Why your baby is wary of strangers
Let’s talk about attachment.
Our children are almost exactly two years apart but the pandemic has given them slightly different early years experiences, particularly in terms of their relationships with us as parents. Of course, individual differences are expected, but the past year has given us an interesting lens into how we understand normal development.
When S was 15 months, she was extremely clingy to me. If I left the room she’d burst into tears. When we took her to Sicily on a filming trip (combining work and a baby is an adventure in itself) and the airline lost our buggy, we had to carry her for several days before we picked up a replacement. Try carrying a 99th percentile toddler in Sicilian summer (so heavy!) but when I’d pass her to my husband to carry she’d cry until I took her back. On one memorable day we went on a trip to the beautiful Gole dell'alcantara, reached on foot by a few hundred stairs. My husband carried her up and she howled until we reached the top and I took over. It was a stressful end to a beautiful day.
Was she particularly clingy? Perhaps, but that sort of behaviour is actually a sign of a normally attached child who wants to be close to their primary caregiver – i.e. the person they have spent most of their time with. Due to working patterns, in S’s case that was me. The interesting thing is, this didn’t happen with our second. He is equally attached to us both, having had similar doses of us over the past year. Lucky him!
Why is this important? Well, I’ve heard a lot of stories about pandemic babies crying when another stranger as much as looks at them, and friends have expressed worry about clingy behaviour. Here one mother recalls that her child “absolutely screamed the place down” when she saw her grandparents. Interestingly, A also cried at those unfamiliar to him if they so much as looked at him – he did the same when my mother saw him after almost a year apart. He’s been at childcare throughout the pandemic so has had a lot of social contact.
A common misconception is that attachment applies only to one person – a single “familiar” (often the mother) – when in fact, children can be attached to more than one caregiver. This could include relatives, friends or people in their childcare settings. Reassuring, isn’t it? Essentially, it takes the pressure off mothers to have to do and be everything – as some in the attachment parenting philosophy have long proposed. It’s especially common among Western parents that one primary caregiver does more of the childcare (spoiler, usually the mother*). In many indigenous groups others take a much more active role.
Besides, what we think of normal when it comes to parenting is anything but – we are all products of cultural customs and ingrained habits. Worrying too much about attachment fears ironically serves to put more pressure and guilt onto mothers, causing additional stress, when a simple solution is more egalitarian parenting (which in turn makes for happier, healthier relationships too, by the way).
Whilst a lot of babies have had reduced social contact this past year**, screaming in the faces of strangers doesn’t mean they are acting abnormally, it can simply be a sign of a securely attached child who is understandably wary of anyone he or she is not used to seeing.
*NB for all the men reading this, it’s not that dads don’t want to do as much as mums. In the way our society is set up, men are often expected to (and do) work longer hours than women, who in turn work the majority of part-time roles. Look at any employment statistics and you’ll see what I mean. Over time this adds up to, well, a lot… and perpetuates the cycle.
** we know older children can be affected by a lack of social contact. While this post is about infants, for those with older children who are experiencing emotional issues, the following articles have useful information and advice:
·Previous post: How much do young children really understand about coronavirus?
·Helping Children With Anxiety in the Pandemic (New York Times £)
·Covid Anxiety: Child 'asking if he's going to die' (BBC News)
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