PARENTHOOD

Greymouth Evening Star, 25 February 1928, Page 10

PARENTHOOD

“ONLY-CHILDISM” DENOUNCED. Dr. Alice Hutchison, of .Great Ormond Street Hospital and the Tavistock Clinic for Nurses, speaking on the “•Psychology of Parenthood” at the Conference of Health Visitors and School Nurses, at King’s College, Strand, asked why some families of children quarrel violently over their games (reports “The Times.”) This friction between brothers and sisters, she said, was the-inevitable result of a superficial discord between the parents. It was of the greatest, importance that there should be superficial harmony between the mother and father. Superficial discord worked havoc, arid children who quarrelled at their games were the inevitable result. Most mothers fulfilled their duties very well during the period of infancy, but when the child began to assert itself and to oppose its will to that of the mother, then difficulties ;began. A sense of irritation and of impatience ?<rose in the mother, who failed to realize that without this assertion of its will the child could not develop. In many homes the preparation of a girl for marriage mainly consisted in clothes and a trousseau. In America she understood they had begun to prepare young men and women for marriage in classes, but she thought that was a most appalling reflection upon the parents of those young 'people. Fathers and mothers ought, from their own experience, to instruct these young people. She declared very clearly that birth control had wrecked number of marriages. At the present time there was a real difficulty because of the expense of bringing up children, and therefore the use of birth control was having a very deleterious effect upon women. It was producing that terrible monstrosity the only child. They might come to speak, not of drink, but of “only-childism,” as the greatest curse of this country. INDEPENDENCE IN CHILDREN. Dr. Hutchison ■ said they wanted to see children absolutely break the tie of dependence upon their mothers. They saw the young man who would not marry because he would not leave his mother because lie was a baby and would not break the tie. He could not do without her. They wanted fully-grown men, who would leave home and take a wife, not as a second mother, but as a mate. What seemed to outside people to be excellent parenthood often meant failure to the child. If they made a child a baby they made him selfish, and a fully-grown man he would never be. She could conceive of no better training for parenthood than work in a first-class nursery school, where they learnt to be quiet, patient, and to stand aside. The hardest thing for parents was to sit still among the children. They were for ever jumping up to show the children how to do things. There was no need to do this. They wanted to teach the child to draw. Children would learn how to draw by themselves if they were left alone. There was far too much domination in parenthood, too much interference with the child’s development.

Mr. J. J. Mallon, Warden of Toypbee Hall, dealt with the father’s problems of yesterday .and to-day. He referred to the decrease in the birth-ra,te, and said that by 1932 there would be a real shortage of young people for industrial work. This was one of the problems -which the industrial world would be obliged to face in the near future. “A great deal is said g.bou.t tfie -dole,” he s.ai.d, “but a very large proportion of what is said is utter foolishness. Those who iivo among the working classes know that a miracle has happened. It means that in times of adversity the home is not broken pp. It means that those who are thrown out of work through no fault of their own, and ■tlmir dependents, are not allowed to suffer.”