fear or discomfort. "Lisa looks so pretty today: look, she has a butterfly clip in her hair."

I've been doing a lot of "time ins" rather than "time outs", where I sit with him and we discuss what went on for four or five minutes. I try to focus a lot on how his words made me feel, and ask him as well what he was feeling when he said those words.

What does he watch on TV? I've seen behavior affected significantly by what kids are watching, there's even a good study on how watching "Arthur" make kids have MORE conflict rather than less. I try to stick mainly to PBS shows and I screen potential shows using the Common Sense Media site to help me decide if things are age-appropriate.

I try not to cave on my policies, so he knows what to expect every time he challenges me. I noticed, for example, that when I had no strict policy for TV watching I was getting temper tantrums daily. I realized it was because he didn't know what to expect. Sometimes he'd ask for TV and I would say yes, sometimes I'd say no. I knew my reasons, sort of, but actually writing them out helped me clarify them and helped my son understand, his tantrums on this subject dropped immediately after I wrote out my policy and explained it. (Loosely, my policy is that he has to have at least an hour of active or creative play and at least thirty minutes of quiet time, as well as picking up all his toys before he's allowed ANY TV. He can then watch up to two shows.)

Snacks are another thing I have figured out policies for. After lunch he can choose cheese, nuts, or fruits/veggies for snacks, but after 4pm he can only choose fruits/veggies. I've also read of people keeping a snack drawer in the fridge and the child is allowed to pick two or three or unlimited things a day of their choosing out of the drawer. If they've eaten all their yogurts, however, it isn't getting refilled until next Saturday (or whenever).

Honestly, being predictable in as many ways as possible is very, very helpful for kids. If you can find them in the library, I'd also recommend looking through the books How to Listen So Kids Will Talk and How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Simplicity Parenting. They have both really helped shape my parenting.

They also sell a book that claims vaccines cause autism, per the description:

https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/ref=pd_sim_14_1/134-8776607-1137662?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1603588248&pd_rd_r=fe5e3b59-6ad4-11e9-851c-1df216413549&pd_rd_w=5VDLc&pd_rd_wg=fCD5F&pf_rd_p=90485860-83e9-4fd9-b838-b28a9b7fda30&pf_rd_r=X5H4BT7K56CFKXGTT6NK&psc=1&refRID=X5H4BT7K56CFKXGTT6NK

I like the Dr. Sears baby book. It covers birth until age 2.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0316198269/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

This book is a must for anyone having kids. So many people read so much about how to raise their babies and kids, but never figure out how to train their kids to sleep properly. This book teaches you how... http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

I highly recommend No Bad Kids and Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids. Both books helped me tremendously as a parent, and helped me parent the exact opposite of how I was raised. One of the most important things at this age is consistent, clear boundaries, and standing your ground. Do not make empty threats - follow through.

File a Title IX complaint with the school's title IX office and with the federal government. Instructions here:

http://knowyourix.org/title-ix/how-to-file-a-title-ix-complaint/

Chances are high that the school and OCR will choose not to act on it, but it's important that boys & young men to leave a paper trail documenting discriminatory behavior. Remember, when it comes to the government, if it isn't documented on paper, it basically never happened.

This is a good book for background information on boys in education:

http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1449440710&sr=8-1&keywords=war+against+boys

A good advocacy organization is Boys & Men in Education:

http://boysmeneducation.com/

... they may know of good resources / tactics for your son.

Your son could also organize a men's rights student organization on campus. Most campuses are in dire need of that sort of advocacy.

Can you give an example of what you mean by misbehave, and what ages you are thinking of?

I think maybe sometimes I would use obviously ludicrous threats, like that I would tie them to the roof of the car, or put them on the roof of the house for the night. It was humorous, they knew it was empty, but it did communicate my annoyance or dissatisfaction with their behaviour.

We would rarely use real threats. Occasionally we would remove a child from a situation, for a while we would send them out of the room and ask them to come back in with a different attitude, or with an apology. If one of them hurt another we might leave the room along with the hurt child. But on the whole they are pretty well behaved.

There are a few books I've enjoyed reading:

Alfie Kohn's books: Punished by Rewards, and Unconditional Parenting.

Raising Happy Children

Playful Parenting

D.W. Winnicott's book: The Child, The Family, and the Outside World

Holy crap, neither did mine!

I've been reading through a book recently: For Your Own Good and it's been like reading my parents parenting playbook. Guess narcissism was more systematized.

Max failed lol:

max read ‏@max_read 24m24 minutes ago
@CHSommers @samfbiddle because you wrote that book 14 years ago and are still humping it

Christina H. Sommers ‏@CHSommers 15m15 minutes ago
Best to check facts before attacking me @max_read I published a new and revised edition last year. @samfbiddle http://www.amazon.com/The-War-Against-Boys-Misguided/dp/1451644183 …

How old is the toddler? Janet Lansbury has some great books about discipline, like this one. It's geared toward parents, but there's a lot of useful info in there for caregivers. Toddlers are little boundary-explorers, and creating a secure, consistent environment where they know what to expect is the goal, but it's easier said than done. Behavior is communication, so if you can figure out the underlying need that's leading to the behavior, and meet the need, that's the ideal situation. It's a daily balancing act of figuring out where to put the boundary and then how to hold the boundary firm.

Jb handley’s book is great also!

The shaming and attacks only further grows the movement. Anyone who’s not well mannered and can’t provide a rebuttal without spewing an attack added on with mumbled nonsense is discarded by those with rational minds.

I recommend listening to this interview with Chris Exley. A scientist studying aluminum (which is in vaccines) for a very for long time.

https://youtu.be/WyAeQKtVr6U

https://www.reddit.com/r/VaxTalk/comments/bkrk0b/aluminium_in_brain_tissue_in_autism_professor/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

You are not alone. And you are not a bad mom.

I have lots of bad days when I don’t live up to the standard I’ve set myself—and PS if you’re looking for learning what TO do rather than just what not to do, I highly recommend No Bad Kids. If you google Janet landsbury you can check out her blog and podcast and search for topics that ring true for you.

Anyway, onto sharing some tidbits: just recently I let loose and just YELLED at my 18 month old. I am very sound sensitive and he likes to screech like a banshee and I was having terrible headaches... so finally I just really let loose and almost screamed at him to stop. He looked at me in shock and started crying in earnest.

I took me a second to even feel bad because I was so relieved to have the high-pitched screeching stop. And my yelling? It was premeditated. It’s not like I just hit a breaking point and lost control. No, I just decided I was going to do it and I did.

I felt bad of course and hugged him and he went about his day and it was all fine.

I have lots of low moments. I haven’t hit my son, but that is by virtue of my tendency to simply check out. When his volume gets high and my system goes into overwhelm, I walk away either physically or I dissociate. Now, you may think hitting is worse, but this is my biggest fear: that I will be the unavailable and dissociated mother who comes out of it only to yell and terrify her offspring.

And yeah, I have the desire to hit. I come from a terribly abusive family history and the urge is strong. I can only offer what has worked for me: I verbalize it. “I want to hit” and just hearing my voice saying it can snap me out of it. It’s worked so far, but I am always scared that I am one tantrum away from spanking.

Sooooo you are totally not alone. It’s very hard to break the cycle of family trauma! And in case it makes you feel any better... I am a god damn therapist myself. I know how I “should” be doing this parenting gig. Doesn’t make it any easier.

Hugs and love.

No Bad Kids by Janet Lansbury was a big game changer for me. It helped me understand why 2 year olds tantrum the way they do, not just tools for working with them.

I would highly recommend the book: Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids. It gave us some great strategies!

For all you would be parents out there, I would suggest this book. Hands down the best book I ever read on parenting. Want your child to sit in their high chair for dinner? Show them their stuffed animal doing it. Want your child to overcome their fear of loud hand dryers. Pretend to dry your hands at home and make a game of it. Want your kid to stop pretending to play with guns? Pretend their gun sends love your way. Everything a child does and learns is through play. By demonstrating outcomes and behaviors you want your child to do / have through play, parenthood becomes easier. (all of the above are real stories from the book that the author, a therapist, walks through)

As others are saying, most of these sound like reflexes. My friend gave me a book called Experimenting With Babies that ended up being pretty fun to go through at different stages. It could also explain some of what you're experiencing with your kid.

I thought one of the coolest experiments was this: When your baby is standing (on the floor) and holding your hands, lean them forward slightly. They will reflexively move their feet as if they are walking (right-left-right-left). They do this up until about three months old, then the reflex goes away to prepare them to crawl. As they start to learn to walk it comes back.

You need a pack n' play.

You don't need a car baby mirror.

You need about twice the number of pacifiers you have already bought. Because they disappear.

You don't need the head insert for the car seat.

Your wife needs a boppy.

You don't need special "burp cloths." You know what works great? Dish towels.

You need a baby monitor.

You don't need special baby Q-tips.

You need diaper rash cream. Boudreaux's, whatever.

You don't need wipe warmers.

You need those fabric boxes. Like these. You will put a lot of stuff in them.

You don't need a ton of toys. Especially the make-your-kid-a-genius ones. You don't need those. Know what they will want to play with? The spatula. Your keys. You know, whatever you are holding.

You need this book. It is the best thing I have ever read...both kids sleep through the night like rocks because of this book.

At least, those are the lessons I think I learned.

No Bad Kids: Toddler Discipline Without Shame - Janet Lansbury

I lost respect for Feminists back when Bill Clinton was president . Two women brought sexual harassment cases against him. Even back then the feminist were saying we always have to believe the women in these cases. Until it was Bill Clinton and then Gloria Steinem and other feminist sided with the Clinton's

I am not a right wing conservative, But over the years I have seen feminist turn their back on a lot of women simply because they did not like their politics.

​

I agree with you that men's issues have been completely ignored and if you are a man and you speak up you are a misogynist. Some great books and a movie you might be interested in

​

The Boy Crisis

https://www.amazon.com/Boy-Crisis-Boys-Struggling-About/dp/1942952716

​

Men on Strike

American society has become anti-male. Men are sensing the backlash and are consciously and unconsciously going “on strike.” They are dropping out of college, leaving the workforce and avoiding marriage and fatherhood at alarming rates. The trend is so pronounced that a number of books have been written about this “man-child” phenomenon, concluding that men have taken a vacation from responsibility simply because they can. But why should men participate in a system that seems to be increasingly stacked against them?

https://www.amazon.com/Men-Strike-Boycotting-Marriage-Fatherhood/dp/1594037620/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1537219858&sr=1-1&keywords=men+on+strike

​

The movie " The Red Pill" I think it is on Amazon

Here's a good book on it. Written by a guy that was a prolific male feminist in the 70's.

His list:

What is the boy crisis?

• It’s a crisis of education. Worldwide, boys are 50 percent less likely than girls to meet basic proficiency in reading, math, and science.
  
  
• It’s a crisis of mental health. ADHD is on the rise. And as boys become young men, their suicide rates go from equal to girls to six times that of young women.
  
  
• It’s a crisis of fathering. Boys are growing up with less-involved fathers and are more likely to drop out of school, drink, do drugs, become delinquent, and end up in prison.
  
  
• It’s a crisis of purpose. Boys’ old sense of purpose—being a warrior, a leader, or a sole breadwinner—are fading. Many bright boys are experiencing a “purpose void,” feeling alienated, withdrawn, and addicted to immediate gratification.
  
  So, what is The Boy Crisis? A comprehensive blueprint for what parents, teachers, and policymakers can do to help our sons become happier, healthier men, and fathers and leaders worthy of our respect.
  
  https://www.amazon.com/Boy-Crisis-Boys-Struggling-About/dp/1942952716?SubscriptionId=AKIAILSHYYTFIVPWUY6Q&tag=duckduckgo-d-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1942952716

These are a couple books/resources I found most helpful:

https://www.amazon.com/Heading-Home-Your-Newborn-Reality/dp/1581108931

https://www.amazon.com/Your-Baby-Child-Birth-Five/dp/0375712038

https://www.amazon.com/Your-Baby-Speaking-You-Behaviors/dp/0547242956

https://www.healthychildren.org/English/Pages/default.aspx

https://www.circleofsecurityinternational.com/

https://www.marchofdimes.org/nursing/modnemedia/othermedia/states.pdf (This is a great explanation of newborn states of arousal. However, I think the information at the end about co-sleeping may be out of date at this point.)

This is my favorite breastfeeding resource. If you are formula feeding, the AAP book as well as Penelope Leach's book both have good guidance. Formula fed babies, like breastfed babies, should be fed on cue/demand, and allowed to determine their feeding volume and schedule. https://education.possumsonline.com/programs/gestalt-breastfeeding-online-program

http://www.zerotothree.org is a great reference for normal development and milestones.

This is a great read about co-regulation, or the process of how babies and children learn to self-regulate:

https://fpg.unc.edu/sites/fpg.unc.edu/files/resources/reports-and-policy-briefs/Co-RegulationFromBirthThroughYoungAdulthood.pdf

Lots of people hate on Ferber, but his book Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems has good information on sleep cycles. You don't necessarily have to implement all his techniques, although in some circumstances they are useful.

There are a lot of different soothing techniques out there. The Happiest Baby on the Block covers the basics. Most newborns like to be held flexed with firm touch. They like movement. They like to be close to another human. They like access to their hands. A baby who is in a frantic or crying state (see the march of dimes link) often needs help to come back down to a quiet alert or drowsy state, and soothing by an adult caregiver can be the key. You don't necessarily have to soothe them all the way into sleep, though, especially as a newborn. Sometimes just getting them calm and drowsy is enough that they can do the rest. In addition, a baby who is crying too frantically will have a hard time latching on to a breast or bottle so it is a good idea to feed before they become frantic since it can be difficult to soothe them if they are frantic with hunger. However, even offering a pacifier or finger to suck on, gently bouncing, or holding them can help them get calm enough to eat.

Hitting is not good for kids or pets. It is how many were raised, so most people default to what they know, but that doesn't mean we can't learn better ways. There are many books on dogs and kids that can explain better why corporeal punishment is detrimental in the long run (Nurture Shock is a good one on kids, and others have listed good dog books).

Generally, dogs and young kids don't get the concept of the correlation between what they did and the punishment (it just makes them hand-shy), and kids that are old enough to get the concept are old enough to discipline in other ways.

Ideas:

1. Have kiddo watch Signing Time on Netflix. It is an amazing show that will help with his language development. No guilt.
   
   
2. Get the book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023 Our 2 year old sleeps from 5pm to 7am every day, and our 6 month old just started doing the same thing with only one wake up overnight. There are, of course, several naps throughout the day. Yes, my son and daughter sleep around 14 hours each night and with naps they sleep a total of around 17 (2 yo) to 18-20 (6mo) hours PER DAY. More kid sleeping time means more relax time for mommy and you.
   
   
3. Give her every Friday night off. Tell her to get out of the house. Find a friend of hers, make plans if you have to, send her to dinner or a movie or SOMETHING.
   
   
4. Do you have a spare room? Arrange to let a nanny live rent free (room and board) in exchange for assistance 20-30 hours a week.
   
   
5. Pick a whole WEEK where each person is on overnight duty. One week you are on duty. You feed little one every time. Next week she is on duty. I read a study that showed doing this week by week made a HUGE difference in the amount of sleep each partner got and their ability to function. Do not take "no" for an answer here. She needs to be able to sleep. Have her pump her breastmilk into bottles and so you can help feed the little one overnight that way.
   
   
6. Do you have a spare room? Put the baby in there immediately. My wife was unable to sleep with our baby in our bedroom because when she made the tiniest noise it would wake my wife up. Putting the baby in the other room allowed both of them to sleep MUCH better.
   
   
7. Is she depressed? Post Partum Depression is real. My wife got put on some meds and it made a world of difference. (For the record, I am anti-meds unless it's really necessary ... and these were amazing.) Have her talk to a doctor, it can improve her quality of life DRAMATICALLY.
   
   Divorce doesn't seem like a wise option. Are you going to take care of the kids? Don't be silly!

This unfortunate NYT bestselling author: http://www.amazon.com/Nurture-Assumption-Children-Revised-Updated/dp/1439101655

There's a really good weekly show called The HighWire with Del Bigtree that is presented by one of the producers of Vaxxed. It is quite well produced and I can't think of a better way to get familiarized with the anti-vaccination side than to watch some of the shows.

For example:

Del Bigtree interview with Al Jazeera

interview with Andy Wakefield


It's also important to realize that the reason so many people - especially parents - have come to question the safety of vaccines is because they have seen first hand one of their children get injured after receiving a vaccine. Most of them will freely admit that until that point, they had no reason to question things and were quite happily following the CDC vaccine schedule. So to understand why this is such a large movement, it's really useful to read or watch some of the testimonials of these parents.

written parent's testimonials

video interviews

2 particularly heart wrenching interviews:

The McDowell triplets in Michigan

Gardasil (HPV vaccine) injury


If you want a couple of book recommendations:

How to End the Autism Epidemic by J.B. Handley

Unvaccinated: Why growing numbers of parents are choosing natural immunity for their children by Forrest Maready

Vaccine Epidemic


Some articles:

No, the Safety of the CDC’s Routine Childhood Vaccine Schedule Has NOT Been Scientifically Demonstrated

RFK, Jr article

Confessions of the Vaccine-Educated

As far as preventing, this is the roadmap. It's telling that the media never covers this kind of information -- https://www.amazon.com/Rampage-Social-Roots-School-Shootings/dp/0465051049

Toilet Training in Less Than a Day was originally designed for the developmentally disabled.

One I liked was Brain Rules for Baby: How to Raise a Smart and Happy Child from Zero to Five by John Medina. He makes a point of using information that is supported by multiple studies.

There's also Bright From The Start and The Science of Parenting, both of which had helpful scientific information.

Thank you! And, great question! I have several thoughts on this:

1. Barter and trade is alive and well in our community and I've heard from other parents that this can be a great way to secure "free" lessons for kids. I did a recent post on this with FW reader suggestions on how they barter for their kids' lessons/sports.
   
   
2. Stuff for kids is (fortunately) cheaper out here in rural VT than it was in the big city.
   
   
3. She will learn early on that we don't get everything we want in life and that she'll need to prioritize.
   
   
4. One of the reasons we're FI is that we pick and choose the stuff we want to spend our money on. Paying for Babywoods to take classes she wants to take will be one of those values-based spending priorities.
   
   
5. I'm very much of the 'Simplicity Parenting' mindset (I highly recommend the book!!), which adheres to the notion that kids thrive on unstructured time during which they're allowed to explore/play/discover independently--especially in nature!
   
   My approach to parenting evolves as Babywoods grows, but it always retains the lens of frugality and simplicity because I believe this approach yields tremendous dividends for not only our finances, but also the way we like to live our life.

Babies are resilient. Don't get too worked up on making sure everything is perfect. When your baby is an infant, make sure you are taking care of yourselves; a frazzled, sleep-deprived parent isn't what your baby need.

As your child grows, don't over-protect them and don't do for them what they can do for themselves. Sure they'll get a few bumps along the way but they will grow into a much more confident and secure person.

