Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day…a day celebrating love. Often we think of it as only celebrating romantic love within a couple…I’ve had a number of conversations that have me celebrating the love parents have for their children.
This week, in various ways, I have been reminded of an important truth…that the love parents have for their child shapes the child in powerful and significant ways, preparing them to love well as adults. When parents are able to provide a secure, loving, stable base where the child feels safe and loved and accepted, the child is better prepared to be able to thrive in an adult love relationship. Heck, a child that has a warm, safe, loving home environment where s/he knows that venturing out is OK because a retreat into warm and safe arms is possible, makes a child generally more resilient to ALL life offers.
I was reading in The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog, that:
Our group (a renowned therapy/research clinic) had observed that the nature of a child’s relationships–both before and after trauma–seemed to play a critical role in shaping their response to it. If safe, familiar and capable caregivers were available to children, they tended to recover more easily, often showing no enduring negative effects of the traumatic event…the “trauma-buffering” effect of relationships…
Perry and Szalavitz
I get that sort of feeling from this video…heard about it on the radio today as an excited father was interviewed about carefully selecting a song that would be played at his daughter’s wedding when he danced with her. He chose this song–a way of celebrating the love that he has for his daughter. The relationship he had with her prepared her for the arms that hold her now as a bride:
Fathers, take an extra minute today to have your children know that you not only love them first, but love them well. Hold them securely, hold them in a way that listens to how they like to be held, hold them so they are able to learn lessons of life while always feeling safe in your arms.
Write a Comment