Family Reality Breeds Contentment

What are the implications to parents witnessing their child come of age and recognizing the sexual energy that child is exploring? What have the children already learnt from their parents and how has it affected them? When they start asking serious questions, most parents might veer from the truth for many reasons. Time or lack of is a factor. Embarassment is another but when we look at the consequences of not being honest to our children, we see that the reality about sex is much more effective than the lies.

Before parents even get to the birds and bees, it is often better to have had a relationship with their children where talk of the unimportant things is something that is commonplace. If children feel they cannot approach you on the everday things, it is unlikely they will come to you on the very important ones.

Try not to lecture to children, communicate with them through a continuous and honest dialogue throughout their lives.

Sibling without the Rivalry

How many children can an inner city dweller realistically have without feeling the strain? It has been documented that the cost of raising one child in the UK from birth to the age of 21 is approximately £200,000.

There is also the question of space. Both external and internal. Will parents have enough parks, playgrounds or traffic free walkways? At home, will there be enough bedrooms to enable each child to have privacy?

Parenting a group of squabbling children after a long day at work is not the first choice of many but this is what inevitably happen once in a while if the home is not big enough and there are two or more siblings.

Solutions may include boarding schools , whether weekly or full time. Parents can explore scholarship or bursary options for their children. Limiting the amount of children one has is a choice that some people living in the inner cities are making.