"On Healing" November 2003

Posted on Mon, Nov. 17, 2003
Let's give children love, not anxiety
Parents must de-emphasize achievement, engender warmth.
By Dan Gottlieb

Almost every religion has faith and kindness as its core values. Religions teach compassion and helping those who are more vulnerable. And we all agree with these principles. So why don't we apply them with our children?

Remember when your children were born and you looked in their eyes for the first time? All you wanted was their safety and happiness. Most of us wished for our children to be nice people, make a contribution to the larger world, find security, comfort and companionship. Many wanted their children to be spiritual beings, to have humility and clear values.

What are we doing to foster those goals?

I recently spoke with more than 200 children in a local middle school, and from what I learned, we seem to be fostering different goals.

The children told me that their parents expected them to get A's and B's. Most said they felt so pressured by their parents that it was almost impossible to make them happy. They told me that even their organized recreation was less fun because if they felt they had too much homework, their parents would force them to go anyway because they must "be responsible and stick with commitments."

Most of these children, as young as 12 or 13, are already thinking of college and what they need to do to get into one of the best schools. They said that for fun they went into their rooms and listened to music or e-mailed their friends - when they had time.

So do you overschedule your child? Do you emphasize achievement and performance? Why?

Partly because that's what parents are doing to themselves. And partly because we love our children.

That love we felt for them at birth never goes away. But pretty soon, the love gets tainted with anxiety. Every day we hear about tragedies, illnesses or catastrophes that could happen to our children. As they grow, we worry about drugs and sexually transmitted diseases. And then there is their future. The job market is difficult and highly competitive.

So we worry. And how do we manage our anxiety? We do everything we can think of to make sure our children will be safe and have the skills to create a future. But what happened to kindness, spirituality, humility and clear values? In our anxiety to protect our children, they are being forgotten.

Andrea Steinberg is the clinical director of Jewish Family and Children's Service in Cherry Hill. In her clinic, she says, she is seeing more children with more severe emotional problems: "Children's problems are being overlooked in the early stages because so many people are overscheduled."

She explained that when a child was stressed or depressed, the symptoms could be subtle. If one does not have time or patience, they are easy to overlook.

"Small problems turn into big problems, and before you know it, it's too late... ." The slight hesitation in Steinberg's voice said everything about what she meant by "too late."

Cherry Hill has seen at least five adolescent suicides over the last two years. "I know there are adolescent suicides in every community," Steinberg explained, "but because I am part of the community, I experience these losses differently. I think about them almost every day."

She is frustrated that her program, like many others, offers a variety of services that just aren't being taken advantage of. "At times I feel frustrated, at times I just feel helpless, but mostly I feel frightened. These are frightening times, and I am truly scared for these young people."

Hillary Domers is also frightened. She is a social worker in that same agency and said she was seeing more 11- and 12-year-old children who were encumbered with overwhelming worry and anxiety. According to Domers, many of them are suicidal or filled with rage.

Today the children we have are largely overscheduled, suffering with stress, feeling misunderstood, and seeing a future of little joy. But what we want is for our children to feel alive, creative and happy, connected to the family and the larger world. So how do we get from here to there?

Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, author of Einstein Never Used Flash Cards, is clear about what children need: "There is plenty of research that indicates children need authoritative parents. Not parents who are rigid and controlling, but parents who have boundaries and are warm in their personality and emotions. These parents have children who do the best in terms of drug use and overall levels of happiness."

Our children also need parents who are committed to at least three family meals a week. Meals in which the discussion revolves around people's interests, values and concerns, rather then simply their achievements. Our children need parents who can be role models for community involvement, joy, relaxation and love. We need to teach our children how to enjoy and cherish life, not just get through it. And most of all, our children need parents who remember the feeling we had when we looked in their eyes for the first time.

Jewish Family and Children's Service has its annual community conference on Sunday. This year the program is "Youth in Crisis." For information, call 856-778-7775 or e-mail bfreedman@jfcsbc.org.