DO NOT, I repeat, do not read the book "What to Expect in Your First Year". We got that one, as well as "What to Expect When You're Expecting" as gifts. They should be called: "What Are All The Extremely Unlikely, Horrible Things That Could Possibly Go Wrong"

On the other hand, I highly recommend: NurtureShock. It is not specifically about infants but it does have a chapter that discusses the latest research on the downside of the "Baby Einstein" type videos. Also, it is full of advice for every stage of development from baby through adolescence. Sure wish I had it 10 years ago.

This is such a hugely controversial topic that I hope you don't get the "How could you let your child cry??" responses. But for me personally, I read the book "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" and it helped me tremendously. It explains the science behind the whole concept of sleep training and my soon to be 4 year old daughter has been sleeping great since she was 6 months old. It started off rocky, like you're experiencing and I would literally turn off the monitor and go to the other side of the house so I wouldn't have to hear it. But eventually all the crying started to taper off. She never woke up angry with me. As soon as I saw her smile, I knew that there was no resentment. After a week or so, she'd cry for maybe 5-10 minutes before a nap. Usually at night she wouldn't cry at all. Quickly after that, she started sleeping through the night (once my Dr. said it was ok to drop the middle of the night feeding) because she had learned to put herself to sleep which allowed her to fall back asleep. Since then, we've had very few troubles with sleeping even when we travel or when her schedule gets thrown off. I fully credit sleep training for that. I wish you the very best!

For anyone else saving this for future reference I'd like to add Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child to your reading list.

We did gentle CIO the first time and it worked great, but as Dr. Weissbluth points out in the book all kinds of stuff happens (vacations, colds, dropping a nap) where you kind of have to start again, although it's far easier each progressive time. I've reread sections of that book a dozen times and each time they make the process far smoother.

CIO is so hard, but truly my baby is happier and more alert when she gets good sleep. It IS for her benefit and it's probably far harder on me than it is on her.

How old is your child? Can you think of specific situations you have struggled with?

First, full disclosure. I'm not a parent, but I am wrestling with this myself while waiting to adopt an infant. I am also acting as a pseudo secondary mother to my teenage sister who is still under the thumb of our nmom. The work for the former, in conjunction with facing issues with nmom head on, has resulted in a huge difference with my sister. I used to perpetuate my mom's abuses, but since then an increase in empathy, patience and respect for autonomy has made all the difference. Situationally it looks different with younger kids, but it comes from the same place.


YMMV of course, but thus far our philosophy can be boiled down to a few core elements:

• Children are immature yet whole beings, entitled to every bit of respect that adults are entitled to
  
  
• Discipline means literally "to teach." Discipline =/= punishment, humiliation, or shame
  
  
• We "work with" instead of "do to"
  
  
• Parenting is the gradual process of perpetually stepping back
  
  
  Of my giant stack of books, I'd recommend:
  
  
• Unconditional Parenting by Alfie Kohn Resource on gentle parenting. Heavily cited and supported by evidence. Also see The Myth of the Spoiled Child.
  
  
• Parenting from the Inside Out by Daniel Siegel Addresses attachment theory, how it effects brain development, how childhood attachment style and trauma effects your parenting as an adult, and how to work with it. Also key is the difference between enmeshing yourself in your child's feelings vs guiding them through them.
  
  
• No Drama Discipline by Daniel Siegel I haven't read this yet, but I'm a fan of Siegel, so...
  
  
• How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber This is a classic, very readable. Gives concrete strategies, and walks through practical scenarios. Discusses natural consequences vs purely punitive measures.
  
  
  If you're a busy parent who doesn't have time to read, I highly recommend this Siegel playlist about attachment and this video about communication and boundaries. Those two will probably lead you down a pretty decent youtube rabbit hole.
  
  Good luck!

I want to encourage you and say your CPTSD won’t affecting your parenting and you providing her with love and security is enough, but I also don’t want to delude you into a false sense of security. To answer your question as to how I do it: Firstly, I put in a massive amount of effort everyday to keep myself grounded and mindful and conscious of how I’m acting/reacting towards my child. On top of that, I never let myself slip into depressive states. On top of that, I have learned to manage and control all of my triggers so that my emotional states never negatively affect my child.


One major element of CPTSD is that it is an attachment disorder. This attachment disorder WILL affect your ability to provide a consistent sense of safety and security to your little one unless you learn how to manage and counteract those insecurities. Another element of CPTSD is that it causes you to develop a distrust/distaste for humans, and a desire to avoid human interaction. This will be absolutely detrimental to your child as he/she ages. All children rely on their parents to provide them with safe, healthy and consistent family and friends. It’s a very tiring and very difficult job, but it creates a ‘safety net’ of security on which your child can lean. How you interact with and value others will turn into how your child interacts with and values others. You will have to spend lots of time around other moms, letting your child play with their child. It’s a strain on you emotionally and mentally, but it’s necessary for healthy child development.


The best advice I can give you as a fellow parent with CPTSD is to start searching for a trauma psychologist and get an appointment scheduled ASAP. Of course anyone can recover from CPTSD without the aid of a psychologist, but when you add a child to the mix, quality and speed of recovery becomes a very important factor. Getting a psychologist to help you process your trauma and learn newer and better ways to do things will save you a lot of time and heartache. A psychologist will also teach you the importance of obtaining and maintaining friendships, and how to better manage all the triggers that parenting will bring up for you.

In the meantime, here is a short list of my all-time favorite parenting books. I’ve read probably hundreds of parenting books at this point: most are bad, a few are great. These are the best, most knowledgeable books I’ve found for ‘people like us’, at least in my opinion:

The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering our Children

ParentSpeak: What's Wrong with How We Talk to Our Children--and What to Say Instead

The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child’s Developing Mind

The Parents We Mean To Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children's Moral and Emotional Development

The Attachment Parenting Book : A Commonsense Guide to Understanding and Nurturing Your Baby

No-Drama Discipline: The Whole-Brain Way to Calm the Chaos and Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind


Feel free to PM me anytime :)

The Informed Parent: A Science Based Resource Guide

Your Baby & Child by Penelope Leach

Congrats! Here are my tips . . . (Cut and pasted from another post.)

1. Stay positive - your attitude/outlook can really make a difference :)
   
   
2. Watch (don't read/or read after watching) The Happiest Baby on the Block film (see below.)
   
   
3. I see you are a reader - I felt like after reading the below books and listening to my parent friends' experiences, I was prepared for almost everything pregnancy and the first couple years of parenthood threw at me (I learn best from reading, and this was just my personal method that worked for me in making confident and informed decisions, or figuring out where to go for more research) - I know a lot of people don't learn best this way/get frustrated trying to implement something really specific if it doesn't work for their baby, rather than just taking pieces of everything they've heard/read about and adapting it to work for them.)
   
   These helped me make better decisions because they presented me with many options to try for trial and error, or good jumping off points for further research. I have honestly never had a "what do I do now?!" parenting moment because I have read so much that I have back up plans in my pocket if the first thing I try doesn't work. I have also never had any of the struggles with my son that a lot of people have around sleeping, eating, behavior, etc. and while I know some of that is because we have a healthy kid, I truly believe a lot of it comes from being an informed parent who explores all the options and tries the ones that have the most evidence for working well in combination with what feels right for me and my family.
   
   I tried to just list the neutral/middle of the road books that are fun and/or give enough indepth information on most sides of an issue to be a great jumping off point for exploring particular parenting styles, options, etc.
   
   In no particular order:
   
   

• Bringing up Bebe - Tells the parenting story of an American expat. living in Paris, and how she observed different parenting techniques between American and French families, and how that plays out in children's behavior. It is a fun "experience" story and I think it lends some interesting insights.
  
  
• Pregnancy, childbirth, and the newborn - I think this is the most informative, neutral, pregnancy book out there. It really tries to present all sides of any issues. I can't recommend this book enough. From here, you could explore the options that best fit your needs (e.g. natural birth, etc.)
  
  
• Taking Charge of Your Fertility - Look into this if you find you are having trouble conceiving, or if you want to conceive right away. Really great tips on monitoring the body to pinpoint the most fertile times and stay healthy before becoming pregnant.
  
  
• The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding - This is published by Le Leche League and really has everything you need to know about breastfeeding, pumping, etc. After baby is born, kellymom.com is a good resource for quickly referring to for breastfeeding questions later, but seriously don't skip this book - it is great!
  
  
• Dr. Spock's Baby and Childcare - Really comprehensive and probably the most widely read book about every aspect of child health and development (and also a lot of what to expect as parents.)
  
  
• NurtureShock - by far the most interesting book I've ever read in my life. Basically sums up research on child development to illuminate how many parents and educators ignore research based evidence on what works well for raising children. If you read nothing else in this book, at least read the sleep chapter!
  
  
• What's Going on in There? - This book was written by a neuroscientist after becoming a mom about brain development from pregnancy through about age 5. It has some of the same research as NurtureShock but goes way more in depth. I found it fascinating, but warning, I could see how it could scare some people with how much detail it goes into (like how many people feel that "What to Expect When Expecting" is scary.)
  
  
• Happiest Baby on the Block - There is a book, but really you can/should just watch the DVD. It has 5 very specific techniques for calming a fussy baby. Here are some recent reddit comments about it. Someday I will buy Dr. Karp a drink - love that man!
  
  
• The Wholesome Baby Food Guide - this book is based on a website which has some of the same information, but the book goes way more in depth about how to introduce food, with particular steps, to set baby up for a lifetime of good (non picky) eating habits.
  
  
• A variety of sleep books, so you can decide which method you might be comfortable with (I believe the Baby Whisperer and Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child are pretty middle of the road, but you can look into bedsharing (The Dr. Sear's books) or the other end (Babywise) as discussed in other comments already here, etc. - these last two links I am letting my personal bias show - sorry, but I just think it is good to know all sides of an issue.)
  
  
• Huffington Post Parents section often has "experience" articles, and browsing subs like this can help with that too.
  
  
• A lot of people love the Bill Cosby Fatherhood book too, but my husband and I haven't read it, so I can't say for sure what is in it, but I imagine it is "experiences" based
  
  
• The Wonder Weeks - describes when and how babies reach developmental milestones, what to expect from those, and how to help your baby with them.

One of the chapters in Nurtureshock.

>I don’t regret having one, just extremely ashamed of being sexual and communicating it to girls and also showing it to the world. Attracting girls’ attention and whatnot isn’t very hard but progressing things to dating, holding hands and eventually sex is impossible. I can’t even call them or message them on Facebook or Whatsapp because I just feel like an idiot for doing so. Making a move in clubs and bars is also difficult although I once got close to leaving with a girl but she didn't want to. I got made fun of a lot growing up for not having a girlfriend and this made me feel like i do not deserve one. It doesn't matter if I've got the green light to go ahead I just feel really ashamed do it. Even something like looking at a fit girl wearing a short skirt makes me feel bad for checking her out and that I shouldn’t be doing it.


I know what you mean. I've been there myself, but even when I was there I was entirely self-aware of my shame and I was skeptical of the validity of my emotional reactions; I realized they were ingrained. Being aware of your emotional reactions allows you to be emotionally proactive. Your sex-negative problem is mostly an emotional issue, and not much else, right? I've been there. I wouldn't doubt that you are also decent looking and have both latent and actualized social skills. Most intelligent introverts have a lot of potential to be who they want to be because they know themselves more deeply than others. You must use your introverted nature to your advantage and recognize the differences in others and yourself. In all honesty, there are an infinite number of unwritten rules; everyone's abstract/emotional logic is different. Many of them are foundational and predictable, however; including yours and mine. Like anything else, being emotionally predictable is not a black/white issue. It is a grey area, and you have to balance your reliability with creativity.


Being made fun of for not having a girlfriend is just as sexist as being made fun of for not having a boyfriend; gender equal too. Were you ever shamed for not having a boyfriend? It's clearly a matter of groupthink and extroverted style; not for everyone. Dating relationships, for extroverts especially, are often attention-getting and showy. They wear their relationships like trophies won. Usually introverts prefer a more private relationship because they have less social desire and are often shamed because of it. Introverts are “themselves” more often in private. Extroverts are “themselves” more often in public. There is no shame deserved either way, regardless of popular opinion. Both styles have their strengths and weaknesses, and you should try to introject some of the traits that you enjoy in others; regardless of type. That is how you become balanced.


>I’m receiving counselling from a pastor who advocates the whole “no sex before marriage” thing and believes that people should only date to get married and sex is only for making kids which is stupid IMO because I do not plan on getting married anytime soon.


Counseling from a Catholic pastor? Watch out, that is one of the most notorious sex-negative societies out there. They own the abstinence-only charade while they parade horribles. Marriage is not the answer to anything; it is an institution of the state. Anything else attached is sentimental.


If you haven't already, I recommend doing an in-depth study of animal sexual behaviors; especially the most intelligent animals. All animals have sex for pleasure, but some animals are only driven to have sex at certain times of the year; humans are on a 24/7 system.


>I’ve tried the no fap route and gotten very high days counts but that hasn’t really helped me at all.


Sexual frustration doesn't help anyone. If you are mindful, then you can use your libido to further your goals, but it is not an all-cure.


>Got any sources to help overcome sex-negative perspectives? I’m interested in recreational sex not baby making sex.


Absolutely. I recommend starting with actual sex science and learning about male and female psychology and neurology. Then work your way into reading about sex culture. You should also study developmental psychology as you will probably need the clinical context in order to objectively self-evaluate your childhood influences; it is necessary for self-therapy. The best therapy will always be self-therapy; no one will ever know you better than yourself.


Evolutionary Science and Morals Philosophy:

The Selfish Gene

The Moral Landscape

The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

Justice: What's The Right Thing To Do?


Sex Psychology, Science, and Neurology:

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex

The Female Brain

The Male Brain

Why Men Want Sex and Women Need Love

What Do Women Want

Why Women Have Sex: Understanding Sexual Motivations from Adventure to Revenge (and Everything in Between)

Sex: The world's favorite pastime fully revealed


Behavioral Psychology and Abstract Economics:

How Pleasure Works

Freakonomics

Quiet: The Power of Introverts In A World That Can't Stop Talking

Thinking Fast And Slow

We Are All Weird


Developmental Psychology:

Nurture Shock

Hauntings: Dispelling The Ghosts That Run Our Lives


Empathy Building:


Half The Sky

The House On Mango Street

Me Before You

The Fault In Our Stars

Also check out James Hollis' Understanding The Psychology of Men lecture if you can find it.



Movies: XXY, Tom Boy, Dogtooth, Shame, Secretary, Nymphomaniac, Juno, Beautiful Creatures, and The Man From Earth.



All of these things are related, but it is up to you to make the connections; pick and choose which material suits your interests best. These are the things that came to mind first, and they have all influenced my perspectives.

One of the best books regarding debunking popular parenting myths:

Nurture Shock, by Bronson and Merryman
http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303248620&sr=8-1

It highlights the importance of effort vs. talent, and much more. One of my favs is stressing that the brain is like a muscle, regularly working it strengthens intelligence. Kids need to work on being smart~

Awesome book for any parent.

There's a good chapter in NurtureShock about that. It mostly tells you what you already know about the adverse effects of praise, but also goes a bit into keeping an eye out for and rewarding effort.

Video games by themselves? Absolutely not. They are at most a secondary problem. The real crisis behind these mass shootings is [The Boy Crisis] (https://www.amazon.com/Boy-Crisis-Boys-Struggling-About/dp/1942952716). This is probably the most under utilized research in the country right now. With the exception of San Bernardino, every mass shooting over the last 50 years has been carried out by a male, mostly younger males as well. Dr. Warren Farrell deserves a Presidential Medal of Freedom for this work and he’s showing us that we have a rather recent crisis on our hands that’s hitting boys and younger men of any and every background like a disease. We have far too many young men lost in this world and fatherless or without a sense of family and community. It’s a complete and total crisis that goes well beyond video games or gun control. My grandson is 22 and he plays every shooting game you could imagine. However, he’s a well balanced young man who’s father taught him what it really means to be a man. We also have a crisis in our communities where the service organizations I grew up with are depleted and [losing members quickly] (https://wotsmqt.com/service-clubs-dying/). So to stop myself from rambling any further, no it’s the fault of the video gamer or the gun owner but those things obviously can become a problem when used by a young man who’s suffering and has no guidance.

I'm sure you're getting great advice. I just wanted to put forward a book suggestion that helped my family immensely. Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child.

The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents


The second has an unfortunate title to share with a parent but it’s really good insight into emotional development.

for an excellent read on this subject try http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1451644183/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1382565522&sr=1-1&keywords=the+war+against+boys

There is absolutely some nonsense going on with vaccines. My momma always said the truth is somewhere in the middle, and that's probably the case here, too. But here's my theory on why this is happening right now:

1. This book came out in the fall that points to a whole lot of links between vaccines and autism. https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248
   
   
2. The movie Vaxxed details how Dr Thompson was a whistleblower in the CDC, admitting they covered up data showing a link between MMR and autism in African Americans boys. You can watch Vaxxed free this week here http://vaxxedthemovie.com/24hourvaxxed/
   
   
3. Dr Zimmerman a PRO VAX CDC EXPERT admitted vaccines can cause autism. He was subsequently fired and not allowed to be their expert witness anymore. https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/425061-how-a-pro-vaccine-doctor-reopened-debate-about-link-to-autism
   
   Some people think all of this is easily explained away. But there is a whole lot of smoke.
   
   
   ETA my only conspiracy-type-thought is that maybe there's another bombshell about to drop and they want to get as many people vaccinated as possible before that. Maybe it's something to do with Merck being sued for falsifying the data on mumps efficacy for their MMR. https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/lawrence-solomon/merck-whistleblowers_b_5881914.html

I've found that reading a few books with different viewpoints helps. You'll be able to get a big picture of things and get ideas for what would work for you.

I only have a 2 year old, so I'll follow this thread for sure to see other recs. I've read Lansbury's No Bad Kids: Toddler Discipline Without Shame , and Ive also read the "Taming your Toddler" chapters of The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems: Sleeping, Feeding, and Behavior--Beyond the Basics from Infancy Through Toddlerhood.

I've got some problems with both books, but Ive also taken good points from both and made use of them.

https://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427/

You must read this book

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1501125427/ref=pd_aw_sim_14_3?ie=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=8ZE1KBX66DPZTY1HR3J6&dpPl=1&dpID=51l6k66X5%2BL

70% of autism cases are profound, meaning they need assistance and can't function on their own

Your anecdotal experience with a mild case of autism sounds like a variation of the vaccine quack talking point that autism is just some mild social awkwardness

People aren't born with autism

Autism is induced, by things like Rubella infection / CRS

There's a best selling book entitled "How to end the autism epidemic"

https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248

Did vaccines cause your brain damage? Or did something else cause your brain damage ?

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/vaccines-autism-and-brain-damage-whats-in-a-name/

I'm a vegetarian. But I don't have qualms with eating locally grown fish/livestock on rare occasion. So maybe! If I'm ever over there. Also, great response.


