“One of the first things I was taught by my late health and parenting mentor, Aleksandra Trent, was that children needed a calm environment – as well as very strong routine and discipline – from 3 months of age and through the formative years”

This would offer structure for the child and enable them to have a sense of security in knowing what to expect in a day, which would eliminate any anxiety from not knowing what to expect next.

Not providing for this contributes to the possibility of the child having learning and focusing difficulties and the under development of their emotional intelligence, taking away from their natural ability to focus and learn well. This could potentially lead to things such as ADHD, etc. This is because they are feeling anxious or nervous the whole time, which leads to breakdowns and, as a result, the brain switches of and is unable to focus on the task at hand.

She was also very clear that a mother and a father always needs to be on the same page, acting as a united front at all times, even when they disagree on matters. She always emphasised the importance of how a mother always needs to speak highly about the father in front of the child and that any quarrels between parents were extremely damaging to a child’s psychological and emotional development. In my common reasoning, this makes complete sense. It is highly stressful for a child to be stuck between a mother’s and a father’s different perspectives. They have no way of choosing sides and they love both equally. Hence, such a child will experience immense emotional trauma should such persistent quarreling be part of the family’s environment.

Such imbalances in the family dynamics within the formative years of a child’s life would inevitably lead to developmental problems on various levels.

I was also told that a child whose father remains as the breadwinner, disciplinarian and in the protective role, and whose mother remains in the role of nurturer, guiding parent and boundary setter, are guaranteed well and balanced development, without ever having any gender confusion.

None of this made any sense to me at the time but, as time went by, I not only studied the Bible for deeper answers, but read some books on relationships too and – in many ways – the same was suggested between the different roles of man and woman, father and mother.

With all this information, I soon realised that I could not allow my child the possible outcomes which the latter may create: the latter being the choice of raising our child with the ways in which we are doing things in the modern world or Western civilization. This is a 360 degree difference to how things were done in ancient times up until about 100 years ago, when common child disorders such as AD, ADHD, PTSD, depression and mood disorders, only to name a few, were not even a reality to families. If found, it was said that a demon possessed their child.

It is common in our times for a mother to be part, if not full breadwinner, who has to drop her child of with someone else from 7am to 5pm from the age of 3 months, leaving the child desperate for the mother’s love, attention and nurturing from a young age. It is common in our times to see young people struggle to keep healthy relationships going and maintaining them, if you just look at the high divorce rate amongst our newer generations. It is very common for same sex relationships in our times. It is very common for young children to be on drugs such as Ritalin etc. just to be considered “NORMAL”. Not to mention the amount of young people suffering from severe depression and anxiety, who are medicated for such conditions from a young age and I could not help but stop for a moment at this reality and ask myself:

BUT WHY IS THIS?

I am certainly not saying all of it is fact, but I wasn’t willing to test the waters and tempt fate- Knowing what I know about modern children’s’ conditions in the new age and having observed how children are being raised nowadays either.

I might be a chancer by jumping out of airplanes at 12 000 ft. above ground level with only a parachute to steer my way back to safety, but I am certainly not the kind of chancer who is willing to create the same old results we are facing in our modern times, by following the ways that are obviously responsible for such outcomes. I have learned: if you want different results in life, then you must start doing things differently.

As Albert Einstein said: “insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

There was no way that I was following suit with these silly modern ways and hoping and praying for the best for my child. And besides, I trusted this woman and her knowledge with my entire life and I had good reason to do so too.

So I decided to adjust my life immediately, in order to support my daughter by ensuring I was always present in her young, evolving life and I made sure she had a strong routine, sound discipline and I started to make work on my relationship with my husband, where I noticed we were off track as to what it is that a child needs from their parents.

I spoke to my husband about it and we both agreed that we will give our child these very basic structures that will fulfill her needs and allow her to always feel secure, loved and supported in herself and with her own family dynamics.

In the next installment, we talk about how we handled our life as parents on the new laws we chose to follow.