That loving touch is essential for children

By Surtiningsih W.T.

BOGOR, West Java (JP): The following may be a cliche, but it is worth the risk of repeating all the same. "No one on their deathbed would wish to have spent more time at the office, but to have spent more time with their children and family."

Most people may not acknowledge this openly but they feel it, especially when they reflect back on years as a parent and grandparent. This is particularly true for people who embarked on parenthood without the benefit of abundant books and magazines on parenting that today's young parents enjoy. They realize in later years that they wished they had spent more time with their children, hugging and touching them.

More than words ever can, touch conveys to a child that he or she is loved, cherished, wanted and beautiful. A feeling of being loved and worthy of a parent's love helps a child to grow and be confident.

That's the theory. Reality teaches you its lesson the hard way. When one is a parent of a houseful of children (nine in my case), one does not even have time to think clearly about how one is able to stretch oneself even a millimeter further to give each child the care, attention and touch he needs.

This is where another cliche is welcome: "Improvise in order to survive."

Say "I love you" to your children even as you pinch their behinds for misbehaving, or something along the line of "I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't love you". If the love is there, and one tries to express it as best as one can, the children will know. Eventually.

Experience, age and reading tell us that if we could improve things, the following are what we should have aimed for:

* More hugs for the kids:

Many parents with "belated insight" wish they had touched their children more to convince them that they are beautiful, decent, intelligent and that they are a source of pride.

Some children say the only times they are hugged and thus feel loved are when they are ill, which probably explains why they are sick a lot.

Children who are entering puberty have become conscious of their sometimes uncomfortable growth spurt, and some tend to think that they are not as loved as their younger siblings. This is a critical period where parental hugs and kisses can help build a child's self esteem.

* Have fathers hug the kids more often:

Most enlightened parents would abhor the outdated social convention that only mothers are allowed to be mushy. Fathers should be just as mushy with their children!

This adheres to the wisdom that if a girl is loved by her father, she won't soon feel the need to seek male attention and boyfriends. If a boy is loved and hugged by his father, he will grow to be a gentle, loving and kind-hearted man.

All fathers should give plenty of hugs to their children, sons especially. It is a deplorable misconception that sons do not need as much love and attention, and as many hugs, as daughters do in order to grow up healthy.

* More time for the three-Ts:

It was written somewhere about the three-Ts of Touch, Time and Talk, which serve as the oxygen feeding the closeness between human beings.

Many people's sweetest recollection of childhood is often the small, ordinary experience of evenings spent just talking, joking and, very often, quarreling with family members.

* Know what it is that children want:

What parents have not, every once in a while, thought that they have given birth to a misbehaved monster because their child plays up? Why do they explore where they shouldn't, do things that are not allowed. Fight, tease, disobey, provoke, argue, make a mess and generally seem to want to persecute Mom and Dad?

Steve Biddulph, an Australian writer and father, says children play up because they have unmet needs.

That may sound like a slap in the face to parents who work so hard to keep their children fed, clothed, warm and clean. This, however, is not enough. Biddulph points out that love is what they really need. Love can also be expressed through skin-to-skin contact frequently; movement of a gentle but robust kind, such as carrying around and bouncing on a knee; and eye contact, smiling, and a colorful, lively environment through sounds such as singing and talking.

We should remember that this "need" for such love does not cease with babyhood or childhood, but is with us until we die.

Surtiningsih W.T., the author of several books for children, is a mother of nine and grandmother of 15.