This book may be of interest to you btw: http://www.amazon.com/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062/ref=cm_lmf_tit_1

Address the root cause, not the symptom. They have misunderstood science, the scientific method and sprinkled conspiracy theory on top. They probably harbor a distrust in science as a whole.
Luckily for you, the topic at hand is more accessible to laymen than physics; it's introductory philosophy of science, but you can avoid the academic jargon.

You have to establish trust in science first. Questions you need to raise and discuss are (in no particular order):

• what is science and what is it not? (I.e., what is pseudo-science and demarcation)
  
• what is the scientific method?
  
• what counts as evidence? (Also evidence levels, from opinion to randomized controlled trials for instance).
  
• what counts as proof?
  
• whose burden is it to provide evidence or proof?
  
• what is research? (Present them an actual paper, many have never seen one. Take for instance one by Einstein, LIGO's gravitational waves or why not Angela Merkel).
  
• where is research? (Present them to journals, etc.)
  
• peer review
  
• how can we trust science?
  
  Obviously you need to learn these topics first. Use a book on philosophy of science or equivalent. In my country it happens to be a mandatory very short course for all engineers.
  
  How you go about introducing these topics to them depends on their personality. You can discuss IRL, motivating them to take a course or, if they'll read it, give them an book such as the one above or something simpler. Regarding conspiracy there are plenty of fun books, especially on self-delusion, like How we know what isn't so or You are not so smart. The latter is also a podcast.
  
  In general avoid using youtube as a source, but if they won't listen to anything else there's a ton of videos raising the topics above, see the veritasium channel for instance.
  

Oh hon, I feel you. This gets me because I felt the same way. I still do. I have a 19 month old toddler.

Start here: Parenting from the Inside Out.

This book will really help you decipher your family, and really give you hope and tools for not reproducing their problems onto your little beauty of a tiny awesome person.

It's pretty straightforward and incredibly useful.

Then read this and this. Yes read them while you're pregnant because again they will give you hope and insight.

Buy this book and start reading it now too. We call it the Baby Bible in our house.

It's a survival manual for the first year of their life. It has everything. I don't know how many times we've pulled it down and flipped to the index at 2:00 am. It's better than Google. It's fantastic. (That said, it has an angle like all parenting books, even though it tries not to. They are attachment parenting writers. Nothing wrong with attachment parenting per se, just an awareness all parenting books have angles, even the impartial ones.)

Also, if you're anything like me, avoid all the happy, glowing, blowing-stardust-and-glitter-up-your-ass, pregnancy books out there. These did nothing but enrage me. I'm talking about What to Expect and similar. Unless you like stardust and bullshit, avoid avoid avoid.

Basically if you go to a thrift store and there's 8 copies of the damn pregnancy or parenting book on the shelf, don't buy it.

Instead check out books like this and this and this.

Now I haven't read those exact books, unlike all my other recommendations above, all of which I've personally read as a scared, overwhelmed pregnant lady or new mom. But as long as you stay in the 'brutally honest' lane and away from the 'syrupy sweet, guilt laden, shame' lane, then you'll be fine.

Even in 2019 there's a mountain of mommy advice bullshit books out there. Keep your instincts and your wits about you, don't forget who you are. Stay strong. And work on yourself with books like Parenting from the Inside Out and the How to Talk books.

Parents are responsible for their childrens behavior. This could be a blind spot preventing you from holding your own parents accountable. If you can't emotionally understand this you wont logically understand this following argument.

If a parent needs to get their children to do something or not to do something out of fear of punishment then it's not a relationship. It's dictatorship and you'll never get respect or compliance from your children when you act like you know what's best for them - and this is the reason why abuse escalates.

It's the parents responsibility to teach their children right and wrong by talking and listening to them, helping them understand, and ultimately modelling that behaviour themselves.

Before you have children, it's important to work on yourself because everything you experienced as a child from abusive parents thats lingering in your unconscious will come to the surface when you have your own children.

It seems you area already projecting some of this by thinking experimentation like smoking in the room or lying about homework is bad. Wouldn't it be better to foster a relationship where your children can you tell they tried a cigarette or don't want to do their homework? That way you can actually be involved in their lives.

If you raise your children correctly I wouldn't worry about most bad activities because you'll give them the skills to know better. The science shows that addictions, victim of bullying and peer pressure are all caused by child abuse and an unstable home. If you want to know more about this look up Gabor Mate (I have more resources).

Actually as children get older they become easier to parent when you raise them peacefully and being involved because you have built up a relationship.

Here are books I'd recommend:
Why Love Matters: How Affection Shapes a Baby's Brain
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Love-Matters-Affection-Shapes/dp/1583918175

The Drama of the Gifted Child: The Search for the True Self http://www.amazon.com/Drama-Gifted-Child-Search-Revised/dp/0465016901

The Truth Will Set You Free: Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self http://www.amazon.com/Truth-Will-Set-You-Free/dp/0465045855[2]

For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence http://www.amazon.com/Your-Own-Good-Child-Rearing-Violence/dp/0374522693[3]

Stefan Molyneux: Real-Time Relationships: The Logic of Love http://www.freedomainradio.com/free/books/FDR_3_PDF_Real_Time_Relationships.pdf

On Truth: The Tyranny of Illusion http://board.freedomainradio.com/blogs/freedomain/archive/2008/09/11/book-on-truth-the-tyranny-of-illusion.aspx

Between Parent and Child: The Bestselling Classic That Revolutionized Parent-Child Communication http://www.amazon.com/Between-Parent-Child-Revolutionized-Communication/dp/0609809881

Playful Parenting http://www.amazon.com/Playful-Parenting-Lawrence-J-Cohen/dp/0345442865

Unconditional Parenting http://www.amazon.com/Unconditional-Parenting-Moving-Rewards-Punishments/dp/0743487486

Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves http://www.naomialdort.com/book.html

Parent Effectiveness Training http://www.amazon.com/Parent-Effectiveness-Training-Responsible-Children/dp/0609806939

The Philosophical Baby: What Children's Minds Tell Us About Truth, Love, and the Meaning of Life http://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Baby-Childrens-Minds-Meaning/dp/0374231966

What's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Going-There-Brain-Develop/dp/0553378252

Becoming the Kind Father: A Son's Journey http://www.amazon.com/Becoming-Kind-Father-Sons-Journey/dp/0865715823

Connection Parenting http://connectionparenting.com/connection-parenting-book.html

Another book that has a strikingly similar philosophy is Playful Parenting by Dr. Lawrence Cohen. It basically takes this approach to "discipline" and combines it with playful ways of helping kids work through their negative feelings.

"Brain Rules for Babies" by John Medina may be of interest to you. I haven't read "Expecting Better," but based on the blurb it seems the two books have similar goals: providing peer-reviewed information and avoiding the propagation of myths.


At the beginning of my pregnancy, I worried I wasn't doing enough to optimize fetal development. There's so much information to be found on pregnancy and child care, I kept wondering, "Which advice should I follow? What helps and what hinders?" It was overwhelming! I'm a FTM, and I've never been around babies, so I was clueless. The pregnancy chapter in "Brain Rules" really simplified it for me: take care of yourself physically and mentally and let the fetus do it's thing. The book continues to cover relationships, brain development, emotional development, and moral development with similar clarity.


I have a few other books such as "What to Expect the First Year" but I just keep them around for reference, haven't actually read all the way through them. Other books I've considered buying are "Mind in the Making" and "NurtureShock."

2 months is too young to 'sleep train', but they're never to young for you to train yourself how to help them sleep :). We read this book "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" by Dr. Weissbluth

http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1425928308&sr=8-1&keywords=healthy+sleep+habits+happy+child

It starts from birth and talks all about how important sleep is, how to recognize tired cues, how to get your baby to sleep, etc. So its 'sleep training' but its not 'cry it out'. But really your 2 month old may not go more than 3-4 hrs during the night at this stage.

I would also like to recommend "How We Know What Isn't So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday Life" - From a footnote in one of Sagan\Dawkins\Hitchens' works, can't remember who exactly. Good book

http://www.amazon.com/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062

It's hard to make sense of the world without an understanding of basic science and statistics. Our brains are constantly looking for patterns and associations. We make a large number of correct observations, but also a good number of false ones. Rejecting a false observations relies on our rational thinking to overcome our emotional response. If you have a child who gets a bunch of vaccines, and two months later start to exhibit signs of autism, your first instinct is probably to blame the vaccine. Your baby is fine before hand, and not okay afterwards. It's only be going back and testing this observation in a scientific manner can we determine if this is an anomaly, or factual. Before you dismiss these people, look at how many irrational beliefs you harbor. Do you believe that basketball players have hot streaks? Clutch hitting in baseball?

A good book about perceptual biases, etc:

http://www.amazon.com/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062

I'm currently reading this, heh. Figured it's one way I could prepare myself in dealing with patients.

Congratulations! Parenting is a learn as you go excercise (every child is different), so I will not offer advice. However, we found the baby book useful.

Also, please read up on febrile seizures. This is not to alarm you, but it is the one thing the wife and I wish we were better informed about. Febrile seizures are not a big deal and have no lasting effects, but can be a bit nerve wracking if you're unprepared.

My LO is only 10 weeks old so I haven't experienced this yet. But my mom was a serious screamer with no temper control so I've been worrying.

Two books have helped:

• no drama discipline: https://www.amazon.com/No-Drama-Discipline-Whole-Brain-Nurture-Developing/dp/034554806X
  
  
• how to talk so kids will listen and listen so kids will talk: https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Talk-Kids-Will-Listen/dp/1848123094

I'm sorry, I don't want to impose, but how can you even interact with this person in any capacity anymore? I'm wondering if she's still being abusive (just not physically anymore) and that you're not recognizing it?

This story goes beyond the typical (but still horrible) N-abuse that gets posted here. I know we're not here to decide who had it worse, but I think in your case, it's important that you know this is far worse treatment than most if not all that I've read on this sub in the last 6 months. She could easily have killed you. I'm not exaggerating.

Please consider reading For Your Own Good by Alice Miller. It may give you some more perspective.

Book free Preview

Book purchase link

Check out Nurture Shock, whose first chapter goes into this in quite a bit of detail. More good stuff about raising kids to be found throughout.

>it's just that pink princesses who need the approval of men and overbearing female family members to have any self-worth...

No kidding!

I do think some of this is developmental (for ex., the chapter in Nurtureshock on race has some really interesting stuff on how social science research shows kids gravitate to very clear-cut 'us vs them' groups at around your daughter's age). I was discussing the 'princess' thing with some friends who have girls older than mine, and they say their twins & their friends all went through the phase for a couple of years before elementary school, then after awhile all decided the princess stuff was awful and switched to black clothing and tomboy activities (also both phases). So there's at least some reason to think that some parts of this will resolve with time as she matures.

No question, though, that the underlying girls vs boys ideology is disturbing. You can't do anything about your co-parent's living situation or family dynamic, but you can promote your own positive view of a 'girl power' agenda that doesn't put down boys. Maybe you could take the 'girl power' thing and run with it in a direction that fits your values? The site "A Mighty Girl" has reviewed & suggested a lot of toys, books, etc., to promote some positive and more empowered ways of being a girl than simply "I love princesses / boys steal girl power." For starters, you could start working some of that stuff into the book/toy collection you have for your daughter.

I don't have any boy book suggestions, but one book I really enjoyed was The Emotional Life of a Toddler (http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Life-Toddler-Alicia-Lieberman/dp/0028740173) Sorry, can't do fancy pants links.

I also really enjoyed NurtureShock (http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130/ref=sr_1_56?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1369239257&sr=1-56&keywords=science+of+child+development)

Neither of these are parenting books, but really helpful in how you think about parenting and your child.

My doc recommended this book as a manual for new parents. He didn't recommend any other books. It's a bit rambling, but it gets you through the rough patches.

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child

It's my bible. Friends with kids come over and say 'ohmygod that is the best book.' Basically trouble shooting baby sleep for a bunch of different scenarios.

This is our child sleep bible. Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child. Our kids are 5, 4 and 2 and it is still useful.

I'm going to sound like a broken record on this site when it comes to sleeping, but everyone whose ever told me about the sleeping problems of their child gets a copy of "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child."

Here: http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

The problem you have sounds like one our friends were having when the child was seven. The book explains sleep, the importance of sleep, and the evolution of healthy sleep habits that has helped literally everyone I know who has read the book and followed through. Your situation was solved by my friend in seven days after five years of frustration. I personally think her victory came because she was given a very educated explanation of why it would work and she stuck with it. Process was a lot of it, but the real lesson is, stick to what you find working until it works. Don't give up. It may take two weeks, but then you are done forever.

For your particular sleep routine, I believe the book would recommend sitting in a chair right beside the child's bed until they fall asleep. No talking to them, just gentle putting them back in bed when they try to 'escape'; no real interaction other than a gentle 're-tucking-in' to mimic your initial tuck and establish the continuity for later when your child finally gets it.

My friend's child was seven and she sat by the bed 2.5 hours the first night reading (today we would have an ipad and reddit vs. a book, times change). Something quiet and out of sight (and interest) to the child. The next night, she did the same thing for about an hour and a half; less the third and fourth night but I remember her showing amazing resolve for four nights. On the fifth, sixth, and seventh nights respectively, she was staying in the room less and moving the chair closer to the door. Night Eight, she was outside the room with the door cracked for about twenty silent uneventful minutes and the child dozed off. Night nine, she got a good nights sleep and my wife and I got two comp'd airline tickets anywhere in the continental US. Woot!

I have recommended/given this book to perhaps thirty couples. Some get offended at the thought of getting a book to rear a child, but I really champion sleep habits as I've seen the impacts on the families who try the book; the relationships between parent and child and the interpersonal relationships between spouses. We've seen 'tough' children take a toll on everyone involved including grandparents who won't watch the kids and friends who avoid another's house around bedtime, dinner time, eating out, etc. The beauty of the book is the "quick tips" sections at the end of each chapter so you can start in minutes and 'catch up'. We were behind with my first child and literally by the book with our second. We spent a grand total of six nights on developing the sleep habits of two children that are still strong today at ages 8 and 9.

One thing that I hear a lot, and not trying to instigate in anyway, but it is an underlying theme of the book that I observe to be true in all families: "we've tried everything". Children are taught AND parents are taught. The child wants attention at bedtime and that is what you have to be disciplined enough to remove. No interaction. The friend I described above had the oldest child I've known these lessons to work on. He was seven, and I think she had the toughest challenge I've seen and showed the best discipline in 'ignoring' the child. When her child resisted initially, she would firmly and gently hold him in place until he stopped. The woman was a saint.

The "total meltdown" you describe is the payoff for the child. They don't infer victory, but there is an innate need that is fulfilled by that attention and if it never comes, it does subside. Remember that you've been taught how you are going to act at bedtime by your child for two and a half years and it may take a bit of reprogramming for both of you, but each time you stray from the continuity of the lesson, you are actually succeeding in teaching a different lesson. I really hope this helps. You need some rest!! (this will work for /u/underthewisteria as well, I believe) Good luck all!

Babies under 4 months have no set sleep pattern at all. Waking every 2-3 hours at night is perfectly normal. Hell, my son didn't even sleep through the night completely until like 18 months, I think. My daughter started doing it at 1 month, but I think it is because she pretty much didn't nap all day long. Every kid is totally different.

I highly suggest picking up Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. It's a really great book and goes into detail about the sleep habits of kids at various ages, as well as how to get them on a set sleep routine. It was invaluable for my wife and I. 4 months is a good time to start sleep training.

There is a great book about this that has not received enough attention.

Among other things, it talks about how school personnel and community members have a tendency to overlook boy’s signs of distress. A young woman in distress is more apt to be taken care of.

https://www.amazon.com/Rampage-Social-Roots-School-Shootings/dp/0465051049

It’s very well researched and academic as opposed to entertaining but it will answer your question better than I can.

It's actually pretty well-documented and studied.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20305080

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14789949.2015.1054858?journalCode=rjfp20&

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0465051049

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0895032902

Again, nobody gets away with a mass shooting. They're always either caught, killed by police, or kill themselves. They also tend to study other mass shooters, and you only have to spent a few minutes studying to realize how your rampage is going to end.

I couldn’t finish the book. I stopped reading when they recommended locking a 5-yr old in their room during a tantrum, and gave a detailed explanation on how to wedge a blanket just right if you don’t have a lock on the door.

One of the authors, Foster Cline, was a big proponent of attachment therapy, a controversial therapeutic technique that killed a few kids back in the 1980’s and 1990’s.

Personally, I think Love and Logic is dangerous, and if I hear of a parent using their techniques, I would suggest alternative books.

I like Peaceful Parent, Happy Kid, How to Talk so Kids Will Listen, and The Whole Brain Child..

A couple of thoughts:

1. Quit telling her that she's doing a good job. Tell her instead "you're working hard at that." For a gifted toddler, their vision of what they want will never ever be as good as they can create. You want her to learn that it's about the process, not the product. You really want to avoid praising her for being "smart" (and having others do the same) when she starts school. Read Carol Dweck's work on growth mindset: https://www.mindsetworks.com/parents/default\
   
2. Figure out YOUR boundaries and then when you set them, be firm. Smart kids who can win arguments with you as toddlers NEED clear boundaries that you enforce no matter how hard they tantrum. Like typical 2-5 year olds, they're trying to figure out how the world works. If it works differently on different days or differently if they tantrum vs. not, then they are very unsettled and the unknown makes the world a scary place. I recommend Mary Sheedy Kurcinka's book: Kids, Parents, and Power Struggles. Stanley Greenspan's The Challenging Child also helped me a lot.
   
   1. If dad says no story until something is tidied away and she says "mum can read the book," then your reply is "You need to tidy that away before anyone reads to you." Let the ensuing tantrum happen (see below).
      
   2. For the light example, I'd say "you're right, that one doesn't hurt. What's the difference? Can you always tell the difference? That's why we have to be careful." Not everyone bit of her "defiance" is true defiance. She's trying to figure out the boundaries of her world. She's two and so she's still very very literal. (When my son was two, I told him that all cars had exhaust pipes. He had to check each car we saw for the next week.)
      
3. Give up trying to avoid distress. Instead focus on helping her cope with her distress. I, too, have a super bright, emotionally intense daughter who's now beyond early childhood. She feels deeply, she's easily frustrated, and she has experienced more negative emotions than many other children. I don't want her to feel less, because that's part of who she is. She feels passionately about social justice and is now finally in a position to begin to work with organizations to effect this change.
   
4. Teach your daughter (a) that negative emotions can be withstood and (b) they are not the end of the world. You have to figure out what helps her when she's in distress. For one of my kids, I needed to back off and leave him alone because ANYTHING I did overstimulated him. When he calmed down on his own, we could cuddle and talk. For another, I need to be there to help her calm down (even now as a teen). I would lay down with her on the bed and hum very softly while she sobbed. For helping kids recognize emotions and deal with them, I recommend Dan Siegel's work: The Whole Brain Child and How to Talk So Kids Will Listen by Faber and Mazlish.

