Passing Through The Veil

By Which I Explain The Law Of Unexpected Consequences

There were quite a few things I didn't expect about becoming a mother. I never expected to, and recoiled from, the idea that I'd discuss the contents of Beltane's nappies, for instance. A few weeks in, I realised that babies don't do much to communicate what's going on, and that the contents of a nappy is telling you something about the baby: so I started talking about the contents of Beltane's nappies.

I still tried not to do it with non-parents. Especially as the nappies were not smelly and disgusting (such is the fate of those changing formula fed babies' nappies - it's the undigested fats in formula, going rank in the gut, that creates nasty nappy smells. See, didn't I tell you the contents of a nappy tells you something?) so I didn't need to pull the "Oh look, have sympathy for me, I'm dealing with nasty baby poo" card. As it happens, most of the nappy changing was done by Osiris anyway, and he was as happy with the sweet smell of Beltane's poo as I was. Yes, we did indulge in the "projectile poo" discussions... but I still tried not to with people who did not have nappy using children.

But the biggest thing I didn't expect about becoming a mother, was not the things I'd thought about and decided upon changing... it was that in the world of parenting, what you do is not simply about What You Do. It's also about What Others Think You've Said, When You Do Things.

I discovered, that simply doing something, was making statements. Huge bold statements. Most of them aggressive. And I'd never opened my mouth. But the statement was heard, loud and clear, nonetheless. Just by doing A), I was also carrying a loud hailer and screeching B), even if I didn't open my mouth.

Confused? Allow me to explain with a few choice examples.

Babywearing. We had a wonderful didymos wrap. It was a birthing present from a cousin who said "Don't bother with a pram" and bought us the sling. She was right, we didn't need a pram. We went from the car to the shops, back to the car. A pram was useless. So we used a wrap instead. Sounds simple enough. Except we found that by using a sling, we were saying things we had not intended. We were, for instance, saying...

"Prams are evil and the work of the devil and if you have one you ARE A BAD PARENT." All we had to do was turn up somewhere with Beltane in his wrap, and we were condemning every parent in the building, who had a pram.

It was most confusing. People would come up and defend pram use to us. "Of course, I have a bad back." "I can't get my shopping in a sling." And then, of course, there were the all out attacks: "That baby is going to freeze to death, where is its pram?" "What are you going to do if it rains?" Once, when Beltane was happily leaning back in his sling, looking up at leaves moving in a tree, a women came up and slammed his head up onto my chest. She also screeched "That baby is going to hurt its neck in that thing." and then moved on. I was in such shock, I didn't hit her. But it was clear to us, very quickly, that by using a wrap or a sling, We Said Something Bad about people who didn't.

Breastfeeding was the same. Much worse, in fact. Just by breastfeeding, I was saying "Formula is poison and you are a shit parent if you formula feed." Speaking wasn't actually necessary. All I had to do was feed Beltane when we were out and about. With people we actually knew, it was even worse. Then, I also, apparently, had a loud hailer that said to any women near me who was using a bottle "You are a crap mother and I have the moral high ground and I can grind my stiletto into your face and make you feel like shit."

Again, I didn't have to speak. I once popped into a neighbour, to give her some mail, and she was making up a bottle of formula in the kitchen. I didn't get out of the house until I'd had a full explanation of why she needed a break in the afternoon and the baby was hungry and she needed some down time and it was perfectly acceptable to mix feed and could she have some sympathy please?

I hadn't spoken a word. In fact, I'd not clocked what she was doing, till she started defending herself. In fact.. how many of you reacted to me pointing out smelly nappies are because of formula? Perfectly factual comment. No weighting or moral point about it. Just Is. Did you react? Hah! Did you think "Oh, I bet someone sees that as criticism...."

Oh boy. Someone is ALWAYS going to see anything you do as a parent, as criticism. More so if you do something less mainstream than others. This isn't a simple sliding scale of mainstream versus alternate. It depends entirely on who you are with, and where you are going. One person's mainstream viewpoint, is another's freaking green eco-warrier cry to arms. Nappies, baby wearing, breastfeeding, vaccinations, teething... all battle grounds. Don't even begin to mention sleep, sleep training or crying it out.

No matter how crunchy you think you are, some one else is going to be crunchier than you, and think you are 'mainstream'. No matter how much you think it's okay to do something a bit different, you are going to be attacked for doing ANYTHING at all. Everyone lets you know that your action, is both unacceptable, and an unspoken criticism of them.