Posted on Mon, Nov. 03, 2003
Beliefs needn't, and shouldn't, close minds
By Dan Gottlieb

Nothing ignites our passions like the topic of abortion. And nothing closes a dialogue like that topic, either. I can almost hear hearts beating more rapidly as you begin to read this column. So what's going on?

Congress has passed legislation banning the procedure sometimes called "partial birth" abortion, and the President has promised to sign the bill. Now, antiabortion people will almost certainly be joyous after years of work, and abortion-rights supporters will almost certainly be angry and frightened. There is also little doubt that this legislation will be challenged in the Supreme Court.

We all know the arguments for and against. We have all heard them and made them, ad nauseam. But when we take a step away from the debate, things begin to get confusing. In my experience with people on both sides of this issue, I have observed that abortion-rights supporters also tend to be against guns and the death penalty. And I've found that people who are antiabortion generally support our right to buy a gun and support the death penalty.

So it looks as if the pro-choice people are really pro-life. And the pro-life people are saying that it's important to have the right to buy guns and kill animals and criminals. So it sounds as if they are pro-choice! I find this all very confusing.

The other thing that makes no sense is that nobody listens. Most of my job involves listening, to both the language and the emotion behind the debate. After many years of listening, I know that when an argument continues for years and never resolves, it is no longer about the words, it is inevitably about the emotions behind the words. So when I listen behind the well-worn language of the abortion debate, I hear people on both sides fighting for and about the sanctity of life.

Abortion-rights supporters are typically opposed to guns and the death penalty because people die unnecessarily. And when it comes to the issue of abortion, they are fearful. They are fearful of losing control over the sanctity of their bodies - their own lives. And they're fearful of losing control to a government that frequently acts without compassion. Remember the operational word here: fearful. So they cherish life and are fearful of the government intervening and taking control of their choices - their lives.

Antiabortion people also believe in the dignity and sanctity of life and that no fetus should be terminated, because life is precious. But they, too, are fearful - fearful of criminals and fearful of being hurt by others. And fearful of that same government intervening and taking away their ability to protect themselves with guns.

Both groups fight for life. Both groups are fearful of losing control.

But why are we not listening? Why can each side only honor its own beliefs?

We all have our beliefs; we couldn't get through life without them. But why do we get so angry when we hear beliefs that don't fit with ours? When doctors are murdered at abortion clinics, it is not about fighting for life, it is about fighting for beliefs.

Fighting for beliefs has become honorable, a character trait to which many of us aspire. After all, isn't that what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan? But one could argue that terrorists are doing the same thing. They believe what they are doing is virtuous and will help their people.

And one could also argue that Manuel Hernandez and Pete Marron also were standing up for their beliefs about the Los Angeles Dodgers in September when they allegedly encountered Mark Antenorcruz in the parking lot of Dodger Stadium. Antenorcruz was a Giants fan. He was shot and killed, allegedly over beliefs in a baseball team.

So now where do we go? We must stand for our beliefs, but horrendous acts have been committed by people doing just that.

Beliefs can provide many things for us. Our beliefs and convictions guide our lives. Without them, we might feel adrift in some existential sea. Sometimes they can answer questions for us when we need guidance. Sometimes they can help us raise questions. And when we feel more vulnerable, confused or at risk, we clutch our beliefs more tightly and they become a road map for life, telling us where we should be going and how to get there.

But if we clutch our beliefs even more tightly, they can become a prison. When we become imprisoned by our beliefs, we stop hearing. Our minds are closed and so are our hearts.

I wonder what would happen if we embraced our beliefs as we would a lover we knew and trusted. Where the embrace itself is trusting and not suffocating, where we trust enough to separate from the beliefs and examine them, allow them to grow and evolve and do the same for ourselves in the process.

The alternative is to embrace our beliefs tightly enough that we go through life with a closed mind and a closed heart. And that would make us less alive. Which is odd, considering the nature of the issue is the sanctity of life.

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