How about The Explosive Child by Ross Greene? Focuses on the Collaborative Problem Solving approach (see also www.thinkkids.org), which views temper tantrums as a delay in the development of emotion regulation skills and works on building those skills. Jed Baker's No More Meltdowns is another great option with some similar ideas.

For general parenting -- including dealing with tantrums -- I love How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk by Faber and Mazlish. Dawson and Guare's Smart But Scattered helps with executive functioning skills-development of all types (emotional regulation is an executive function; others include things like organization and planning).

Oh, and I haven't made it all the way through it yet, but The Whole Brain Child has some good ideas on how to talk about distress tolerance with kids, e.g., "surfing the emotional waves."

Here are some links for the product in the above comment for different countries:

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Toilet-Training-Less-Than-Day/dp/0671693808/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1397230837&sr=8-4&keywods=How+to+potty+train

• UK: amazon.co.uk
  
• Spain: amazon.es
  
• France: amazon.fr
  
• Germany: amazon.de
  
• Japan: amazon.co.jp
  
• Canada: amazon.ca
  
• Italy: amazon.it
  
• China: amazon.cn
  
  
  This bot is currently in testing so let me know what you think by voting (or commenting).

FYI you can toilet train at 2, http://www.amazon.com/Toilet-Training-Less-Than-Day/dp/0671693808

If you think about it there is no way that our ancestors were just letting their babies poop everywhere, so training kids not to shit where we sleep can't be that difficult.

Brain rules for baby. Available on audio book.

It's a very academic heavily-sourced, book on parenting techniques, generally advocating authoritative parenting.

As far as schools, visit a few, look at the grounds, and talk to the teachers. Much of what they'll be learning at age three will be social, and whether it be Waldorf or Montessori, they'll mostly be playing with legos and in sand boxes at this age.

Structured play is great. Pretend time is great. If you can set up some cardboard boxes, and let him play pirate, that's pretty good for him.

There's plenty of debate on whether stay-at-home parenting is superior to day-care/pre-school, but suffice to say that it depends on the kid and both are totally viable options depending on your circumstance.

It's not serious to not be fully-potty trained yet, but you should probably get on that, especially considering it limits your preschool options a lot.

There are things called "swim diapers"

use sunscreen, but not spray on

Use shoes in dangerous environments but barefoot is okay on grass and dirt.

A three year old can climb up a play structure just fine all by himself.

Good Luck! :)

The Nurture Assumption by Judith Harris, in case you want to approach human cognitive development from a developmental psychology perspective, and how parenting and peer presence compete in the development of children into adults

https://www.amazon.in/Nurture-Assumption-Children-Revised-Updated/dp/1439101655

> People have absolutely terrible intuitions ... and if something effective seems to lack face validity, I think people just trust their guts and shun the "weird" method.

I graduated in psych two years ago, and man I totally agree. People have absolutely terrible intuitions about so many things that have been well-researched in Psychology. Sometimes I wonder if Psychology suffers from this more than any other field. This book certainly comes to mind.

I sort of pride myself in being extremely skeptical. Whenever I encounter "common knowledge" — even, perhaps especially, my own assumptions — I try to say to myself "hmm, I bet there's some really fascinating research that proves this wrong." Unfortunately I don't meet many others with that mindset.

http://www.amazon.com/No-Bad-Kids-Toddler-Discipline/dp/1499351119 No Bad Kids: Toddler Discipline by Janet Lansbury might be a good read for you.

Does she indicate why she's removing them at all? Is it a game? Does she not like the look? Do they feel weird?

This sort of thing is fairly run-of-the-mill 2 year old testing of boundaries, to some degree. Whether she's laughing during this, or screaming and crying, might help narrow the cause.

If it's a game, I'd suggest just walking away and explaining that "we can't do X until you're dressed". I've had luck with star charts too, though she may be a bit young for that concept. Basically, don't play the game with her if she thinks it's funny, or is doing it to get a rise out of you. Yes, this makes your morning longer, but it will work over time.

If she doesn't like the look, as my son started doing, we chose things together. Really, he's given a false choice between a couple of things we've already deemed acceptable, but basically it's the illusion of him deciding what he's wearing.

If they feel weird or it's a sensory thing, that's also normal and something you can work through via the type of clothes you buy (i.e., sticking with stuff that's tagless and has minimal seams). Eventually you'll find "safe" items that feel ok. My daughter actually had Sensory Processing Disorder from about 4y6m to 6y6m, which led to a lot of screaming and crying about clothes "feeling weird". But with OT and a lot of patience, we worked through it. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, but can go into more detail over DM. I do think yours is too young to have those issues, they don't present until around 4 or so.

If this is your first toddler, there are a million books out there you can read too. We really liked No Bad Kids, by Janet Lansbury. She has a great podcast called Unruffled, too.

This is my next read, now that I find myself saying, "no!" Like allllll the time :)

Feminism is about privilege for women, and responsibility for men.

Feminism started off by claiming the same privileges as men (voting, able to enter into contracts, etc.) and went on to demand more (affirmative action quotas, special programs for women in STEM, no responsibility for sexual activity, reshape school to female needs and learning styles, etc.)

Feminism did not adopt the responsibilities of men - conscription, mandatory fire brigades and response to hue-and-cry laws, financial responsibility for spouse's debts, etc. It later demanded additional responsibility for men (waiving due process, he for she, men must be quiet in the face of feminism, etc.)

I suppose that "facilitating the needs of women and children" does resemble taking on extra responsibility for women the was feminists demand. However, male children are included; feminism has led to what Christina Hoff Summers calls "The War Against Boys" So here, traditionalism is less gynocentric than feminism.

Traditionalism also allows men to be men, and allowed for male spaces. Feminism is opposed to "toxic masculinity" and demands entry into any male space it detects, even informal ones (see gamergate for an example ...) Traditionalism allowed men competition, excellence, independence, and many other virtues that feminism tries to snuff out society wide.

This is not to say I encourage traditionalism; I am merely pointing out that just like MGTOW, tradcons are not "just like feminists".

https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/

the book is already out of stock.

Get your copy if you want to help getting the truth out.

>My child is much safer with vaccines mate, rather trust decades of scientific research than minutes of facebook research.



Well that's just not true at all.


>Seriously scary stuff. When further research is not encouraged in a certain area, then it's clear you are treading in dangerous waters.
>
>
>I do think these debates are important, especially nowadays when people are crucified simply for bringing up the issue of possibly improving vaccines and not simply trusting corporations blindly.
>
> As I usually say, vaccines do not need to be abolished, they can and should be improved. The issue is not as black and white as people portray it.
>
>The amount of research that has sprung up connecting the usage of heavy metals as vaccine adjuvants to neurological problems, as well as autism is considerable, yet is rarely discussed.
>
>---------------------
>
>>In early December 2017, Dr. Chris Exley of Keele University in England and his colleagues published a paper that for the first time looked at the brain tissue of subjects with autism to determine the level of aluminum (note: they spell “aluminum” as “aluminium” in the United Kingdom) found within their brain tissue. For anyone trying to convince the world that “the science is settled and vaccines don’t cause autism,” the study’s findings are deeply contradictory to that statement. In a blog post written by Professor Exley on the day his study was published, he explained the groundbreaking results:
>
>> “…while the aluminium content of each of the 5 brains [of people with autism] was shockingly high it was the location of the aluminium in the brain tissue which served as the standout observation…The new evidence strongly suggests that aluminium is entering the brain in ASD [autism spectrum disorders] via pro-inflammatory cells which have become loaded up with aluminium in the blood and/or lymph, much as has been demonstrated for monocytes at injection sites for vaccines including aluminium adjuvants.”
>
>
>I strongly suggest anyone genuinely interested to read the following page, if you wish to see a very different view (filled with research of course) on the vaccine/aluminium link and its possible relation to autism:
>
>-Aluminum in vaccines and the autism epidemic
>
>The man behind this research is J.B.Handley. He has a child with autism and has dedicated his life to solving and researching the issue - and preventing the modern autism epidemic.
>
>He even has a book on this issue, available here:
>
>https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/
>https://jbhandleyblog.com/home/2018/4/1/international2018
>
>---------------------
>
> Here is another link to a research paper (by Tomljenovic, Exley not involved here as far as I know) connecting the usage of aluminium adjuvants to the rise of autism:
>
>Do aluminum vaccine adjuvants contribute to the rising prevalence of autism?
>
>This research is sadly not freely available, but if you wish to read it anyway, you can get around that with a page like www.sci-hub.tw
>
>In which case it becomes more readily available:
>
>https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0162013411002212
>
>
>--------------
>
>Recently, even a respected (now smeared and his reputation destroyed of course) vaccine medical expert, employed and tasked to destroy the autism-vaccine connection has come out with info that the link undoubtedly exists. There is an interview with him on Shirley Attkinsson that can be found on YouTube.
>
>Full Measure with Sharyl Attkisson: January 6, 2019 - The Vaccination Debate
>
>James Corbett: Vaxx Propaganda in Overdrive as Vaccine/Autism Link Confirmed
>
>------------------------------------------------
>
>For an absurdly high amount of research papers, check out this comment here.
>
>
>
>

I know Weissbluth recommends earlier bedtimes to make sure they are getting enough sleep (it's easier to put them down earlier than to get them to sleep in, allegedly). It works for us (daughter is two and goes to bed at 7:30, and is up by 7:30) but every parent has to do what works best for their families. I also appreciate having adult time with my husband for a few hours a day, it helps us reconnect and unwind after a stressful day.

http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/product-reviews/0449004023

Since the Parkland shooting, I’ve read quite a bit about school shootings in general. I’m more of a book reader than an article reader; notes below.

Article Library

If you want a good general overview, I’d recommend reading Why Kids Kill linked below first. I’m far from an academic—never even attended a traditional college—but it’s really readable. Even if you don’t want to read the whole thing, you can pick up the ebook and just check out the references/footnotes. They link to tons of articles.

Once I finish School Shooters (also linked below) I plan to start working on this library of resources for more detailed info. That’s Langman’s site.

General Books

• [Deadly Lessons: Understanding Lethal School Violence] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0309084121/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_RlbZAbAK8DRRY) - Not exactly a book; you can find the pdf online. This is the report from a study commissioned by Congress to investigate school shootings of the 90s & 00s. Rampage & Why Kids Kill cite it often. It covers 10 incidents in-depth. Each incident was investigated by a different team of academics.
  
  
• Rampage: The Social Roots of School Shootings The authors of this book wrote two of the breakdowns in the Deadly Violence report. This is sort of the expanded version of those reports. Dispels a lot of stereotypes & myths.
  
  
• [Why Kids Kill: Inside the Minds of School Shooters] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0230101488/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_5kbZAbFHKSRSB) by Dr. Peter Langman - This guy is a leading expert on school shootings. He lays out his three categories and gives examples of each type. This book covers only school-aged rampage shooters who targeted their own schools, so guys like Adam Lanza and Seung Hui Cho aren’t included. Lanza was an adult who targeted his former elementary school; Cho targeted his college.
  
  
• [School Shooters: Understanding High School, College, and Adult Perpetrators] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1538106930/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_LPM0AbJF3Z2R7) by Dr. Peter Langman - This one is similar to Why Kids Kill, with a broader scope to include people like Lanza and Cho.
  
  ___
  
  I’ve also read these books which cover specific incidents. (I read a lot of true crime in general, so this list goes back years, not just since Parkland.)
  
  Specific Incidents
  
  
• Columbine by Dave Cullen - He did a ton of reporting on the original shooting and later released this book. It’s well researched and incredibly readable. More suspenseful than many thrillers, IMO. His conclusions are debated but it’s sort of seen as the definitive story.
  
• [No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine High School] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1590560310/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_mCbZAbTR94H0K) by Brooks Brown - He knew the shooters and he disagrees with a lot of what Cullen says. If you’re going to read one, read the other too, for a more rounded view.
  
• A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy by Sue Klebold, Dylan’s Mom
  
  
• Newtown: An American Tragedy
  
• The Reckoning: Searching for Meaning with the Father of the Sandy Hook Killer
  
  
• One of Us: The Story of a Massacre in Norway -- and Its Aftermath - Not a school shooting but an excellent read.
  
  
• No Right to Remain Silent: What We've Learned from the Tragedy at Virginia Tech - Written by one of Seung Hui Cho’s professors who tried to get him help.
  
  
• Murder of Innocence: The Tragic Life and Final Rampage of Laurie Dann - A supringly little-known but dramatic story about a woman rampage shooter.
  
  
• Think No Evil: Inside the Story of the Amish Schoolhouse Shooting... and Beyond

I took a class where we talked about that very issue for a session. I think this book "Rampage" touches on it, but I never read it. I think it was just mentioned.

I completely agree that it is not a good sign that kids want to shoot up schools.

During the class, it was mentioned that some school shooters just go to the school when it's empty and shoot it up. Even when they do shoot people, they just shoot at random, and don't usually seem to be looking for anyone specfic, since it's about the entire institution. I wish I knew where that report was, but hopefully that book has most of it. There were some other characteristics in there like... it's usually males, it's usually males that don't play sports, some may feel obvious, but others were more interesting, but they all seem to point to a gap in the educational system.

I think America in particular needs to diversify the way it can teach kids, and allow them to still feel part of the community. Not very easy, especially since we don't value teaching that highly, hence the phrase, "if you can't work, then teach."

Then again, maybe we just want drones.

Oooh this sounds like a great strategy! Have you read Whole Brain Child if not I highly suggest it.

What a great question! I am really fascinated by the field of infant/early childhood mental health and social-emotional learning in general. It's a fascinating topic that is also somewhat in the early stages. There is much that we need to learn, but also much that we do know, as well.

Priority number one in promoting positive mental health, particularly with children with speech delay and other developmental challenges, is enabling the child to feel safe and calm. There is something called neuroception, which is a person's physiological ability to detect a threat to their system. This term was coined by Dr. Stephen Porges and he has a wealth of information on the subject that you can find at his website if you are interested. Whatever you can do to teach the child how to regulate themselves to a place of feeling calm, at ease, and relaxed is paramount to anything else. For it is in this state that a child is most ready to learn (both academically and also ready to receive instruction or discipline from caregivers). Children and adults are much more receptive to all that we have to offer them when in a state of calm and safety. This allows the pre-frontal cortex (the most advanced part of our brain that regulates higher level thinking, verbal processing, and many other functions) to be fully engaged and receptive. If there is any sense of threat or danger to a child, this portion of the brain goes completely off-line and is rendered useless as the amygdala and limbic system (fight, flight, or freeze response) takes over. There is an incredibly useful explanation of this that you can actually use to teach the child greater awareness of their own brain and how it works. You can find it here.
It is an incredible tool in teaching positive mental health and teaches children how to notice their own physiological responses to events in their daily lives, which leads to greater self-awareness and regulation of their own mental state.

Once you have taught this hand-model of the brain to the child, you can then use it as a way of warning them when their "lid is about to flip" and then provide them with strategies for calming themselves down. You could offer a visual wheel of choice that gives the child options of what to do when they are feeling stressed, angry, etc. This is something you can develop alongside the child and elicit ideas from them when they are calm and relaxed with you. Making it visual will be particularly important and useful to a child with speech delay as they are limited in their ability to verbally express their feelings which can lead to more behavior.

If you are not able to prevent the behavioral issues, then allow the behavior to happen while being present with them and ready to comfort them when they are finished. Be ready to help them calm themselves down by modeling calmness yourself, deep breathing, etc. So much of promoting positive mental health in our children is about cultivating our own positive mental health for ourselves and then modeling that to our child. If we have the reserves to maintain a sense of calm in the midst of stress, then the child will feel the space and freedom to do the same.

I hope that addresses at least some of what you are after. I would appreciate it if you could follow up with some clarifying questions, if not, so that I can better assist you. But before I finish, I wanted to direct you to some really great resources on the topic. There are two great books by Dr. Dan Siegel and Tina Payne-Bryson Ph.D. The first is The Whole-Brain Child which does a great job of explaining, more in-depth, the concepts that I have discussed here. I know you will find it valuable and useful. The second is No-Drama Discipline. This takes the theory of The Whole Brain Child and applies it to discipline, offering practical and useful strategies for use with kids. The third is a book by Dr. Mona Delahooke and is called Social and Emotional Development in Early Intervention. This is a fantastic book, but is also geared toward professionals in early intervention programs. I still believe that you will find a lot of useful ideas and concepts in there, though. Also, be sure to check out Dr. Mona Delahooke's blog for excellent articles addressing these issues. There is a wealth of resource there.

I wish you well as you explore further on the topic. Please let me know if I can clarify anything or provided further resources. All the best to you!

Warmly,
Jeff

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1946885320/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_apa_i_7gk1Db2J6PWPQ (funny/satire)


https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553386697/ref=cm_sw_r_wa_apa_i_uik1DbA38N3HV (actually helpful parenting advice)

Not really sure if this will come off as condescending but here are some books for general parenting or parenting kids with behavioral issues. For any folks out there looking for resources.


The Connected Child
https://www.amazon.com/Connected-Child-healing-adoptive-family/dp/0071475001
Mainly focuses on attachment, or lack there of, for adoptive parents but some of the info is good for parents with children who have behavioral issues caused by attachment issues. Does have some religious aspects but also creates space for non-religious folks as well.

The Whole Brian Child
https://www.amazon.com/Whole-Brain-Child-Revolutionary-Strategies-Developing/dp/0553386697 great general parenting book.

No Drama Discipline
https://www.amazon.com/No-Drama-Discipline-Whole-Brain-Nurture-Developing/dp/034554806X help me understand what’s happening in my kids brain in misbehaving and tactics for working through various issues.

These really helped me feel empowered and informed as a parent. Every time we do well with the stuff we feel like the best parents in the world. Hope this helps anyone out there that might need it.

Edit: links and formatting. I suck at it and I’m on mobile so...
2: a word

Get this book: http://www.amazon.com/Toilet-Training-Less-Than-Day/dp/0671693808/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408989944&sr=1-1&keywords=toilet+training+in+less+than+a+day

Especially read the part where the mom and child go thru it, line by line. It worked in 2-3 days for my oldest and youngest. The book has been around since the 70's, but it definitely works wonders. (as for my middle kid, I had decided to hold off training after his sister was born. He woke up one day and announced he wasn't a baby like her and didn't want to wear diapers anymore...and didn't! I didn't argue)

I love Toilet Training in Less than a Day
It’s based in Behavioral psychology and was developed first for severally mentally disabled adults. It’s an oldie, but a goodie. My kid is 4 now, but we trained at 2.5 and it worked. I’ll be using this book for my 1.5 year old in a little bit.

We used the methods in the book. "Toilet training in less than a day." Worked with our young uns.
Edit: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0671693808/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

I have been listening the the audio book version of "Brain Rules for Baby" on my commute to and from work.

http://www.amazon.com/Brain-Rules-Baby-Raise-Smart/dp/0983263302

I gives a lot of good information regarding baby's brain development from stuff you and your wife can do while pregnant through the early years of development.

