The Parenting Dance

 

Many parents go through a period where they struggle to understand what their children are telling them.   In more challenging situations, parents can have a hard time connecting with their babies.  I often suggest they try considering these times in a new framework.  Consider parenting to be a dance.

Starting from the first moment you hold your infant in your arms, you have to learn about your partner.  Parents must consider the way their children move, the way they speak, sound, and smell.  What type of rhythm do they like?  And just to make it slightly more complicated, each partner or child is different, and as children grow and develop, the dance changes a bit.  Then slowly but surely, you learn how to move fluidly together.

Little by little, you begin to understand who your babies and children are, what works for them, and how to enhance their development and interactions.   You learn the signals that the music is about to change, when to take a step closer and when to take a step back.  Over the years you begin to easily recognize when you partner needs to perform solo, and when only a parent partner will make the dance seamless.  Parenting is a living entity.  Allow for the time to reflect on your partner and the dance.  You’ll be “dancing with the stars” before you know it.  You can do this.