I've been thinking about this a bit. For those of us who live a little outside the majority - like are vegetarian, or agnostic as two examples - do you plan on raising your kids as such? And how do you plan on explaining it to 1. Your kids or 2. Others?
We are non-religious and don't plan on bringing up our child as religious. (Although we both understand the value of community that church can bring, it's not our thing).
I don't think our families will be shocked but would still love to hear others thoughts - particularly (and this is maybe very philosophical): when should you or shouldn't you pass your beliefs into your kid? Is raising them non-religious the same as raising them vegetarian for example?
Definitely not trying to start some crazy hot-button discussion today but maybe I'm just into some deep thoughts on a Thursday
Re: Raising your kid outside the norm?
I have celiac too but my kids eat gluten. They have so many other allergies that I hate to deny them things that they can eat. We have had them tested for celiac and they don't have it (at least for know).
I don't really care what my extended family thinks...the only one who is really Christian still is my mom, and we have plenty of other things to disagree with her about. We won't be letting her tell us how to raise our child. But if someone in our family does take our son to church or expose him to Christian views, I won't be upset or anything. I hope our child will learn about Buddhism and meditation too from my husband's side of the family and so on. I want to let our child have some of the positive benefits of religion without any of the extremism that sometimes goes along with it. And to teach tolerance for other religions/world views is important.
Religion is sticky for me because I enjoy going to church and finding peace there. Although I do struggle sometimes with my beliefs, I do believe in God and Jesus and find a peace in it. My husband...not so much. I definitely want my son to have that peace though. When my mom passed away, prayer and faith carried me.
DH is atheist/agnostic but surprised me in agreeing to bring up LO Jewish (which I chose when I was 13 - that's another thread). We talk a lot about making sure LO is exposed to as much diversity as possible. Hopefully that instills the lesson "there is no norm" that other PPs mentioned.
I love this thread and seeing all the good values listed here. Gives me hope for this world. You're all gonna be such good parents!
As far as diet goes we mostly push non GMO foods or organic. I'm not crazy about our food system being hijacked by a company that profits off of poisons. We a mostly organic diet to avoid excess pesticides and artificial additives, colors, and preservatives in our diet. I cannot prove it, though I have a strong instinctual belief that there is a link between food allergies, autism, and increased cancer rates and GMO foods so we do our best to limit them. If people have questions on why I choose this path I'll answer them, but I'm not here to judge either way or to win you over to "our side". It's a choice like most everything else in our lives.
Great thread btw.
On another note...... My weird parenting thing is I will NOT be a pinterest mom when it comes to 1, 2, 3, or even 4th birthdays........ I will do family parties at our home that are personal but I'm not going all out because it's not really For the kid when they are that little.... It's for the parents ego. The kid is too little to have "friends" and impress them. When he gets to be school age we will do what he picks for parties etc.....
I don't have any specific food preferences for my child as far as gluten goes.... I do worry because like @laurendutch my husband has Eosiniphilic esophagitis...... So I'm praying my kid does not inherit this!!
My neighbor recent had a bday party for their 4 year old at Chuck E Cheese. They invited 24 kids thinking only 12 would show up...nope all 24 kids came. It was $12 per kid!
SO.....she is obsessed with our big, clumsy Doberman, so we're going to have a family/friends cookout a week after her bday with a Doberman cake (oh, Lord, please help me!!). It's what she likes as a less-than-one-year-old, and what DH and I would like to do...hang out with friends and family!
P.S. Sorry for hijacking this post, a bit off-topic
We certainly won't be baptizing or raising our kid in the church, mostly because we feel it's disingenuous and actually very unfair to the church to pretend we believe something we don't! But we wouldn't begrudge our child if they decided to join a faith when they were old enough to understand it and make a conscious choice. I was brought up Catholic (my great grandpa was a priest!) and DH has two Lutheran minister grandpas so plenty of exposure to go around.
Apologies for use of the word norm in my initial post - I struggled for a better word but simply meant making a choice that might put your child in some minority relative to his or her peers. No judgement on it! It seems we all kinda understood what I meant but just making sure I cleared that up.
Our families will be against this but this is something DH and I both have a strong opinion on.
On that note, our 'norm' is hugely involved with our church. We attend regularly and are actively involved. My 8 year old attends a Christian school. Food rules involve eating as healthy as possible and treats in moderation. Considering some of the people we have run into, this sometimes seems the out of 'norm'.
I'm a huge baby wearer and we co-sleep so I suppose that might be something that some people look at us funny for. But to be honest, it's because I am busy, I need my hands free and I like to sleep. I had one kid who wouldn't sleep without us and now that he has a sibling, I am happy to say that they can share a bed now and my husband and I can have ours back. Until this one is born, of course.
2nd round exp 8/20/18.