I'm having a good time with Happiest Baby on the Block (though I think it's really slow and repetitive, and their "conclusions" (it isn't this, this, or this, so it MUST be this) are a bit, uh, presumptuous; I think the book is spot on for how to treat the baby, especially in the "4th trimester") and The Nursing Mother's Companion. And these aren't baby books, but my husband and I are also reading Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and The Birth Partner to prep for labor.

I have a few more books on my shelf to reference just in case, like Sears' The Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby from Birth to Age Two (but I am wary of anti-vacc notions of the book), Brain Rules for Baby, and for fun, Experimenting with Babies.

Here's a pretty good book on the subject: https://www.amazon.ca/Nurture-Assumption-Children-Revised-Updated/dp/1439101655

Based on all the literature she reviews, her estimate is that genes determine like 60% of us.

I'm sorry but I downvoted this.

First, I find it kind of puzzling that one can write about "another child has been lost to science" while in his own explanation completely ignores social science. Yes, social science is more fuzzy than the natural sciences. This is hardly a surprise given how easy natural science is from a research point of view. Just to mention one example, physicists can destroy a few billion atoms and nobody cares. In contrast, people would probably be a bit irritated if we'd dissect just a few hundred humans.

Second, while some researchers have studied child attachment as a cause for religious beliefs, there's also a good chunk of evidence pointing the other direction. For instance, twin and adoption studies indicate that about 40-50% of the variation in religiosity may be due to genetic influences.

Children may – at some point in their lives – be willing to belief nonsense but this is often corrected in later stages of development. The belief in God is nonsense from our point of view, but the wide-spread acceptance of supernatural ideas indicate that this is a by-product of our cognitive equipment. Expressed differently, for many people concepts like gods, ancestors, ghosts, etc. are very intuitive, and this may be why many people continue to believe.

Third, some research suggests that parents may not be such a influential source when it comes to socialization. Concerning personality, it seems the larger influence is a kid's peer group. Parents may only appear to be so influential, because the parents of a peer group share a common culture. Efforts to teach critical thinking may be wasted if one's kid grows up in a neighborhood with lots of religious parents.

It's a very sad thing, but a lot of the reason why abused children often themselves become abusers is just that they share half the genes of an abuser. "Nature vs. Nurture" isn't a settled debate, but there's at least something to the Nature side.

That certainly doesn't mean Palpatine was always doomed to be evil, but there's a statistical tendency against him.

Maybe the Jedi, having the supernatural ability to sense emotions and foresee the future consequences of their actions, could raise a troubled child the right way, with far better parenting than any mundane person could manage - but on the other hand, look at Anakin.

I don't think a Palpatine raised by the Jedi would have become a Sith Lord nonetheless, but it's not impossible.

I don't think that's true of the desi community. There are a ton of other criticisms I have of feminism including it's neglect of boys from a young age while it fixates on girls so that they can catch up. I've been meaning to read this book by noted feminist Christina Hoff-Sommers. In any case, I don't see either one of us changing our minds so let's just agree to disagree :)

The War Against Boys: How Misguided Policies are Harming Our Young Men by Christina Hoff Sommers http://www.amazon.com/dp/1451644183/ref=cm_sw_r_udp_awd_8Hx0tb1GKWD4A

Not what I mean at all. Where the hell do you live? As I told you, I live in SoCal. Give me examples that are somewhat remotely relavent to me. Do you think that Egalitarians/MRAs support ANY of those things? Are you new to this subreddit? If you are trying to justify the evils of feminism by comparing them to the Taliban, you're setting the bar pretty damn low.


For over half a century, feminism has been Spreading Misandry, Legalizing Misandry and Sanctifying Misandry.


Waging a war on men and sadly, even a war against boys.

That is why I, like most members of this subreddit, are vehemently antifeminist.

Admittedly I’m not where you are yet, but I have recently read this toddler discipline book for help with my 11 month old. She’s been pulling the cats’ tails and petting them roughly and I felt I wasn’t getting through to her. The book is Janet Lansbury’s No Bad Kids. I’m following her sample script of “I won’t let you touch the tail,” and removing my kid from the situation. She goes into wayyyy more detail and I really like her approach. I read the ebook pretty quickly.

Edit: I know 11 months is pretty young but I’m proud to say she is petting the cats much more gently now! We have success at least half the time after only a week. Admittedly she was never being rough with them out of anger, but it’s still a learning curve for her. She looks over at me while doing it to gauge my reaction.

Yes. I didn't recognize my mom as a narcissist until after I had a baby (who's now a toddler), but I think about this a lot now. I'm actively working on it by reading a lot of books on how to be a good parent, like No Bad Kids and Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child. I've also been talking about this worry with my therapist. She pointed out that I'm approaching empathetic parenting with intention, so that already seems to set me apart from my mom. That makes me feel like I'm on the right path.

I've also been thinking lately about how my mom and my MIL, who is also a narcissist, expect my husband and I (and our siblings) to take care of them. They're not infirm or anything - they've acted like that our entire lives. I remind myself frequently that it's my job to take care of my kid, not the other way around. When he acts out, it's because he's having a hard time. It's not something he's doing to me.

To be honest, it is sometimes a challenge. Even when I feel like I'm doing everything right, I wonder if he'll feel more positive about me than I do about my mom when he gets to be my age. But working on my relationship with him isn't draining in the way that my relationship with my mom is. I feel like all the hard work I put into myself and my relationship with him will pay dividends. If he knows I love him for who he is, I will have succeeded.

Check out this book: https://www.amazon.com/No-Bad-Kids-Toddler-Discipline/dp/1499351119

And more from the author on her website (and facebook page): http://www.janetlansbury.com/

I just bought Janet Lansbury's No bad kids, an book on toddler discipline without shame.

https://www.amazon.com/No-Bad-Kids-Toddler-Discipline/dp/1499351119

But you may want to look into some of the "facts" behind 3rd wave feminism. [Here] (https://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=J5D4SKX8NC5V3C3HF5H9) is a great place to start.

You can't trust people's words but with repeated actions one can infer motivation. Individual decision making is aberrant behavior to them and they seek to root it out. Education programs and the social sciences have taken a dark turn in the last couple of decades and a lot of them view classic male behavior as toxic masculinity that must eliminated from the culture.

A feminist wrote a book about it

The War Against Boys: How Misguided Policies are Harming Our Young Men https://www.amazon.com/dp/1501125427/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_IaHiybSP69RXY

link?

Edit - it ain't free. Link

I don't think information should ever be lost, even if people disagree with that information. Copying/pasting the parent comment just for information sake.




>Seriously scary stuff. When further research is not encouraged in a certain area, then it's clear you are treading in dangerous waters.
>
>I do think these debates are important, especially nowadays when people are crucified simply for bringing up the issue of possibly improving vaccines and not simply trusting corporations blindly.
>
>As I usually say, vaccines do not need to be abolished, they can and should be improved. The issue is not as black and white as people portray it.
>
>The amount of research that has sprung up connecting the usage of heavy metals as vaccine adjuvants to neurological problems, as well as autism is considerable, yet is rarely discussed.
>
>────────
>
>In early December 2017, Dr. Chris Exley of Keele University in England and his colleagues published a paper that for the first time looked at the brain tissue of subjects with autism to determine the level of aluminum (note: they spell “aluminum” as “aluminium” in the United Kingdom) found within their brain tissue. For anyone trying to convince the world that “the science is settled and vaccines don’t cause autism,” the study’s findings are deeply contradictory to that statement. In a blog post written by Professor Exley on the day his study was published, he explained the groundbreaking results:
>
>“…while the aluminium content of each of the 5 brains [of people with autism] was shockingly high it was the location of the aluminium in the brain tissue which served as the standout observation…The new evidence strongly suggests that aluminium is entering the brain in ASD [autism spectrum disorders] via pro-inflammatory cells which have become loaded up with aluminium in the blood and/or lymph, much as has been demonstrated for monocytes at injection sites for vaccines including aluminium adjuvants.”
>
>I strongly suggest anyone genuinely interested to read the following page, if you wish to see a very different view (filled with research of course) on the vaccine/aluminium link and its possible relation to autism:
>
>-Aluminum in vaccines and the autism epidemic
>
>The man behind this research is J.B.Handley. He has a child with autism and has dedicated his life to solving and researching the issue - and preventing the modern autism epidemic.
>
>He even has a book on this issue, available here:
>
>https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/ https://jbhandleyblog.com/home/2018/4/1/international2018
>
>────────
>
>Here is another link to a research paper (by Tomljenovic, Exley not involved here as far as I know) connecting the usage of aluminium adjuvants to the rise of autism:
>
>Do aluminum vaccine adjuvants contribute to the rising prevalence of autism?
>
>This research is sadly not freely available, but if you wish to read it anyway, you can get around that with a page like www.sci-hub.tw
>
>In which case it becomes more readily available:
>
>https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0162013411002212
>
>────────
>
>Recently, even a respected (now smeared and his reputation destroyed of course) vaccine medical expert, employed and tasked to destroy the autism-vaccine connection has come out with info that the link undoubtedly exists. There is an interview with him on Shirley Attkinsson that can be found on YouTube.
>
>Full Measure with Sharyl Attkisson: January 6, 2019 - The Vaccination Debate
>
>James Corbett: Vaxx Propaganda in Overdrive as Vaccine/Autism Link Confirmed
>
>────────
>
>For an absurdly high amount of research papers, check out this comment here.

I've been reading this book and am about 1/3 of the way through. The author makes some really good points about how we arrive at beliefs and the mechanisms we use to discredit things that conflict with those beliefs. I can't go thought point by point in the entire book but here is a couple things he brings up:

>People's preferences influence not only the kind of information they consider, but also the amount they examine. When the initial evidence supports our preferences, we are generally satisfied and terminate our search; when the initial evidence is hostile, however, we often dig deeper, hoping to find more comforting information, or to uncover reasons to believe that the original evidence was flawed.

and

>The important point here is that although evidence and reality constrain our beliefs, they do not do so completely. For nearly all complex issues, the evidence is fraught with ambiguity and open to alternative interpretation. One way that our desires or preferences serve to resolve these ambiguities in our favor is by keeping our investigative engines running until we uncover information that permits a conclusion we find comforting.

A brief search on Amazon brought up these:

http://www.amazon.com/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062/ref=cm_lmf_tit_1
http://www.amazon.com/People-Believe-Weird-Things-Pseudoscience/dp/0805070893/ref=pd_cp_b_2

What do you think?

And I must say, I like your approach: First teach him critical thinking, and then, if necessary, point out to him that religion is one of the fields where he should apply the rules of scepticism. If he's not too deluded (which I'd expect since he wasn't indoctrinated as a child), he will probably come to the only reasonable conclusion.

Am reading Henrietta Lacks ATM and really liking it.

I also recommend ...

The Selfish Gene - Richard Dawkins

The Demon Haunted World - Carl Sagan

God Is Not Great - Christopher Hitchens

Risk - Dan Gardner

Bad Science - Ben Goldacre

Why People Believe Weird Things - Michael Shermer

How We Know What isn't So - Thomas Gilovich

EDIT : MOAR

Quirkology - Prof. Richard Wiseman

Tricks Of The Mind - Derren Brown

59 Seconds: Think a little, change a lot - Prof. Richard Wiseman

How to Lie With Statistics - Donald Huff

https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062

> What are some things that we can do early on that yall wish yall had done?

Start a budget and begin tracking your spending. I really like mint.com because it integrates all your accounts and categorizes spending automatically. The budgeting tools are also really intuitive and work well. I'd suggest figuring out the baby's monthly expenses and then starting to set aside that amount of money each month starting now. You'll help to build savings and also you'll get to simulate living on a baby budget.

If you're planning on using daycare, now is the time to start looking. Any place that's good will have a long waiting list for infants, and the cost is definitely something you want to start working into your budget. Here's a useful page I added to the wiki to help navigate this minefield

If you get the financial stuff figured out early it will minimize freaking out later on when you have fewer options and less time.

Oh, also, I found that reading about pregnancy was simultaneously boring and scary. I prefer to read about parenthood instead. I would recommend The Baby Book. It is biased toward attachment parenting for sure, but there is also a lot of great objective information about baby's developmental milestones as well as frank discussions about common problems that arise and several (attachment parenting) approaches to addressing them.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Baby-Book-Revised-Edition/dp/0316198269

All of the Dr. Sears books are great. They treat you and your baby like people, not projects to schedule or manage.

http://www.amazon.com/Thats-What-Theyre-Definitive-Breastfeeding/dp/159337285X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1397570127&sr=1-1&keywords=so+thats+what+they%27re+for

This is kind of old, but a funny way to learn to succeed at breastfeeding.

http://www.amazon.com/The-No-Cry-Sleep-Solution-Through/dp/0071381392/ref=pd_sim_b_13?ie=UTF8&refRID=0NSBRKTSW2JNFCDDDGK6

This is the gentlest way to deal with sleep issues if you have them. I have never had sleep issues, though, as we coslept. In fact, I have never slept as much as I did when my oldest was a newborn. I slept 12 hours a night.

I highly suggest the book: The Baby Book, Revised Edition: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby from Birth to Age.

It really helped my wife when she wasn't producing milk. It also helped me when I was alone with the kid. I had never been around children and it helped me understand what is normal and when and when not to worry.

Check out Playful Parenting:
https://smile.amazon.com/Playful-Parenting-Connections-Encourage-Confidence/dp/0345442865/ref=sr_1_3

The basic thesis is that at this age, you can get the kids to do what you want by making it fun for them. It's like Mary Poppins said:
> In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find the fun and - SNAP - the job's a game.

Simplicity Parenting has a wonderful chapter about toys and how keep them meaningful but under control. It's a fantastic book.

Engage your kids. Now that clothes are done gather all the books and divide them by kid and sit with each one and ask if they want to give it a home on their shelf or give it to a kid who would like it more or be more age appropriate for. My 7 year old doesn't need the baby books any more so she purged those along with those with topics that don't interest her any more.

We did stuffed animals after clothes and she got rid of 50%. The big thing for her is that I remind her that if she keeps it, it needs to have a home in her room, not just piled in the corner or in a tub. She will pick the "easy" items first, those she knows bring joy. Then the shelf is full and she isn't interested in making a "home" for what remains and is okay with putting them in the to-go bag.

We preserved the Legos and Playomobil (two or three sets total) and she sorted through the rest of the toys, mostly Happy Meal quality small plastic crap and old crafts. After she selected the good stuff she was ready to move on and I told her we had to finish but she was allowed to decide that the rest could "move on". She picked out three more small items, said the rest could go and went off to play with friends. I put the rest in a trash bag and put that out of sight (so she can't go back). So far no complaints, just lots of positive attention from visitors for having such a peaceful and tidy room. Still plenty of books and trinkets but with room to breathe.

Edit: also this book, Simplicity Parenting, address the obwervation you made: being overwhelmed by too many toys.

Continue with the counselor. Don't be afraid to see a different counselor that is a better fit for you. The problem with the term "counselor", is that is could mean someone with 1 year of college experience or a person with extensive residency with 7 years of university experience. I would look for a registered psychologist who specialized in CBT or EMDR. Although all professionals legally have to report child abuse. However, I don't think simply having the desire to strike your child would be grounds for a CPS call granted you aren't doing it.

First off, I would find a new child care provider. Your mom is still abusing you. The more you are around your mom and subject your children to her behaviour, the worse it will get. There ARE child care providers that are versed in allergies. You may need to pack lunches as well as provide a list of do's and don't's. Consider a in-home nanny, or a child care provider with training.

It is really hard to re-train your brain. You have trained your brain to act out with violence/anger when upset. Retraining that will take serious time, mindfulness, and patience. Consider looking into more anger management courses as well as parenting courses. When in doubt, if you feel like you are going to explode. Make sure your kid is in a safe environment, and leave the area. Go to your room/bathroom. Relax. Takes some breaths.

I can suggest these books:

• https://www.amazon.com/Peaceful-Parent-Happy-Kids-Connecting/dp/0399160280/ref=pd_sim_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0399160280&pd_rd_r=7PMR1CTCYJGZDGWNWE6F&pd_rd_w=jL1qX&pd_rd_wg=kE4mT&psc=1&refRID=7PMR1CTCYJGZDGWNWE6F
  
• https://www.amazon.com/No-Drama-Discipline-Whole-Brain-Nurture-Developing/dp/034554806X/ref=pd_sim_14_4?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=034554806X&pd_rd_r=ACH627BTDQ8YCYQ5SF1R&pd_rd_w=uZWwA&pd_rd_wg=tbVWJ&psc=1&refRID=ACH627BTDQ8YCYQ5SF1R
  
  Simply asking for help shows you care.

+1 on "The Gift of Fear"

Toxic Parents by Susan Forward

For Your Own Good by Dr. Alice Miller, especially the Afterword

People of the Lie by M. Scott Peck. (This one not as much as the first ones, but still helpful)

read a book by Alice Miller

A good parenting book- I always loved Penelope Leach: http://www.amazon.com/Your-Baby-Child-Penelope-Leach/dp/0375712038/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1

This is it: https://www.amazon.com/Your-Baby-Child-Birth-Five/dp/0375712038

She is British, so a few things are different compared to American advice.

My absolute favourite parenting book was Your Baby and Child.

I found Your Baby and Child by Penelope Leach to be a very good read. It's not focussed at the dad, but I found it to be very reassuring. It covers a lot more than just pregnancy, labour and birth.

Experimenting With Babies. Love that book!

This was well received by a couple of a similar description:
http://www.amazon.com/Experimenting-Babies-Amazing-Science-Projects/dp/0399162461

Got these for my husband.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0399162461/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1592405525/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

First, I have to ask, what is the significance of potatoes and oatmeal?

Now for suggestions:
If she has a mac or a light colored laptop you could get her one of these

I don't know what a child life specialist is, but this book was awesome

This book looks cool

A wallet/coin purse with her favorite disney character

Yep. Racism gets perpetuated by the idea that race is bad to talk about... read Nurture Shock last week, and this was one of the points they reviewed in the study of children and their attitudes.

Could it have been Nurtureshock? It's not exactly a parenting book, but uses scientific data to show how a lot of what we thought about raising kids is wrong (most notably, why we shouldn't praise kids) and it's really good. Definitely a must-read for someone who's looking for data instead of anecdote.

NurtureShock covers this well (think Freakonomics or Tipping Point for raising kids). They even tackle the black Santa thing in Chapter Three: Why White Parents Don’t Talk About Race

Most black kids don't even believe in black Santa.

http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130

NurtureShock is great for the overall picture of raising a kid to adulthood. Pretty scientific and very thoughtful.

Get this book.

My first little guy is 5.5 months old, and he had been needing to be held to go to sleep. He was going to bed around 10, waking up two times per night and needed to be held to go back to sleep. Now, he goes to sleep at 8, wakes up once around 3 or 4 to eat and immediately goes back to sleep until about 7:30.

It also teaches you about the signs of when they are tired during the day so that you can put them down to take naps at the right times. Timing their sleep cycle can be hard work, but now that we are in a routine, my wife, my baby and I are all happier.