It's just bizarre. It's also devisive. It's also, ultimately, harmful to babies. The world of all things parenting being criticised for everything, reduces true risk to nothing, and encourages everyone to think all things are up for grabs. This isn't true: there are things you simply should not do to babies. You should not harm them, or put them in the way of harm. But even when there is sound medical and scientific evidence of what harm is.. everything is reduced to parental choice and opinion. In a world where everything is up for criticism, all criticism is equal. For every 'choice', there is a 'defence'. Dangerous and damaging practices, such as cutting the end of your baby boy's penis off... becomes on par with discussing whether or not to put fluoride in your 4 year old's toothpaste. Discussions on depriving babies of food and solace, in order to make them sleep through the night in a biologically induced coma... are on par with whether or not you choose a BPA free bottle for your organic formula. Real criticism is sidelined into perceived criticism... and we all lose. Especially the babies.

As a parent, no matter what you do, or don't do, you learn two things quickly:

1) Someone will think you are nuts for doing what you do

and

2) Someone will assume you are criticising them for not doing what you do

Do note that "NOT". It's not about actively criticising things. There are loads of things I will actively criticise. Very rarely to a parent's face, as that's not going to help anyone, but in general terms. In general terms, I will criticise sleep training, scheduling hungry babies and infant genital mutilation. I will stand up and say "These things are harmful and we should, as a culture, stop doing them." I will criticise not using a proper car seat, and I will argue what a proper car seat is, for a small child. If you are pregnant, and you ask me, I'll point out formula feeding has risks, and then leave you to decide for yourself, what you do. I'll criticise medical support agencies for not supporting mothers to breastfeed effectively. I'll criticise you if you hit your child, or belittle it, or ask it to do something it's not developmentally capable of. If you are hitting your child a lot, I'll report your damn ass to the authorities if you've refused all offers of help.

There are things I will criticise. But my point here is not the things you genuinely criticise. We all have to stand up for what we believe in. My point is the concept that by doing action A, you are criticising others for not doing it. It's that when you do something, you are automatically - with no intention on your part - criticising those who DO NOT do what you do. You have implied nothing... it's all in their court. They have inferred it for themselves. It is owned by them. It's utterly out of your hands.

It sucks. And it's part of being a parent. And the less mainstream you are, the more your actions are deemed to imply criticism of others.

You are at the mercy of the person who is making the assumption. The only thing you can learn to do... is ignore it. To learn to slip under the wire. To side step the moments where you will be perceived as Being Against Something... by not revealing what it is you do.

When dealing with other parents, you learn to never raise any parenting issues. When dealing with your family, on parenting, you only speak when spoken to. You put actual discussion of issues to one side, and only ever discuss them in safe spaces. Spaces where you are sure you are speaking to those with similar viewpoints. Otherwise.. you never know how SOMEONE will react to something you do. You keep your head down and slip under the wire.

You go undercover.

We thought, 5 years in, we were experts at it. We thought we had it sussed! We'd learned to avoid, deflate, confuse and confound everyone on just about everything. The art of saying nothing. "Is he sleeping through the night?" "Sleep's going fine, thanks." "How's he doing on solids?" "Weaning is going fine, thanks." "Is he potty trained yet?" "We're happy, thanks"

As Beltane got older, we thought we were over the hump. All the dangers - the conversations that could not be had - were slipping away. We were no longer in a war of unexpected consequences. Just by being who we were, we were know longer attacking everyone else, silent and unspoken.

How wrong we were.

As Beltane got older, and began to attend a play based Nursery, the questions started. Worse, they were to him not us:

"Are you excited about going to school soon?"

"What school are you going to?"

"Have you got your school uniform yet?"

It was, and is, relentless. In shop queues, on the train, at the playground. As a child gets older, the default setting for all and any contact... was school. School is the central touch stone. The safe subject. The North Star of useless, casual conversations.

Unlike all the other areas, it is totally unavoidable. You confront it everyday. And as the child ages, it just gets worse. There is simply no way to avoid answering that you are not going to send your child to formal schooling. Beltane, before hitting age 5, learned to say "I'm home educated." as a way of defending himself against uncomfortable silences and pauses, and adults pushing him to give an answer about 'when he was going to school'.

It's not comfortable, working out a deflect strategy with your 4 year old. Although it was nice empowering him to feel safe and secure when the strange questions were asked.

But it's the things we don't say, that are causing us problems, again. For we are discovering that now Beltane is of school age, and we are no longer speaking of our intent to home educate, but we are slipping into being home educators... that we really are in dark territory. We're discovering how loudly we are criticising others.

For when we say "We're home educating actually." we've discovered we are also saying...

"Schools are shite. Any parent who sends their child to school is shite. All teachers are shite. Any one who was ever in a school is SHITE. And you ARE A BAD PARENT if you don't home educate."

Several things are despicable about this. Not least of all that home education is not a choice. Home education is what you do when you bring the baby home. Home education is how the baby is sitting upright, eating foods, drinking fluids and playing with their toys. Home education is how they know the colour red from the colour blue.

