Attachment Parenting Never Ends.

“Mom, will you sing to me?” A question that I have heard now for more than 17 years as each day comes to a close. When my boys were babies, I started singing to them every night.  As they grew, it didn’t change, although no longer cradling them in my nursing arms. I began to crawl into their bed with them, lay down, spooning them, and sing.

We sing three songs:

• The classic, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”

• A song I made up to the tune of Frere Jacques that we call “I love Ziah” (insert Luna or Tevan)

• “Lullaby & Goodnight”

I’m not sure what made me start doing this. But I just love it so much. And don’t get me wrong there are days where I don’t feel at all like stopping what I am doing and singing. But someday, they won’t ask anymore.

Tevan my oldest, now in his senior year of high school, outgrew asking me around 10. I was not ready, and kept asking him: Are you sure you don’t want me to sing? “Yea mom, I don’t need that anymore.” Looking back, it also aligned with my becoming a single mom, and I think he was trying to be THE BIG boy in the house. But you bet, momma wanted to keep singing.

And funny enough, thinking about other things children wean from, I’ve often heard that if you allow children to outgrow things themselves, they often will be ready before you! And that when it happens like that, rather than being parent driven, you know you’ve honored them, their independence, and given them what they needed.

Fast forward to today. Tevan is broaching his adulthood and becoming an independent man. Luna, nearly 15, is in his first year of high school and driving. And then there is my Ziah, in middle school and almost 12. I am choked up right now writing that down. How can that be? I know everyone says that…sigh. But man, when it happens to you, get ready, put your seat belt on and have some kleenexes at your disposal.

I am remarried, and in a beautiful relationship with a man that has stepped up to father my boys. And these boys as they shuffle off to bed, make sure to say, “I love you, Peter”. Tevan is still ‘all grown up’, and has not asked for singing since. Luna seems to be slowly getting there. Luna is my Mr Responsible, who has an alarm set on his phone for every homework assignment. Some nights, I don’t even know he went to bed, but you can bet it is an appropriate hour with that boy. Other nights, his boyish face steps in, and smiling he looks at me, and asks, “Mommmm, can you sing to me?”. Those words coming from this young man, with feet bigger than mine, now my own height, and his lanky body…they melt me. We’ve now graduated from lying in his bed, to now he jumps into mine, or sits on my lap….I KNOW!…and we sing.

I caress his blonde head of hair, singing, while I am in awe at his growing body that I made. He gets heavy and sinks into my body just like he did when he was little. His breathing slows, and unconsciously, his hands start fondly rubbing and hugging me. I am immediately transported to what I know is Heaven.

And then there is Ziah. This babe is my youngest, my boldest, and my most dramatic of all the boys. He rarely lets an evening go by without singing. And if he’s been at a sleepover, I’ve been out of town or I’ve been gone when he goes to bed, BOY! Do I hear about it. Here he comes…Mommmm you haven’t sung to me in forevvvvverrrrrr!!!! A smile brightens in my heart. He climbs into bed, onto the couch or wherever I might be, and we fall into each other. His pace of breathing almost immediately slows to the sleep breathing, his weight I can certainly feel, oooooooff, and his sweet face and body is right back to those precious memories of our nursing days.

Our nursing days! It is really like my breastfeeding days have been extended with our singing evenings. Without even realizing it until I am writing this right now..that is exactly what it is!!! I've extended our nursing and my attachment parenting with our singing.

Can you sing to me, mom? I never want them to stop asking. But as with Tevan, they will. Just like with everything, they need me until I’ve done my job and they don’t. Isn’t that the whole point of this parenting thing? Being able to raise children who are capable, strong, wise, independent, and know when they need to ask for help and when they don’t?

My world and my career have been surrounded with children, parenting and attachment. Turns out attachment does not end when they turn one, start pre-school or begin driving. It is a way of life. Attachment has and remains the core of my mothering. And it is never going to end. As they grow into adulthood, have their own relationships, their own children and are navigating the unknown…I’ll be there, ready to give them anything they need, and maybe they’ll let me sing to them once more.

Summer J Friedmann, IBCLC

11/25/2019