I cannot recommend this book enough. My wife has been doing it all, so I don't know how early the book recommends using some of these techniques, but do yourself a favor and get it. Don't suffer through sleepless nights like my wife and I did.

Kids need consistency and love a schedule. You (not your son) need to set the time and stick with it. We did the let them cry method, but there are other methods as well if it's too hard to deal with.

re: the 5.30 wakings. if you can, let him cry until it's the time you want him to get up. he'll eventually get the picture that he isn't supposed to be up or at least be quieter. This can take a week or two which is hellish, but just keep an eye on the prize.


Lastly, for my wife and I the book Healthy sleep habits happy child has been huge. It has a lot of excellent advice on how/when to alter sleep patterns depending on what age/problem they are experiencing, and different methods to deal with them.

Not that this helps - but my daughter used to drink 64oz+ of formula a day, about half at night until we switched to food when She cut down to 40ish ounces. The pediatrician always thought it should be less but we never got there. She's skinny for her age but we share meals and she usually eats a bigger breakfast, lunch and dinner than I do plus 3 or 4 healthy snacks (cheese, nuts, hummus, fruit, etc)

I give her a sippy full of water every night and she usually finishes it. I personally wouldn't be freaked about diabetes/whatever unless she's drinking that much water at night. Kids are different, and some eat way more than others.

I'd get rid of milk, cold turkey and just offer water. My daughter never accepted water in a bottle so we just put a non-leaky sippy in her crib with her at night. It seems to me like the milk is how she's soothing herself back to sleep and she's just going to have to learn to do that part on her own, minus the milk. It's tough and there's a lot of differing opinions, but I'm (now) a big believer in cry it out. I like this book and it's gotten us through everything so far.

As far as neighbors, I'd be really honest and really nice. Go down, tell them you are trying, the next 3-4 days will be rough. Maybe bring them cookies and ear plugs as well. We lived in an apartment when my daugher sleep trained and my neighbors were surprisingly nice about it when I gave them a head's up on what was happening and apologized both before and after.

Start with this book on sleeping. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0449004023
Drop one feeding at a time, replacing the daytime ones with meals. I would call a lactation consultant at your local hospital, they can really help guide you through this part of the process as well.

Actually throughout history females were much, much more likely to survive to adulthood and reproduce. And they have always had their own set of privileges and their own forms of power.

Speaking of books/papers:

The Privileged Sex

The Myth of Male Power

Female forms of power and the myth of male dominance

Favored or Oppressed?

The Legal Subjugation of Men (1908)

The Boy Crisis

Legalizing Misandry: From Public Shame to Systemic Discrimination against Men

Replacing Misandry: A Revolutionary History of Men

The Second Sexism: Discrimination Against Men and Boys

Gender differences on automatic in group bias: whey do women like women more than men like men?

Sex Differences in the Ultimatum Game: An Evolutionary Psychology Perspective

Intrasexual Competition Shapes Men’s Anti-Utilitarian Moral Decisions

Moral Chivalry: Gender and Harm Sensitivity Predict Costly Altruism

The Gender Empathy Gap: Chivalry is not dead when it comes to morality

Note that with the exception of the first link, which leads to an historical study of female privilege written by a right wing military strategist, all of these books and papers were written by liberals and socialists.

Another recent [study](Objectivity and realms of explanation in academic journal articles concerning sex/gender: a comparison of Gender studies and the other social sciences) (conducted in Sweden, of all places) concluded that 'gender studies' is by far the most unscientific and biased discipline in all of the social sciences and possibly all of academia. Basically, if you've learned about gender solely through the lens of feminism, you've been wildly misinformed.

Warren Farrell starred in the documentary about MRAs. He is also writing a new book with John Grey about The Boy Crisis.

>And 'idiot on the internet' describes literally every person who thinks men shouldn't be discriminated against

Fuck you too. I know more about feminism, men's rights, and gender than you ever will. You're the idiot here.

If you'd like to learn how to implement vaccines in a safe manner, I suggest this book:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1603588248/ref=cm_cr_arp_mb_bdcrb_top?ie=UTF8

He explains the problem with the current vaccine schedule and teaches you, with facts and science, how to implement vaccines in a way that is safe for your loved ones.

It's a little better, but not terribly so. The Washington Times gives the impression that it's a reputable national newspaper, but after digging a little deeper, it's more aptly described as a conservative leaning tabloid with close ties to the Unification Movement, which is a religious entity.



That being said, there's not a lot of substance to this article. Their source is a book and its author who is there to promote it. If the book itself is a secondary source, what does that make this article? A tertiary source? I worry that we're playing the telephone game a bit with the actual science here.


Ideally, I'd like to be able to examine and scrutinize the methods used to draw these conclusions and see that it's gone through peer review. We need to be able to compare the incidence of these factors in the population of school shooters with that of the general population, for example, to see if there's not some cherry picking going on.

Am o serie de surse, problema e studiata de foarte mult timp. Sunt niste surse foarte bune pe jstor dar acolo tre sa dai 15 euro ca sa citersti un articol

​

Lipsa tatilor

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3904543/

https://books.google.ro/books?id=reWupx_OJs8C&pg=PA434&lpg=PA434&dq=fatherless+child+psychological&source=bl&ots=0vXmqQagfz&sig=rWrMucn6p-iIccWV9dr32qZd8eU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik9LrSv8zdAhVJqIsKHXyXC-sQ6AEwEXoECAQQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201205/father-absence-father-deficit-father-hunger

https://owlcation.com/social-sciences/Psychological-Effects-On-Men-Growing-Up-Without-A-Father

https://wehavekids.com/family-relationships/When-Daddy-Dont-Love-Their-Daughters-What-Happens-to-Women-Whose-Fathers-Werent-There-for-Them

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S0101-81082004000300010&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1942952716/ref=as_li_qf_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=jordanbpetery-20&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=1942952716&linkId=f9801ef13f207a178b496cce379afa6b

https://ifstudies.org/blog/yes-father-absence-causes-the-problems-its-associated-with

​

Lipsa mamelor

http://www.jungatlanta.com/articles/winter01-motherless-children.pdf

https://www.nytimes.com/1994/05/01/opinion/l-children-without-mothers-are-at-special-risk-954179.html

https://living.thebump.com/gender-development-boys-mothers-16935.html

https://herdacity.org/what-can-you-do-for-a-motherless-child/

​

As mai putea pune. In general un google cu effects of fatherlessness sau effects of motherlessness iti da suficiente informatii.

​

Asta trateaza mai multe tipuri de familii (inclusiv lesbi/homo) la un nivel un pic mai superficial.

https://books.google.ro/books?id=reWupx_OJs8C&pg=PA434&lpg=PA434&dq=fatherless+child+psychological&source=bl&ots=0vXmqQagfz&sig=rWrMucn6p-iIccWV9dr32qZd8eU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik9LrSv8zdAhVJqIsKHXyXC-sQ6AEwEXoECAQQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

​

​

​

Babies don't eat pizza!!?? Oh yes they do! - I gave my baby girl some crust when she was teething and she loved it. But she REALLY likes food.

Here's my advice, in no particular order:

1. Cut yourself some slack. Like a lot of it. The first baby is a huge adjustment and you're not going to be perfect and that's ok. Love him/her and do your best.
   
   
2. Take care of yourself! Do whatever makes you happy when you have a minute - paint your nails, watch tv, whatever. You will be taking care of baby 24/7 so give yourself as much YOU time as you can.
   
   
3. Babies and kids go through phases. So when you're in the middle of a rough patch, know that it will end. You have no idea when, but eventually it will end. Likewise, when your baby is being super sweet and cute and everything is sunshine and roses, enjoy every second of it cause that too will end!
   
   
4. Buy this book, read it and follow the advice. Many moms recommended it to me over the years, and I didn't buy it until we started having major sleep problems with my 3 1/2 year old. I've been using the techniques on him AND my 9 month old daughter and I so wish I'd used it on him since the beginning. Sleep is such a big deal in parenting and this book made it really pretty simple.
   
   
5. Cradle cap - rub olive oil on babies head, let sit for 10 minutes, scrub off with a comb while baby is sleeping. Works.
   
   
6. Here is a hand drawn chalk drawing by my son of himself and his baby sister. Notice his war wound - sliced his earlobe open last week and got 4 stitches.

This book was a life saver for us with both kids. If you want a copy, let me know. I buy them by the dozen and give them out to people I know when they have first kids.

> the baby refuses to rest and is up four times every-single-effing-night.

It is a (somewhat) controversial topic, but you might seriously want to consider trying the "cry it out" method.

Long story short, you start by slowly weening your child off of soothing (picking them up, rocking them, etc) but eventually you will just monitor your child but not soothe them during the night.

We did the cry it out method with both of our children after some initial problems and now we all have a happy and wonderful sleep. Just about ever single night. And catching up on sleep makes a HUUUUGE difference to your overall well being and happiness.

Here is a conversation about the topic here in /r/parenting. The first two top comments talk about the cry it out method


Here is another one.

Some studies to back up the talk


If you are really looking for more of an expert opinion there are some books too. Book 1 and Book 2.

Some people will claim that it harms your child's brain, while others will say that that the fear mongering is just a bunch of nonsense. It's a baby. They cry. They get over it.

> there's nothing to link Adam Lanza(Sandy Hook) and Dylan Klebod+Eric Harris(Columbine) is there?

There is actually

All the answers to your question, and solutions to the problem, are in this book: https://www.amazon.com/Rampage-Social-Roots-School-Shootings/dp/0465051049

The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind https://www.amazon.com/dp/0553386697/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_XuYyDb8CZ38YB

There's an excellent book by Dan Siegel and Tina Bryson called the Whole Brain Child that discusses youngster's brain development and how to help them learn to navigate big and challenging emotions. In the book, they suggest to let your child talk about traumas and put them in context. I can't remember if they discuss anything as big as suicide, but it may be worth checking out. They discourage parents from avoiding topics because that may unintentionally teach the child it's not ok to feel big emotions and create a whole different set or problems for later in life.

​

Here's a link to the book on amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Whole-Brain-Child-Revolutionary-Strategies-Developing/dp/0553386697/ref=sr_1_3?crid=NKHEH3NMWMIQ&keywords=the+whole+brain+child&qid=1566087190&s=gateway&sprefix=the+whole+%2Caps%2C197&sr=8-3

You might find the book "The Explosive Child" helpful in understanding your child's behavior. My son sounds very similar to your daughter (and honestly, much, much less of an explosive child than what the book is truly intended for). However, the premise of the book is that kids who explode like this are lacking in the skills of flexibility and adaptability and that helping them learn these skills is far preferable to punishing bad behavior that stems from a lacking skill.

My pediatrician also recommended the book, "The Whole-Brain Child", which helps explain some of the way children's brains functions. This book is especially useful because it explains why, during huge meltdowns, your child is really incapable of rational thought. You have to wait until the child is calm again before trying to address any of the challenges you're facing.

With that being said, I have noticed in particular that my son has a lot more frequent meltdowns when he is 1) tired or 2) hungry. Asking "are you hungry?" and offering him a snack sometimes snaps him right out of it.

Interacting with him/discussing his feelings/giving hugs during the meltdown seem to make it worse (contrary to my initial impulse which is to walk him through his feelings). This is really only possible AFTER the storm has been weathered. Isolating him, which is pretty much my least natural response, is what seems to work for him the best. We simply tell him he needs to stay in his room until he is calm and ready to talk about what's going on. He calms down MUCH faster by himself and half the time, he ends up falling asleep (and wakes up in a perfectly happy mood).

I came here to cautiously recommend therapy. My recommendation caused strain on our relationship. It turns out guys don't want you to send constant emails about every therapist within 20 miles who sees kids... If they go to therapy and you're privy to the info, read up on the diagnosis to see how you can help them thrive! I'd also spend less time parenting and more time reading up on step/parenting. Terrible twos often bleed into the threes. Reading was incredibly therapeutic for me.

Stepmonster - popular here, I'm a fan
Single Girl's Guide - never read, well reviewed
How To Talk So Kids Will Listen
The Whole-Brain Child
Subtle Art - best book ever

Thank you. I will look for it.

Is it this one or this one?

First I'd like to recommend this book. It made a huge difference in my relationships and understanding of my children.

Next, I am seeing a lot of posts about ADHD. Don't put a label on your child. You may need to seek professional help for her, and they may come up with a diagnosis, but until that time comes she's your little girl and you main job is to love her, not put a label on her. Also keep in mind, if you go looking for a diagnosis, you're likely to get one.

Third keep in mind teachers are people too. Some teachers will just "get" your little girl better than others. You may want to talk with other teachers your child has contact with (music, art, and physical education) are they having similar problems? If not you have two options. Leave her in the class she is in to teach her some life lessons on learning to deal with people you don't necessarily like, or roll the dice and have her moved to a new class and take your chances with a new teacher.

Lastly, you're doing better than you think.

My son was a little older than yours when we did the method in Toilet Training in Less Than A Day but he was at a similar stage.

That book is no joke. I took off work on a Friday, we basically hung out in the bathroom doing their routine starting at 9am, and he was trained completely by noon. Not a single daytime accident since (and maybe only 2-3 nighttime over the course of a year.) It was written in the 70s/80s which is also entertaining (but very politically incorrect!)

I know it's late for this post, and you might already be finished potty training, but I would highly suggest the book "Toilet trainining in less than a day." It's behavioral-based toilet training, and it's worked great for our two kids. One day to train the first, and the other took about a week (though she's young, just 18 months old).

We used this book.

With all the stories I've read here, ALL of Reddit needs to read this.

http://www.amazon.com/Toilet-Training-Less-Than-Day/dp/0671693808

Take a few parenting classes with your wife! You'll bond and you'll know what to expect.

There's also this book called Brain Rules for Babies about the do's and don'ts of raising your child to be well-adjusted kiddo. Easy read, basic stuff, but it backs stuff up with science. so. that's always good.

The book I didn't like (despise is too strong, it was just too simplistic) was What to Expect.

I loved Mayo Clinic Guide to Pregnancy. It felt in depth and comprehensive while still being practical.

Another two books I've loved have been "Brain Rules for Baby" and "What's Going On in There". Brain Rules is written for more of a layman's audience while the second is very very technical if you're not familiar with neurology, though the author does a good job of explaining things. They both touch on pregnancy and how different things affect the developing brain and why something is good or bad. It also talks about what you can do now, while pregnant, to give your child the best chance you can and all backed up with peer reviewed research. I loved them!

Our stack of books is about a foot high and growing, and my favorite book so far has been Brain Rules for Baby, a book with a lot of great guidance backed up not just by anecdotes but also sound science. As a counter to our instincts to be over-protective, the other book my wife and I have both really enjoyed is 50 Dangerous Things You Should Let Your Children Do.

I wouldn't worry as much about kids having role models and such. Parential influence is probably overrated. Genetic influence, on the other hand is often underrated. What I am trying to say is that your son might turn out good or bad regardless what you do.

Parenting doesn't matter. Genes matter.

https://www.amazon.com/Nurture-Assumption-Children-Revised-Updated/dp/1439101655

http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1451644183/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411147865&sr=1-1&keywords=war+on+boys

War Against Boys.

> Thank you for sharing the link to Pew, it's a good example of what I've been talking about.

An example of what that you've been talking about?

>Just to clarify, I never said that all mothers want to work full time, I said that many mothers want to work more than they do.

Right. I just don't see any evidence of that.

If you look here, for instance, as of 2013, 17.6 million mothers work full time, 5.97 million work part time, and 1.86 million are unemployed out of a total of 25.5 million mothers with children under 18 in the labor force. With some simple math, we find that 69% of mothers (with children under 18) work full time, 23.4% work part time, and 7.6% are unemployed.

Given the (multiple) pew polls about women's work preferences, that means there is actually a substantial amount of mothers who would prefer to work less -- a substantial portion of the mothers working full time would prefer either to work part time or not at all.

>For example:

Yes, but you didn't include this:

>Among mothers who currently work full time, many would rather not. About 44% say that working part time would be their ideal situation, 9% say not working outside the home would be ideal. Only about half (46%) of full-time working mothers consider their current situation ideal.

Or this:

>The way mothers view their ideal work situation has fluctuated somewhat over time, and these changing preferences likely reflect changing economic circumstances. The share of mothers preferring full-time work increased sharply between 2007 and 2012 (from 20% to 32%) – an intervening period that included a severe economic recession.

I thought the above was a significant part because it speaks to the cyclical nature of preferences.

>Secondly, according to your source 30% of fathers don't want to work full time (can you please provide me with a link, it would be super helpful).

The statistics are there in the article I already sent to you. Here's a similar article about the same thing.

From the article:

>Still, there are important gender role differences. While a nearly equal share of mothers and fathers say they wish they could be at home raising their children rather than working, dads are much more likely than moms to say they want to work full time. And when it comes to what they value most in a job, working fathers place more importance on having a high-paying job, while working mothers are more concerned with having a flexible schedule.

This pattern of preference distinction gets repeated over and over.

>Thirdly, whilst many fathers are happy to work full time, they would like more flexible work arrangements within the context of their full time role.

Yes, of course. Why should that be surprising? If you ask people "would you prefer more flexible work hours?" they're going to say yes. But that doesn't really get to the heart of the matter -- which is that men work more than women, and men prefer to work more than women. If you also ask men, "would you prefer to work part time or full time?" a large majority of them will say full time.

>As the report notes, this is primarily down to education. I'm not too familiar with the issue of the education gap in the US, although would like to know more as I'm quite interested in men's issues. Do you happen to know of a good source that provides an overview of the issue?

Yes, it's precisely about education and how variables can be manipulated to show a gap. The caveat you mention is true -- but it's just substituting a set in which variables are creating the gap for another set where variables are creating the gap.

As for resources, I know there's this book.

There's also this site, though I don't know how good it is.

>This isn't strictly true and frustrates the hell out of me. Yes this is the case for some families, but if you look at the reports I included that discuss the issue of childcare, many families don't have viable childcare options, forcing one parents (nearly always the mother) into the primary carer role.

It is true, though. The fact that people don't have childcare options is a perfectly valid claim with which I'm not disagreeing. But what I'm saying is that if childcare were improved to such a great extent that no one had any child care problems ever, the "gap" would still exist and to a large extent. You're not actually going to get rid of the gap until you can change women's preferences.

>Does this assumption about "what women want" mean that men simply don't want to care for their children?

No, I don't see why it should.

>If we take as the assumption that this is simply something fathers don't want to do, what is the knock on effect for other issues relating to the family and our gender roles?

But that's not the assumption. Like if I say, "John isn't as tall as I am," have I really said that John isn't tall? What if I told you that John is 6'9'' and I'm 7'0''?

That men prefer to work full time, even if that means sacrificing time with their children doesn't mean men don't want to take care of their children or tremendously enjoy it. And that women are more willing to sacrifice work to take care of their children doesn't mean they don't want to work or tremendously enjoy it.

>There is a fair bit of research to demonstrate that discrimination takes place

That doesn't invalidate what I said. Here's what I said again:

> If you look at single women or unmarried women, for example, their promotion rates and wage earnings are roughly on par with men.


