Ceil's Individual Path

Even as a child, I felt a strong desire to be myself. In grade school, I remember one girl who seemed to think she had to read every book I read. The first few times it happened, I let it go. Maybe she really was interested in the same book I was. Then one day she wanted to know what I was reading. I instinctively closed the book and wrapped my arms around it so she couldn't see the title. She looked on the check- out- list and found out anyway.

“When you bring that book back let me know so I can check it out,” she said.

“There are other books,” I said.

“But I want to read the book you’re reading.”

“You can read another book while you wait,” I told her, but she didn’t. She waited until I returned the book and then checked it out. Couldn’t she think for herself? Today I would call that sheep mentality but at the time, her behavior frightened me and I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t care what she read if it was something, she was interested in, but it was terribly wrong in my mind to do anything for no other reason than someone else did it.

Maybe I was trying to save her or maybe I just didn’t want to be responsible for her, but I snuck the book from her desk and hid it. When she found it, I stole it again, but this time I put it back in the library. That ended the game, because she never thought to find a book on her own.

Years later when my first child was born, I worked at the hospital three to eleven. Edward kept the baby at night while I was at work and I kept him in the mornings while Edward went to school. We only had one car so, of course, Edward would bring the baby with him when he came to pick me up. As a result, the child was awake at least until midnight. When my head nurse found out, she came down on me like I was an unfit mother. “But he sleeps during the day,” I told her. According to her, babies had to go to sleep and be awake at certain times.

I thought this was nonsense. Babies are individuals. They come into this world with their own fingerprints, DNA and personality. Keeping him awake so he would sleep late, well, actually so I could sleep late, worked perfectly for all of us. I was very luck he was the first child because that routine would not have worked with my second child. Believe me; I tried to change his sleep patterns. Did not work. Eventually, I learned that there were certain things I had to do to make sure the children were safe and cared for, but things would go better if I allowed them to choose for themselves as much as possible. For example, one of my children, a high energy individual, required frequent small feedings. He wasn’t a chubby kid, he just had a high metabolism, and as long as he cleaned up after himself, I had no problem with these frequent snacks.

In another example, one of the boys chose to wear jeans everywhere. The other boy didn’t even own a pair of jeans and that fit his personality. The boy that wore jeans liked to work on cars, drive the tractor, and do anything outside. It didn’t matter to him what someone else wore; he wore jeans because that was who he was. The boy who never wore jeans went to college to become an accountant and later switched to radio and television. No surprise there. That’s who he was.

If I had insisted that my high energy child could not eat between meals, or that both boys had to dress the same it would not have caused physical injury, but it could have affected their self esteem and their becoming the person they were intended to be. They could have become like the little girl in the first story or they may have developed guilt for eating between meals or insecurity for not dressing like the crowd.