Parenting from the Inside Out

[jempd]

I am reading two books right now that touch on the subject of attachment quite a bit without being part of the contemporary AP movement, more academic. One is Parenting from the Inside Out and the other is The Emotional Life of the Toddler. What's fascinating to me is how attachment is studied, how the studies are conducted, and what the researchers are taking from these studies. And not just the formal studies but what they learn from observing children and parents interact. Everything points to the importance of attachment. For example Parenting from the Inside Out is not about wearing your baby or cosleeping per se, but being able to be present to interact in a significant way with your baby or child because you are not preoccupied with whatever it is that makes you emotionally unavailable, i.e., living in the past because you have never fully recovered from a crummy childhood yourself and so forth. Strong argument for sorting out your own issues before parenting. But on the other hand, I find it a hopeful and encouraging book, saying in effect that you can heal from a not-optimal past and be present for your child with some self-awareness. It stresses the same AP idea though, which is that children need to form a secure attachment at birth on, as does The Emotional Life of the Toddler. I know that such an idea is not exactly challenged anywhere, but they do mean responding to your child's need to be picked up, to be comforted, whenever, and that not doing so affects the attachment.