Source 1

Source 2

Source 3 shows that fathers are 1.83 times as likely to be recommended for a management position than childless men, while childless women were 8.2 times as likely as mothers to be recommended for a management position. Interestingly, childless women were more likely than childless men to be recommended for promotion, to be offered a higher starting salary, to be recommended for hire, and to be considered "competent" and "committed." In some of these categories, there seem to be boosts to fathers, but the data show that childless women are rated ahead of childless men, which suggests to me this is mostly a "mother versus non-mother" issue and not a "men versus women" issue.

Also, as an aside, I clicked on your source 9, and here's what I read:

>We have found that girls and young women have achieved equity or surpassed boys and young men in school literacy, as well as Year 12
and higher qualification attainment. Despite these achievements...

Why is women surpassing men treated as an "achievement" instead of as just another inequality? I've found this kind of rhetoric in many of the studies and articles about women, and each time it strikes me as misguided. Perhaps you can shed some light on this: why are inequalities that favor women treated as achievements?

No, we won't. American culture still hasn't moved past the idea that girls are oppressed. The only stories you'll hear on the news involve extra classes and attention for girls.

Boys receive lower grades than girls despite doing better on tests. How could this be? Read more here.

Sorry for lateness of reply. In case you're still interested...

Take her article about conservative feminism, then have a look at her articles published on AEI. I think you'll find many of them that are aligned with conservative feminism, and none that are in conflict with it. For example

>Conservative feminists are unconvinced that Uncle Sam is Mr. Right.

Article supporting

> They are suspicious of elaborate big-government "pro-woman" policies in advanced bureaugamies such as Norway and Sweden and think American women are faring as well or better in the workplace.

Article supporting

>Conservative feminism is pro-woman but male-friendly. If boys are languishing academically, if blue-collar men lose most of the jobs in the recession, or if innocent young men are falsely accused of heinous crimes--as several members of the Duke University Lacrosse team were in 2006, with campus feminists at the head of the mob--conservative feminists will speak out on men's behalf.

Book supporting

In short, everything she defines conservative feminism as aligns exactly with her own positions. Many of which I agree with! If you can find articles that go against that definition I'll concede the point.

I don't think misrepresenting positions makes one a conservative but conservatives often regard the CDC as biased and seek to attack it as an institution. Here is the quote:

>If a woman was unconscious or severely incapacitated, everyone would call it rape. But what about sex while inebriated? Few people would say that intoxicated sex alone constitutes rape — indeed, a nontrivial percentage of all customary sexual intercourse, including marital intercourse, probably falls under that definition (and is therefore criminal according to the CDC).

The actual question used by the CDC to which she is referring is as follows:

>When you were drunk, high, drugged, or passed out and unable to consent, how many people ever had vaginal sex with you? (emphasis mine)

The reason I wondered whether it wasn't deliberate was because she actually quoted the question in her article, then perhaps misread the "and unable to consent" for an "or unable to consent". Who knows. Here is the link.

https://www.amazon.com.au/No-Bad-Kids-Toddler-Discipline/dp/1499351119

Now that you are entering into this stage of development, I suggest the two following books.

"No Bad Kids" by Janet Lansbury http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1499351119/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1499351119&linkCode=as2&tag=janetlansbury-20&linkId=JW6MS6RW3DRKLN7Z She also has a blog that's mostly pretty handy.

"Love and Logic in Early Childhood" by Jim Fey https://www.amazon.com/dp/1930429002/ref=cm_sw_r_other_awd_lfEIwbTM3Y95V

Your baby is testing boundaries. He's testing to see if he can get a different reaction from you. And he does! Sometimes you snap at him, sometimes you say no, sometimes you ignore him, sometimes you give him a swat on the bottom... Different reactions.

A 13 month old is too young to respect an abstract boundary. It just is. My suggestion is that whenever it is at all possible, rearrange your environment so that he can't get in trouble. I know its tough because the dog has to get to water, but if its conceivable to move its location, do that. (Laundry room with a doggy door, maybe?) Control the environment, not the baby. When that is not possible, keep your cool and stay consistent.

What your gender is programmed for is irrelevant. The jig is up: boys are graded more harshly. In my opinion, it's a big reason many more men than women flock to objectively-graded majors in college: to escape sexism in academia.

http://people.terry.uga.edu/cornwl/research/cmvp.genderdiffs.pdf

https://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/884262.html

Et cetera. The sexism is there. But it's not a narrative that goes well with the 77-cents-on-the-dollar crowd.

So have I

In many cases that is accurate, especially in education. Men are having a crisis where we are falling far behind in schooling in all almost all subjects and in getting degrees. The system is set to favor women and not men. It's such a big problem that is literally affecting the economy. Men are being affected primarily in America, but also around the world.

Yet Australia, New Zealand, and England, among other places, all see it as a problem and are actively promoting ways to help men rise to the status of women (boy only schools that encourage things like rough housing, tag, etc, as an example) while America is doing the opposite. There are major lobbying efforts by women organizations to go against men and stop such policies here. It's literally a war against boys

> I am not comfortable painting the shooters as the victims here.

The Parkland shooter was relentlessly bullied and tormented for years before he finally snapped, and the fucking kids admitted it.

> Nor am I comfortable with saying that society treats boys so bad their only recourse is to go on a shooting spree.

Recourse?

When your single mother beats you because she doesn't understand discipline, your overweight female teachers want to put you on Ritalin because they can't handle how much energy you have, and then when you do everything you're told to do to get female approval and it winds up backfiring horrendously, someone in that situation is eventually going to snap.

Now say something really dumb, like 'you have a chip on your shoulder.'

> The victim mentality has to end, along with all the mass / school shootings.

https://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1501125427/ref=sr_1_1?gclid=Cj0KCQiAtrnuBRDXARIsABiN-7AXtT-XvJl8jQypTQq74EDR_hDWQyhtWL3gCW72iSvB8hdNxV3YAIIaAi9dEALw_wcB&hvadid=241909021669&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9033589&hvnetw=g&hvpos=1t1&hvqmt=e&hvrand=10007966018918261274&hvtargid=kwd-132846382&hydadcr=24634_10399776&keywords=the+war+against+boys&qid=1573856052&sr=8-1

When feminists are pointing it out, you know there's a fucking problem. Sometimes people are victims, and sometimes policy needs to be redressed.

Do you know what the most common correlative factors are among mass shooters, I mean besides virtually all of them being men?

And then there's this https://www.amazon.com/How-Autism-Epidemic-J-B-Handley/dp/1603588248/ref=pd_aw_fbt_14_img_2/138-3139197-7280332?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1603588248&pd_rd_r=73e89c47-6ae5-11e9-9f47-dd789adca390&pd_rd_w=AAPi4&pd_rd_wg=IKvKS&pf_rd_p=3ecc74bd-d08f-44bd-96f3-d0c2b89f563a&pf_rd_r=Q9F6RNT74Y9VNDY8X33T&psc=1&refRID=Q9F6RNT74Y9VNDY8X33T

If I could just recommend an amazing book that concerns things like this:

How We Know What Isn't So by Thomas Gilovich is absolutely one of the greatest and most life-changing book I've ever read.

I recommend you read How we know what isn't so for understanding what is wrong with using yourself and/or those you know as the reason spanking does not cause violence.

Spanking is correlated with increased violent behavior later in life. Is that because violent kids are more likely to get spanked? Maybe. Is it only those who got badly spanked (abused) that end up violent? Maybe. Is it only those who got spanked capriciously? Maybe.

It doesn't really matter that we don't know if those confounding factors are more important or not. You cannot say that spanking doesn't cause violent behavior when the two are correlated unless you have data that shows either that they are not actually correlated or that they have another cause. Your sample set sucks and the conclusion you draw from it is a hasty generalization.

I'm not trying to sound like I'm attacking you here, and this will likely be my last post.

I just want to say anecdotes are NOT evidence because the conditions are unknown and uncontrolled. Another good read about that here. They can be extremely misleading. At best, they are observations that can serve as the basis for deciding to study something. I know what you mean, but this is a really important point. I also didn't miss the part where you mention the treatment could have been something you didn't know about (like steroids). This is an example of why anecdotes cannot be evidence. I also think the secret steroid thing doesn't need to come into this discussion; I have heard similar reports of acupuncture effects.

I did not mean to single out your memory in particular, but I wanted to make the point that with anecdotes memory IS an issue. Check out this book. Our recollection of events can be significantly distorted, though its hard to believe.

The articles I cited above address your point of a dog having no concept of treatment and placebo. Most likely true! But my point was that the placebo effect can appear because of perception or situations around the animal - i.e. there are other factors involved.

You can't know "it wasn't some postivie experience for her that perked her up" or anything else. Even the stress you mentioned might have contributed to the placebo effect for all we know. I don't see how you can say the possible explanations I provided are out of the question.

Again, I don't want to sound like I'm being a jerk or attacking you. I did want to address how science views anecdotes. It sounds like we are on the same page at any rate. My points were just that placebo effect is a broad term that encompasses a lot of errors and bias and that it may well exist in animals.

Certainly. You aren't racist ... but.. black lives matter dont understand black people are racist too. You aren't one of those crazy anti science global warming denialists... but ... celebrities and nazi pedophiles, right? And denialists shouldn't be picked on because because they are pointing out some science is dodgy. And while you can split hairs by carefully saying " I didn't say" this or that, it was carefully implied which allowed you to imediately deny that was your intention when you are called on it. Please read the book, follow it with https://www.amazon.com/How-Know-What-Isnt-Fallibility/dp/0029117062 and https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Fast-Slow-Daniel-Kahneman-ebook/dp/B004R1Q2EG

Define the features you place on this word "god."


All of this proves what I call god doesn't exist.

God has one or more of theses features:

• transcendent mind
  
• telepathy
  
• magic
  
• consciously controlling reality
  
• using nothing to make something
  
  Why these things fail:
  
  
• every mind we know about requires a physical brain and people used hyperactive agent detection to decide things without minds have them
  
• many versions of god exist in imagination yet nobody can prove any of them for reality
  
• violates physics and never observed
  
• without a mind this is impossible
  
• everything comes from something before it (until you reach a scientific nothing which is still something in the philosophical sense)
  
  Also :
  
  
• the kalam's cosmological argument is about a first state of existence not a first being
  
• if god is greater than anything we can think of by also existing it is complex requiring a precursor
  
• god can't evolve from simple to complex failing kalam and anselm before anything else exists
  
• outside of reality means imaginary
  
• http://www.humanreligions.info/hyperactive_agent_detection.html takes the facts and explains them logically
  
• https://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0029117062/65536-21 shows how intellect is flawed
  
• the levels of cognition are instinct, intellect, and knowledge
  
• knowledge means knowing things, when you know facts you know the truth
  
• verifiable facts require empirical evidence
  
• I provided evidence
  
• you provided argument to the stone
  
• just because god is obvious to you doesn't mean it exists
  
• if you can't show me god exists you don't know that god exists
  
• if you can't prove me wrong you don't know that I don't know god doesn't exist
  
• if you define god as something that obviously does exist I don't consider it god
  
• my definition of god does not exist
  
• if I'm wrong prove it
  
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_the_stone - since you say I'm wrong and can't prove it
  
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_by_assertion - since you say evolution proves god but you can't prove that either.
  
  https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2018/01/31/the-four-scientific-meanings-of-nothing/
  
  The scientific nothing used for a universe from nothing is not the same thing as a philosophical nothing. The philosophical nothing is never observed and may not exist except outside all existence. Nothing at all can exist outside all existence because that is no place and no time with no properties whatsoever. Outside existence doesn't exist basically.
  
  What happened before the big bang? Nobody actually knows and that is okay. Everything after the big bang was completely natural and we have no indication that before it was any different. "God did it" is only valid in a fact debate if you can prove it.
  
  The deist god literally uses magic to take a philosophical nothing and turning it into something yet has no place or time to exist within. The theist god is based on religious text and those fail on things we can test easily.

This all sounds pretty normal, and like a non-'problem' that will fix itself before you know it.

At least the kid sounds normal. What doesn't sound healthy:

> He blames me for the way she is.
> He says she's spoiled

You can't spoil a kid with love; dude has some bizarre thinking on this. And you both need to stop blaming and nagging. There's nothing wrong with the kid and if you spend the early years sniping at each other you will miss out on a really lovely time that flies by really quickly.

I would do more reading on normal babies -- this is something you might both read together.

> When I'm home and I try to hand her off for a bit she usually cries.

So don't hand her off. Stick around while she gets to enjoy both of you. Have family meals; have dad provide any needed assistance with solids. Play games together as a family. The more secure she is that mommy isn't just going to take off and leave her with daddy and never return, the easier it will be for you to leave. Keep building a good secure foundation, and don't force things she's just not developmentally ready for.

the baby book. my daughter is a week tomorrow. love this book, lots of great tips, great information for both partners. coming from a dad.


http://www.amazon.ca/Baby-Book-Revised-Everything-About/dp/0316198269/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374470043&sr=8-1&keywords=the+baby+book

for practical / medical books, my wife and I would highly recommend the Dr. Sears book to all of our friends. our son is 4 and our daughter is 3 months, and we still reverence it :

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0316198269

Playful Parenting by Cohen.

It's a great book about how important play is to kids and to parents. Using play to stay connected to my son and get him to behave feels like cheating sometimes. We have a great relationship, and he's really well behaved.

It also has great tips for using playtime to help circumvent and or conquer unnecessary fears in a toddler or young child.

Topical - Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids https://www.amazon.com/dp/0345507983/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_LAXQBb6Z6ZVB9

This is a great book:
http://www.amazon.com/Simplicity-Parenting-Extraordinary-Calmer-Happier/dp/0345507983

1. Simplicity Parenting - by Kim John Payne
   
2. 10/10
   
3. Parenting advice
   
4. A little different from what would normally be recommended but hey...if you have a kid, are about to have a kid, know someone having a kid or ever want to have a kid, put this book in your queue. Great advice through out and I can't wait to apply it more with my new family.
   
5. Amazon

That's somewhat true, but not entirely.

We know from psychological research that explicitly rewarding or praising children's EFFORT is great for them, and praising their innate abilities (intelligence and looks usually, but also just talking about how "you're a natural!") is generally bad for them (see: growth mindset.) We know that there are a number of issues with the children of inconsistent parents: there's a lot more family conflicts, conduct problems, issues with depression, and they have self-esteem issues as adults (there's probably a lot more, honestly.) We also know that children are most compliant (and really, this applies to people and animals in all situations) when you use a combination of both positive reinforcement (giving them things for good behavior) and negative punishment (taking things AWAY for bad behavior) and for younger kids, time-out (see: Guidance for Effective Discipline). We also know that verbal reprimands aren't effective if used frequently, and that spanking (corporal punishment generally) is associated with higher rates of future substance abuse and violent criminal activity, as well as an increase in aggression immediately.

I know you're suggesting there is no ONE authoritative book that tells every parent how to act in every situation, but there are quite a few (this looks particularly good) that say the same sorts of things as what I'm saying, because it's backed up by research.

Are there kids where this won't work? Yeah, probably, but I suspect this sort of parenting would work for a vast majority of kids if parents started when they were very young and continued to put work into their parenting as the children got older. Kids who had parents that DID NOT do this when they were younger (~birth to five years old) could be essentially doomed to be problem children for the rest of their lives (into adulthood) if their parents were substantially poor parents though, for sure.

I would suggest reading the following books:

http://www.amazon.com/Drama-Gifted-Child-Search-True/dp/0465012612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323483898&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Your-Own-Good-Child-Rearing-Violence/dp/0374522693/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323483921&sr=8-1

Perhaps we have differing ideas on what "horrible person" means.

Or maybe we don't, considering that you went straight for a Hitler analogy (although, even in the case of Hitler, I would refer you to this book).

In any case, feel free to replace my last sentence with, "Well, next time you make a choice that you know is going to hurt somebody, I'll be sure to write you off as a horrible person."

And yes, I am bored.

For an intriguing (though psychoanalytic) look at how coercive parenting can aid the creation of an oppressive society, you may be interested in For Your Own Good by Alice Miller.

When our kids were little, my wife and I kept referring to Your Baby and Child.

Penelope Leach's Your Baby and Child does a really good job of explaining situations in a way that represents a young child's perspective of them. It can be easier to empathize with your kids if you can understand how they view the world.

With that said, you should be proud of the way you are responding to a situation that really disturbed you as a parent. Putting yourself in timeout, calling your spouse and your therapist, and investigating ways to handle things better in the future are all really positive ways to proceed. You clearly have developed a lot of skills and emotional tools that your parents didn't have, and that's the result of a lot of hard work on your part. Hang in there!

I bought my husband this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Experimenting-Babies-Amazing-Science-Projects/dp/0399162461

It's a very easygoing read and the 'experiments' are simple and fun

http://www.amazon.com/Experimenting-Babies-Amazing-Science-Projects/dp/0399162461

This was a fun book and explains a lot about development. It helped my husband bond a bit more when he felt like there wasn't much he could do.

Random enough, somebody shared this book in my local Buy Nothing group on FB this week. Might be just what you’re looking for.

Experimenting with Babies: 50 Amazing Science Projects You Can Perform on Your Kid https://www.amazon.com/dp/0399162461/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_rfJRDbR3FKY4Z

FWIW - I have not read the book so I’m not endorsing it or experiments on your children. 😄

My husband got me a book called Experimenting with Babies: 50 Amazing Science Projects You Can Perform on Your Kid that explains this and other neat developmental phenomena. It is great fun.

Check out this book, if interested.

http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130

So far my highly recommended ones would be:

NurtureShock

Your Self-Confident Baby

Dear Parent: Caring for Infants With Respect

It's OK Not to Share and Other Renegade Rules for Raising Competent and Compassionate Kids (Currently reading this one now)

I tried reading The Baby Whisperer The Child Whisperer but couldn't get past the second chapter. It reads like an infomercial for the book and it was just awful.

The book Nurtureshock (http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1324347141&sr=8-1) has a lot of fascinating studies about children and teens (including the one you mentioned about starting school later) that, as the description says, "upends a library's worth of conventional wisdom."

The study was done at the University of Texas in 2006. I do not have an internet link but they discuss it and others in Chapter 3 of this book: http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1312430754&sr=8-1

This book is full of some awesome insights into parenting.

Whether or not you spank your children is not by itself going to determine if they are lazy, selfish, or defiant. Parenting (and children) are a lot more complicated then that. Children do need structure/discipline but there are many valid ways to implement that.

I read a book called Nurture Shock with a summary of research on different parenting issues. If I recall correctly it basically said that spanking/physical punishment is not shown to have long term negative effects in cultures where it is common. In cultures where it is uncommon spanking does have long term negative effects. So if you live in an area where spanking is uncommon don't spank as your child will end up wondering why his parents hit him when his friends parents would never hit his friends and this can cause negative long term effects. If that is normal to the child (everyone in your area uses this form of discipline) they will feel differently and be okay.

