I was truly inspired by the way the babies were raised who lived in the remote village in Venezuela that was talked about so much in Jean Liedloff's book, The Continuum Concept. The way of the mothers and the community in which they lived resonated with my heart! I knew after reading the book that my mothering would never be the same!!! I also realized that making the shift from a Western style of mothering to a continuum concept mother would be a little challenging while living in a Western culture. I would need to find support in doing things "differently." But I also saw that it would be worth it, even if I did feel alone at times, because the way the Venezuelan children turned out was so phenomenal!!!
These children were well mannered, independent, and responsible. They did not argue with others or ever even try to be better than anyone else. It was as if they were all secure in themselves. There was no identity crisis in the teen years. In fact, by then, they were managing themselves within the "adult" world. And not because they were "forced" to, but rather because they chose to! Everyone was left to make their own choices, and because we are all social by nature, when left to make the choice, we choose to "fall in line" and do the "right" thing. Nobody was judging others either, and this all made for a truly BLISSFUL SOCIETY!!!! Honestly, it's not just every mother's dream come true for her child to turn out this way, but it is also every mother's dream for herself! Can you imagine, not feeling like you have to compete for others attention or worry about whether or not you will be accepted?!!! You would feel so free and secure that you would be EMPOWERED to be the BEST YOU that you knew how to be!!!
And so, feeling inspired by the Venezuelan mothers, I have chosen to implement the concepts of their society as much as possible and as best as possible. From the moment my baby was born, literally he came out of my womb and went straight into my arms, laying on my chest, listening to my heartbeat, and he's been with me ever since! Or he's been in the care of his father, which does happen on a regular basis. In fact, he was always with either one of his parents without exception until about three months of age. And since then, until the start of the Day Village when our son turned nine months, he had only been in the care of another person - either another family member or very close friend - for one to two hours at most and only on three separate occasions. I intuitively chose this even before I read the book, knowing that our role as parents is significant. I personally did not have a child to have someone else raise my baby. We are committed to being the primary care givers with the vast majority of responsibility being on me as the mother. I have embraced this role as a new mama with great joy! Now with the start of the Day Village, I have connected with other like-minded moms who are committed to raising their babies the same way. Now as a tight-knit community, we do give each other a "break" on occasion from our role as mother, in order to center ourselves. It is important to note that all of our babies at this point are older than seven months and are in the crawling stage where they are desiring more and more independence. They are put down on the ground to have independent play with the other babies and crawl and explore. But as soon as they crawl back to us, we are committed to meeting their needs and answering their cries, which is their way of communicating with us since they do not yet speak in words. Until they gain an even larger amount of independence through walking, us mothers still carry our babies in our arms using slings and carriers for several hours a day. This allows us to go about the tasks that need to be done throughout our day. We also co-sleep and have our babies near us at all times. And of course, we also breastfeed our babies, and do so A LOT as the babies desire! This is just the beginning of it, and yet we all see a HUGE difference in our babies and receive constant remarks from outsiders on how happy, content, and healthy our babies are!
To learn more about The Continuum Concept, visit:
Thaddeus, Noa, and Ellie all play nicely as they learn to share their toys. Us mothers are nearby, but are intentional about not interfering too much. We allow the children their freedom to interact independently with each other and learn to be social on their own.
Remember to catch the new interviews on the Raw Mom Summit every 24 hours! Starting at 9:00pm EST on Friday, December 11th for 24 hours, the following amazing interviews will be available: Ron Obadia, Brigitte Mars, Daniel Vitalis, and Lori Painter. ENJOY!
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