Well, yes, on any given day, as the song of a certain singer-songwriter says, it might be Tuesday, what's the matter, it could be that it was Wednesday ... the case is that it comes at once. Your little one or your soul girl stopped being a wonderful baby, to become what you clearly he will become the next pre-teen in the house.
Yes, it seems that the six arrived and with them the rebellion (again). Perhaps you were the lucky ones who lived quietly from the terrible two or perhaps from the usual ones that like most of us have suffered the terrible two, three, four and of course, five. Well, it looks like you've just entered (well, your son or daughter has done it), you're going to be on the side of the bad guys, in what could be called proto-adolescence. (I've invented it, but it fits a lot)
And where is my baby?
Well, your baby years ago that disappeared to give way to a beautiful child, who had his tantrums and was gradually discovering the world of your hand.
But now that big baby, let's call it that, has transformed back into a little person who continues to discover the world at every step he takes, only that each one of those steps is no longer you who decides them. Now it is he who is looking for a place at home, at school, in the family ... He is no longer a part of you, so to speak, Now he is one more in the family and looks for his space, which is a first pass of what will come years later with adolescence.
Looking for a hole
He said before that our children are no longer the babies that swarmed all over the house, going from one place to another, wanting everything as their own and asking for the attention of everyone who came across them. Now, they continue from here to there, but with one caveat, they now seek their place, their little world where they are themselves, where they are unique. And it is not that before they were not for us, but now they are the ones who realize it.
That is why it is in these moments when their autonomy takes on a very important value, because it will be through it where they will find the meaning of belonging to a family, To his family.
Another example that, at least seems clear to me at these ages, is when older siblings imitate parents giving, or distributing work to younger children. And it is that the benefit there is mutual, the older one benefits by strengthening his hole and emulating the roles of his parents and the little one begins his journey to become someone more autonomous (let's not forget that our children usually go much further than normally we usually go).
Having autonomy means that others trust you
It is not just that our children learn to place a dishwasher, to pass the broom, to go out to the playground to play without us being over watching every step they take. Autonomy implies responsibility that corresponds to our trust in them, something in which we often go behind our children.
Phrases of the type: "Let me do it, that you don't know," "Expect you are small," "You see how you couldn't do it," They say much more than we think. With phrases like that, we tell them that failure is bad, that they don't measure up to our eyes and I don't think there's anything harder at that age that in the eyes of your parents feels they don't trust you.
We all make mistakes, We have all been wrong at some time in our learning process, it is based on mistakes as humanity has advanced. I will not say that we let them do the first thing that comes to mind, we are adults and it is our duty to analyze what they can cover and what they cannot, but always keeping in mind that many times our children will be able to surprise us and that as a rule, we see them less capable of what they are and above all, of what they feel.
Clashes with authority
One of the things that most catches my attention at this stage, especially since it was something that happened overnight, are the confrontations before the rules, which according to him, they are always unfair. He was never a child of tantrums or direct confrontations, it is not that he always obeyed but I cannot say that he was especially disobedient and much less responded. But we have passed to a child who He flatly refuses to obey if he does not match his plans. It is not only that he rebels against what they ask for, it is that he is expressing, in a more or less clumsy way, his desire to be unique, to mark his space.
They are not adults, they do not even reach teenagers, but what is clear is that they are no longer the babies that one day we both snatched. They have grown and claim their own space, their gap between us and there begins another of the difficult tasks of parents, to reorganize the family, give new spaces and that no one gets hurt.