The bigger issue to me here though is that your boyfriend is very uncomfortable with it. If you are considering having a child with him it seems like a bad idea for you to use a form of punishment he considers abusive. Also, even more important then punishment is modeling the behavior you want your child to have. Your child is going to learn to do as you do more then you say. So you should be having a child with someone you consider to be a good example of how you would like that child to grow up.

While this is completely unrelated to what you asked for, I recommend this book to any logically-minded parents.

The second comment on the page is gold too.

'How Not to Achieve Freedom' is an entire book on libertarian infighting by Stef. Just sayin'.

I try to keep libertarian infighting to an minimum that I possibly can although I probably take more potshots than I should (although I try to be fair in the shots that I take).

Divorce rates by faith group according to the Barna report [1]:

All adults 33% 3792

Evangelical Christians: 26%

Non-evangelical born again Christians: 33%
Notional Christians: 33%
Associated with non Christian faith: 38%
Atheist or agnostic: 30%
All born again Christians : 32%
All non born again Christians: 33%

Protestant 34%
Catholic 28%

Upscale 22%
Downscale 39%

White 32% 2641
African-American 36%
Hispanic 31%
Asian 20%

Conservative 28%
Moderate 33%
Liberal 37%

Also

>In addition to finding that four out of every five adults (78%) have been married at least once, the Barna study revealed that an even higher proportion of born again Christians (84%) tie the knot. That eclipses the proportion among people aligned with non-Christian faiths (74%) and among atheists and agnostics (65%).

OK I generally agree with this video, even if I don't entirely agree with the methods.

According to this very weak study from a biased source, families who practice Natural Family Planning have a 5% divorce rate [2], substantially lower than the typical rate even among Conservatives.

If you want to lower your chances of divorce, be an Asian Catholic who is also conservative and doesn't use contraception. Are Asian Catholics who don't use contraception the most influential demographic in America? No not really.

It's funny that Stefan strongly criticizes the demographic with the lowest divorce rate while also saying that libertarians should move towards being the population with a low divorce rate that forms strong families, while simultaneously encouraging people to join the demographic with the lowest marriage rate (by far) with a moderately high divorce rate.

I think that not spanking children is preferable. However, many families that do practice spanking lack the sophistication, IQ, and cultural cachet to otherwise raise their children. It's like commanding innately incapable people of being smart enough to have high paying jobs. "You really should not be dumb, you person who is not capable of being intelligent." It's a nice sentiment but the people who need to hear the message the most aren't going to be the ones capable of acting on it.

Libertarians or anarcho-capitalists don't need to be THE strongest faction in the world to thrive and survive according to sets of rules that make us happy. We just have to be strong ENOUGH. We don't have to be 100% unified on every single issue that's conceivable. We just have to be unified sufficiently to reach a threshold that makes independence feasible. A lot of hopelessness arrives from setting goals that are unrealistic or too high or deferred too far into the future.

You're not going to convince 220m Indonesians to stop spanking their children. It's also not entirely clear to me that spanking has the same effects across all cultures in all contexts. This book, 'Nurtureshock,' sold a lot of copies and raised a substantial debate about it. [3] Science is a complicated back-and-forth of debate and experimentation. It's incredibly hard to divine ironclad moral norms based on isolated studies that make a naive connection between spanking and IQ.

[1]https://www.barna.org/barna-update/article/15-familykids/42-new-marriage-and-divorce-statistics-released#.UgLq8pJJPXU
[2]http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/natural-family-planning-builds-a-culture-of-life/
[3]http://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Children/dp/0446504130

I'm a nanny and we just started doing a "modified cry-it out" method. We put her in her crib and if she cries, let her cry for 5 minutes. Go in, pick her up and do as little coddling as necessary to calm her down. Put her back in her crib. Wait 10 minutes and then we go in, and repeat adding 5 minutes to the time. If it lasts more than an hours worth of time, we get the baby up for a while (maybe even 15-30 minute) then try again. Though she is only 5.5 months, I suspect it would work the same with your 8 month old.

I believe this was in Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child

Good luck!

My recommendation to all new parents - http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

My ex-wife and I used this on our first child - by the 3rd night she was asleep in under 5 minutes. When my son was born, we started the process a bit earlier, same result. They are now 5 and 7, and to this day fall asleep in minutes, and I still feel what we learned from this book is the reason why. Setting a routine early on will benefit you and your child for years to come ;)

My wife and I are/were/are going to be again in a similar situation. We came to this agreement:

• She agreed to take the nights after 12pm (when i go to bed).
  
• On weekends we both get a day to sleep in
  
• On weekends/days off I try to get up with the baby (I also can sleep through the baby)
  
  Some other things:
  
  
• I don't think you need to go to the baby every time (obv. not everybody agrees with me on this), get rid of the baby monitor, if your kid is anything like mine, you don't need it
  
• When you talk to your wife about this, acknowledge her difficult position, then acknowledge yours (hopefully she acknowledges yours).
  
• Be ready to take that baby when you get home until you go to bed; this part will suck
  
• Sometimes you will need to suck it up and be sleep deprived.
  
• When you start sleep training (we did this at 5 months), everything gets immensely better
  
• We found the book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child to be very helpful (http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023). This is not for everyone, but it was for us.
  
  
  edit: I forgot to mention, it does get easier.
  

I think a lot of it depends on temperament. She might not be suited to CIO w/ checks. A friend of mine recommended a book, "healthy sleep habits, healthy child" link:

https://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0

We're on night 7 of Ferber and he went from 120 min (day 1) to 50, to 10, and diminishing from there, but I think the first night lasted so long because us going in to comfort him actually worked him up more

But Ferber has a chapter on "what if it's not working..." have you bought the book? That chapter might be really helpful for you

It sounds as if you've tried a lot of things, but how long have you stuck to just one consistent routine? I understand that sleep training is very difficult to get through, but it's really important to stick to one method for at least a week or two before deciding that it absolutely doesn't work.

We used a modified CIO method for our daughter, The Sleepeasy Solution and it worked really well for us. Other friends of mine have raved about Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, which advocates an extinction CIO method, but that wasn't for us.

I know it can be really, really hard to listen to your child cry, but if you set strict check in times and stick to your routine for the long haul, I think that helps more than anything else. Our baby's sleep improved within a week or so once we stuck to a plan. She still has bad nights occasionally, but as long as we always go back to the same routine, she knows what to expect. Good luck!!!

get in good shape, take care of yourself.
Get rest
I wouldn't really be angling for a promotion right now

When the baby is born, and this may be a couple of months in. If possible, through bottle feeding or pump - and - serve, try to find a way to go 2 nights on 2 nights off when it comes to waking with the baby in the middle of the night.

This isn't possible for everyone, but my wife and I did it with both of our kids, and I think we were better for it.

Read Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023 or at least the summaries.

Happiest baby on the block by Harvy Karp was helpful as well. "Treat first 3 months as 4th tri-mester" is the general idea.

Sleep problems are fucked, because you end up dealing with complex problems with little or no sleep yourself. My wife and I were in a similar situation (just with respect to sleep, or lack of baby sleeping), and found this book to be a FUCKING GODSEND. I don't know if we just needed something to "follow" or whatever, but we gave this book a good college go, and it worked out for us.

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child

I have never been in your situation, so I don't know how you feel. My best piece of advice though is about sleep for your child. This book literally changed my life. Went from having a moody child that went to bed at 10 - or 11pm and woke up at 6am every day to three days later having a child that went to bed at 6pm and woke up at 8am. It was incredible the difference it made in mine and my spouses life.

I'm definitely not saying that it will work like that for you, but I think well rested kids are of paramount importance for sanity as a parent. I will also say that the first 3 nights of sleep training were terrible. You'll probably need to warn your mom of that. But after that it was like a light switch went off.

http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

For your former partner (again, I've not been in your situation, so take this all with a grain of salt) you can either forget about him, or hold him to his responsibilities. A judge will force the payment be made to support his child. It will come directly out of his paycheck. The only way to get around this is for him to be paid under the table. He will bitch about this. 'Makes him look bad' 'How could you do this to me' are excuses that I've heard from people that have done this. Shouldn't be your problem, not your problem.

That's all I've got. Sorry it's not more. Things will get better.

Only sleeping 2 hours at a time at night is not something I would consider normal. Maybe try implementing healthy sleep patterns first. That might take some time, but it should be worth it.

• Bed time at the same time every night, same bedtime routine.
  
  
• Your child might not be as hungry as you think it is. Babies comfort feed and wake up to seek reassurance. And at 6 months, they definitely don't need to feed every 2 hours. For comparison, I got my prematurely born twins home on a 3 hourly feeding schedule. Try to not feed him and see what happens. Leave him in his crib and pop in a soother instead.
  
  
• He might be teething as well, and at 6 months many babies are crappy sleepers because teething in mighty uncomfortable. Bonjela is your friend.
  
  
• I've seen other moms recommend this book: http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023/
  
  And re CIO: I'm pretty sure you're all going to downvote me into oblivion for this, but frankly, I don't care. For me there are only very few reasons why parents should use any sleep training method at all. I sympathize when you're a working mom with a busy schedule who is out of energy and can't deal, that's definitely a reason. Or, your child has a genuine sleep disorder. And no, waking two to three times a night isn't one, that's just you looking for an excuse. I find it astonishing how often US moms whine about how they want their sleep back at 6 months in. What the heck did you expect? I never hear that here in the UK, yeah, we're tired, we complain about being tired, but that's just the way it is. If you value your sleep so much, get yourself a dog you can train. You might see that I'm a bit pi**ed off here. You know why? I have twins, who are teething, one of whom has his third bronchiolitis since christmas, who has been hospitalised twice since February when we ALL had the flu. They are teething and cranky, and sick, and last night I was up at 12, 1, 2, 3, 4.30-5 and hubs had to get up at 6 because no. 2 had breathing issues again. I was at our local twins club meeting yesterday, do you know how many of the about 15 moms sleep train? None, because getting up at night and being tired is part of the package. Go ahead and CIO, but quit trying to justify your selfishness with "Oh if I'm well rested then my child will benefit." when your kid wakes up one or two times a night" and is a singleton. Bloody hell.

Getting your kid to sleep is the ultimate opportunity to show some alpha. In my experience, moms are way more likely to cave when the kid starts crying/won't stop crying. This is when you hold strong. Hold Mom in your arms, "Baby is fine. She needs to learn to put herself to sleep. She can do it." Etc., etc.

This book changed our lives: http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023.
Our little girl sleeps so well now, takes regular naps, and overall is a much, much happier baby.

http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

This book is awesome and talks about kids and sleep and how to help them from infancy to adulthood

I bought [The Baby Book] (http://www.amazon.com/The-Baby-Book-Revised-Edition/dp/0316198269) before I even started trying to conceive with my first, just on a whim, having never heard of Attachement Parenting and everything clicked. It's a great resource on babies in general, but from a gentle, AP perspective. I'd recommend this book for ANY expecting parents, honestly.

[The Attachment Parenting Book] (http://www.amazon.com/The-Attachment-Parenting-Book-Understanding/dp/0316778095/ref=pd_sim_b_9?ie=UTF8&refRID=0WC7WNX0VS1BQNCQTK5F) contains a lot of the same information, but with some additional resources, and if I recall it goes into slightly more detail.

I'd also highly recommend [Attached at the Heart] (http://www.amazon.com/Attached-Heart-Parenting-Principles-Compassionate/dp/0757317456/ref=pd_sim_b_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=0JWRN280KQTRGGP6NH0M) as an excellent resource for new moms who want to practice AP.

As for other resources, I belong to a lot of AP and gentle parenting groups on facebook which, while sometimes overly preachy or cloying, often offer great blog posts or affirmations to mull over. Even when I'm super busy with kids and life, I can usually spend five minutes to read a facebook post and often that's all I need to recenter myself and keep myself focused on my parenting goals.

wildcard_, Thanks for your comment; it gives me another chance to try condensing the large and varied data on the subject into a short response -- not an easy task, but one I keep working on. For starters, two links: the first two columns of a 5-part series, both of which include discussion of this topic: Part 1: Civil Society Requires Non-Aggression - and one thing more and Part 2: How the Idea of Civil Society was Destroyed

Now a short list of reasons why emotional health is, indeed, crucial to the functioning and protection of a free society:

1. Emotional health (love, the sense of connection with others, compassion, or however you prefer to say it) supports honest behavior, crucial to the market. A society of sociopaths will not remain free for long, assuming it ever is.
   
   
2. Charity and other help for the disabled and poor (of course, in a free market you'd have many fewer poor), especially at sufficient levels, requires emotional health. You apparently believe this function is strictly based on a free market, but to the extent we see voluntary charity NOW or in any situation, it is because most people feel at least some sense of connection to their fellow man. High-tech birth processes in the US -- 20% - 25% of all births here are now C-section, for instance -- harm the mother-newborn bond and to some extent shut down the newborn's sense of connection to others; such a start to life affects outlook, philosophy, physical health, and other predispositions life-long. A recent study found that today's college students score 40% lower on measures of empathy than students did in the 1970s; I believe this corporatist-fueled plague of artificial birth practices is at least partly responsible. The Business of Being Born is a good resource here and especially worth watching by anyone planning to have children.
   
   
3. Widespread emotional health prevents (or reduces, depending on how widespread) the incidence of mass murder that has characterized human societies for centuries. Government itself is a major tool for this, as you know, but a functioning government is not necessary for a democide or for lesser mass-murders, from the small-time Charles Manson type to larger examples such as the Rwandan genocide which was initiated, planned, and largely executed by various groups outside the government and strongly fueled by tribal animosities. Government WAS involved to some extent, but it seems clear that unlike, say, the democides committed by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and so many others, the Rwandan horror was mostly outside of any government's official policy.
   
   
4. Even for the far more common situation of a government murdering its own, widespread emotional damage plays a major role in bringing the perps to power and thenb recruiting willing torturers and executioners. Alice Miller has written extensively on this, especially in regards Nazi Germany; **For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence provides a very detailed look at the issue. See also Ghosts from the Nursery: Tracing the Roots of Violence by Robin Karr-Morse and Meredith S. Wiley for basics about how early experience affects later behavior and Miller's short article Adolf Hitler: How Could a Monster Succeed in Blinding a Nation? -- note that the site graphics at that link are appropriate to the nature of the site, aimed at parents with small children.
   
   The links and references above only scratch the surface.
   

The Whole Brain Child

Unconditional Parenting

I understand your point, and it seems it stems from a place of love and from the need to protect children. Still please consider you might be wrong, there are plenty of non-violent and more effective actions to keep a child safe and educate him or her while at the same time not scarring their little mind and their future selves and propagate violence in society. if you beat your child, even a light spanking, YOU become the danger in their eyes, but at the same time you are necessary and loved, so this cause a deep conflict that will very likely bring to anxiety, trust issues and possibly depression. This has been proven over and over, a quick scholar google search will confirm all this. One good starting book can be this one: https://www.amazon.com/Whole-Brain-Child-Revolutionary-Strategies-Developing/dp/0553386697/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1496839146&sr=8-1&keywords=whole+brain+child

Good for you, you must feel real smart.
Maybe start with this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-End-Autism-Epidemic-Revealing/dp/1603588248
Or don't. Good luck. Peace.

Interesting discussion. I remember readinging Thomas Gilovich's How We Know What Isn't So: The Infallibility of Human Reasoning and one of the points he made was that in sports, the away team almost always receive harsher punishments from referees and are viewed as aggressors and penalized more.

He stated that the reasoning for this was that the darker colors away teams wear are associated with violence and aggression in western society so it is easier for referees to inadvertently reach biased conclusions so that a 50/50 call might actually be 45/55 or whatever.
Source

Perhaps this viewpoint on color carries on to race and 'colors' our perceptions of others subconsciously.

http://www.amazon.com/Playful-Parenting-Lawrence-J-Cohen/dp/0345442865

I don't understand why parenting is made into a series of battles.

I'm not aware of any studies that support corporal punishment in any regard. If you're interested in this topic, read Alice Miller. I haven't found a better book than For Your Own Good on the subject.

Mind elaborating on your observation a bit more? Because all I ever see in the news these days is how men are demonized and women are put on a silver platter. Lesser jail time for the same crimes, longer lives than men, and young women are treated better in public schools than young men.

Take your pointless white knighting elsewhere.

http://www.amazon.com/Healthy-Sleep-Habits-Happy-Child/dp/0449004023

Problem solved.

I see this place as the opposite. An ideology has taken root in the west that

-Denies that race exists and insists it's a skin deep social construct

-That insists all humans are one universal being

-that America's job is too spread democracy and human rights to the people of the rest of the world, who all can become americans

-that anything local and small is evil

Lawrence Auster, Pt Buchanan, E. Michael Jones, Paul Gottfried, thomas sowell, Steve Pinker, and charles murray are the best critics of this new progressivism. Tumblr is a reflection of it, but it has real world consequences. Look at the treatment of John Derbyshire, Joseph Sobran, and Norman Finkelstein. Look at hate crime laws. Look at the war on drugs, which springs from the idea that drugs cause poverty and crime, not that people themselves are responsible for their actions and the characteristics that lead them to commit crime lead them to drug use. Look at affirmative action programs that [mismatch black students in schools beyond their capabilities, which they drop out from] (http://www.amazon.com/Mismatch-Affirmative-Students-Intended-Universities/dp/0465029965). Look at [ford foundation supported urban renewal social engineering schemes that bulldozed black neighborhoods in the name of "intergration" and were based on the belief that modernist architecture would create morally upright citizens] (http://www.amazon.com/The-Slaughter-Cities-Renewal-Cleansing/dp/1587317753). Look at public schools [doping kids and banning roughhorsing in the name of suppressing masculinity] (http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Boys-Misguided-Policies/dp/1451644183/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1405264818&sr=1-1&keywords=the+war+against+boys). Look at the destruction of the black family by welfare programs [created by upper class white liberals] (http://www.amazon.com/Losing-Ground-American-1950-1980-Anniversary/dp/0465042333/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1405264997&sr=8-1&keywords=losing+ground)





Making fun of otherkin is meaningless. They are powerless. It's the pro victiminzation/environmentalist (meaning people are products of their environment) ideology that is destroying our culture.

Honestly, get into STEM. Get everybody into stem. The reason people fall for psuedo-science so much is a fundamental lack of scientific literacy.

Even though the war that's being fought is cultural, it's only been made possible by the dynamics today by scientific literacy. Jordan Peterson himself has a background in clinical psychology and has years of Academic experience behind him, so he knows how to structure his talks to hit the right notes of the audience he has. The platforms that's enabling us to have these discussions are built by HTML, CSS, PSP and Python programmers. Mathematicians and statisticians structure and analyse the data that's used to gauge voter preferences and target impressionable people with propaganda and advertisements. If you're not extremely educated in this landscape, you're going to lose. It's easy to shit on people like Zucc as being an emotionless lizard man now but he created the platform that arguably controls a good amount of the public discourse.

We have computers in our pockets, and the majority of the people that use them don't even know how they work. If you haven't the privilege to get into a science or technology field then at least start reading books like Carl Sagan's Demon Haunted World and some Thomas Gilovich.