All children are home educated. Every single one. If you doubt this, go find footage of children from a Romanian AIDS orphanage. Witness the utterly silent children and babies as they head bang into cots and beds, view the shambling disconnected movements of children so damaged by lack of attention their brains are jelly. Observe a child that's never been home educated: only kept warm and fed enough for basic survival. No human interaction to allow them to develop normally, and teach them that red is different from blue, or how to hold cutlery and how to chew. No arms to hold them when they cried... so they simply stopped crying.

So it's not that we decided to home educate. It's that we don't choose to change that. If you have a child in formal schooling, you chose to initiate that as an additional activity in your child's life. You chose to add it. You filled in forms, and made it happen.

We did not make that choice. We've not performed that action. We've not opted into something. We haven't filled in a form saying we home educate. We've done nothing. We've just not initiated formal schooling. We're just carrying on as we are.

And by doing that, we're criticising you for doing something different?

Come again?

It gets worse, of course. because unlike baby wearing, and breastfeeding, and gentle discipline... you find out that you're not just criticising the individual by not electing to use the formal school system... you're criticising Society, Western Culture and Civilisation As We Know It.

To some, you are also saying:

"You are a shit person and you live in a shit country with a shit culture and I'm rejecting all society and all civilised laws and what's more I'm personally attacking you for being the worst sort of person it is possible to be and I'm assuming you live an a cruel and torturous world. I am rejecting all you have ever been."

If they are parents of school attending children, you are also saying:

"YOU ARE A BAD PARENT and only my child is worthy of attention and love and nurture as YOU CLEARLY DON'T CARE FOR YOUR CHILD."

Home education, so far, in our experience, is the gold standard in "I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE REALLY SAYING." Trust me, you don't even have to breath heavily, to get this reaction from some people.

When you say you home educate, suddenly you're a vampire at a blood donation drive.

You are rejecting all that is good and right and clean in the world, and you are stating that social structures that exist to keep society together.. are Bad Things. On the personal level you are damaging your kids by refusing the wholesome and pure experience of being with their peers whilst they earn their academic flying colours... on the cultural, you are attacking and damaging the fabric of society. The absence of your child in the social structures of the day, will weaken society.

And don't you dare try and explain your choices.. for every statement will be met with what you really mean: "YOU ARE A SHITE PARENT." Doesn't matter why you say you are not choosing to change your life - all that will be heard is: "You Are Bad For Not Home Educating."

The crazy thing about this... the truly crazy awful thing...? I don't know a single person who doesn't have reservations about formal schooling. I don't know a single person who does not admit, and discuss at length, that formal education is not meeting our needs as a society. Not one person I know, is not anxious about something wrong with formal schooling. Particularly teachers. No one can agree on what a 'good' education is, or how to achieve that in a way that serves both child, and society. and tax payers. The current system has been changed so many times in the past 20 years it's the classic swan designed by committee - a complete turkey. Everyone accepts that schools are performing less well in basic skills and literacy than ever before, and that many students are deeply unhappy.

Yet.. yet.. if you say you're not going to use that system... you are suspect. Truly suspect. It's not pleasant, it's actually slightly sinister. You're having your Party credentials checked - are you a member of The Human Race? Or are you a plant for the other party? The non-human one? Satanism, demonism, vampirism.. anything undead and unholy. You've rejected the sacred and hallowed ground of The School, and so exist in some weird shadowy veil of darkness. You walk on unhallowed ground.

As Beltane is now 5, and of school age, it really is like slipping under a veil and becoming Something Else. When once his being in a shop with us during 'school time' was not noticeably, it's now obvious that people look at us with a "Why isn't that child in school?" When they ask him why he's not in school, and he answers "I'm home educated!" they look around in panic. Very few manage to recover themselves, or stammer out a reply. Most purse their lips and stare at you.

We smile and move on.

It's not so easy to do so with those we know, who are using the School system. Especially family. Every one has a reactive response to anything you say. No matter what you say is your positive reason for not using the School system, you are criticising them. Say you like being close to you child: you're saying they are not close to their child, or don't like being close to your child. Say you are happy to continue learning at home: you are saying they aren't.

You Simply Can't Win.

No matter what you say, they will always hear something else.

And in the spirit of simply not being able to win... welcome to Unhallowed Ground.

We know we're dark, mysterious, unholy and probably destined for being undead. We relish the fact that you, and your attitudes to us, is slipping us under a veil. We will walk in our world when we choose to, and carry on raising our child as we see fit. Our child is our business and none of yours. We don't care two hoots what you think we're saying about you.

It's not about you.

It's about us.

Deal With It.