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Someone has been writing me about this page, asking if I am the one who manages it or something. She has written me about 3 times now but never says why she wants to know. So I just delete her mails.

I am afraid she is going to complain that I have been copyright infringing so I am changing it around today

btw I feel really resentful that she has never explained why she has been writing. i feel manipulated i guess. i need honesty. and she is not being honest about her motives for writing. i feel robbed of my time. disrespected. hurtful towards her. bitter. i have painful memories of people writing me with fake motives. for exampleonce someone was writing about a totally fake high school they created just to try to get people to link to something on some website. i smelled a scam from the first email and i checked it out and i was right. they went so far as to make a fake website for their fake highschool. i kind of regret not making screen shots of that now. priscilla is the only witness i have to it. and she is not talking to me anymore.

this person who has been writing me sounds so fake - kind of a fake friendliness but not especially friendly - i already deleted the mail from yesterday which i kind of also regret now. if she writes again i will copy and paste it here. she never says who she is or what organization she is from, if any. it is really fucking annoying to me. and if i am right and she works with or for leach somehow then i will lose nearly all respect for leach. i already lost a lot as i read this more closely - i am pretty sure she was recommended to me by david caruso. the one who said 'because they are evil"- you can search my site or that or for david if u want. im feeling drained about this whole thing right now.

I will say my name is Joe Doe -just to confuse the annoying lady.

April 14 2016

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Excerpts from Interview with Penelope Leach (Full interview is found at http://www.todaysparent.com/main/feature/article.jsp?cId=2948)

The first question asks about the role parents play in children learning how to "regulate" (a term I don't like) or "live with" - another term that doesn't thrill me - their emotions.

Leach says they play a big role - which is pretty obvious to me. Then she says it depends on their "stage of development" another term I don't like - I have been writing for years and I never felt a need to use that term. It is too academic for me.

Anyhow Leach then says it is important to let very young children, like babies "experience and express emotion."

She says it is not helpful to say 'don't cry to a child who has hurt himself. I agree.

She also says it is not helpful to sneak out of the house so your baby won't know you are leaving. I agree with that, too.

Then she says "If your going makes her feel like crying, it's better for her to cry and find comfort from the other parent or the caregiver she's been left with.

That's ok but not a great way to put it. I'd say something more like "your child is feeling afraid of abandonment, and that is natural. It is important to help all children feel secure and

not afraid you will abandon or reject them - including teen children."

Then Leach says something like "we want to comfort all distressed children" -- distressed is a word I don't think I have ever used in my writing. It is another academic sounding word. It is vague, like academics like things to be so they can stay detached. Anyhow, she says not to hide or cover "bad" feelings. This is kind of amusing because she uses some academic type words and expressions, then she says "bad feelings." It reminds me of the word "ouchie."

Then the interviewer says, "So our task is to help kids gradually learn, through the repeated experience of being comforted, that "When I feel bad, I will feel better some time."

This is kind of a typical way of thinking. It reminds me of how some psychologist said that if you are talking to someone depressed you should tell them things will get better. A lot of people left comments to that and said that such advice was crap, basically. And I agree.

So let's see how PL responded. She said, yes but there was more to it. She said it was something about learning that your feelings won't harm you or anyone else and that "what matters in terms of developing social control is what you do with your feelings, that the way you act because of your emotions affects others."

hmm. I don't really agree with that. I don't like the term "social control." We are already controlled way too much I'd say. I would say what matters is that the child or teen learn to use their feelings to identify their unmet needs, and the problems with society in not offering us an environment which meets enough of our emotional/psychological/intellectual needs, even if it meets our physical needs.

Then she talks about empathy in a convoluted way using the academic term "theory of mind" and she seems to believe children won't feel empathy till age 4 or 6 but I disagree.

I am getting a little tired of editing and commenting so I will just leave a bit more of the page as it was - this way maybe I will see if the person who has been annoying me with her mails will write again.

Apart from lack of experience, what makes it hard for parents to help children with their emotions?

I have to say, some parents act as if the main part of their job is disciplining and correcting bad behaviour and that a concern with a child's happiness as opposed to "learning" might be somehow indulgent. In truth, happiness matters - not the instant gratification kind of happiness that comes from always being able to talk an adult into buying you the Barbie doll, of course. The kind of happiness that matters is more like being comfortable in your skin, and therefore feeling confident, optimistic and able to cope with whatever you have to cope with.

Where does all of this begin?

I think it starts with unconditional love - the love that doesn't say, "I love you because you are so pretty and you are cleverer than the baby next door and you don't wake me up in the night. I just love you because you are you (and I am me)." Unconditional love says, "I love you even when I hate what you do."

People can say that to a child, but doesn't the child have to see it?

Yes. Children aren't mind readers. I meet parents who say, "They know I love them to bits..." when their behaviour makes me wonder if the kids do know, and what makes the parent think they know, and when he last told them. And what the child thought his words meant. Children need to know that parents take pleasure in them. So when did this parent, who's so sure his kid knows he loves him, last ask for more company from the child than the child wanted from him? When did he last ask the child if he had time for a game? When did he last ask for a hug? All too often it's the other way round, so kids feel that they always want more of mom or dad than is willingly offered.