The baby had recently begun some worrisome back-bending. The 10-month old would throw his head back, stiffly arching his body. A chiropractor’s diagnosis: slipped neck discs. Others had given equally unlikely opinions.
I worked on his energy as he sat playing. His energy was blocked not only at his neck, but throughout his body. So the neck was not the problem. The root lay elsewhere.
I tuned into the little one. “He says he needs a friend and that his heart is blocked,” I relayed to Mom.
“But how?” she countered. “I babysit two other children and he plays with the older one. He does not play with the younger one,” she added.
This was going to be a team effort. I invited both the mother and father to tune in and help me field Baby’s answers. I taught them to silently ask, from their heart to his heart, what they wanted to know. I went first to demonstrate.
“He says the older one hits him and this makes his heart closed,” I told them. “Having his heart closed stops his reaching out to the younger one, whom he feels needs a friend.”
Tears streamed down the mother’s cheeks. “It’s true that the bigger one hits him, but he seems to be OK with that. He does back away a little….
“This is really bothering him,” I told her.
“But the whole reason I am babysitting the two other children is so I can stay at home with my son, to give him a sense of security,” she said. She was clearly going to need her husband’s support, so I told BOTH parents to work TOGETHER to find a solution. This brought visible peace to both parents.
Dad had been attentive when playing with the child, but hesitated to communicate with him. Intrigued, he wanted to test this whole business further. “I am going to ask a question from my heart to his heart,” he said, as I had taught him, “But I’m not going to say the question out loud. Can you tell me what he answers?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Tell me when you are done.”
“Done,” he said.
“He says he wants to see animals,” I relayed.
Dad broke out into a big smile. “I asked him how I could be a better father,” he replied.
“And would taking him to see animals suit you?”
“Yes, that is really me,” answered Dad, happily.
“We have talked for a long time about getting a dog,” added Mom, enthusiastically. They were both thrilled with their new-found understanding of their son’s wishes.
But more than that, Dad now really believed in the authenticity of our communication with his son. He began asking more silent questions.
“Wow–he really answers me!” beamed Dad. In a family in which the main visible interaction was between Mom and son nursing, Dad now had a legitimate standing because he could equally communicate with his son and respond to his son’s deepest wishes.
Dad and I watched Mom and baby nursing. There was an awful lot of squirming going on. “He really doesn’t want to nurse,” Dad explained to Mom. “He is looking for something else.”
I agreed. He seemed to be looking for his mother, although she was right there beside him.
“Did he have a difficult birth?” I asked.
“Did he!” responded Mom. “He was an emergency C-section. And then they kept him away from me for a very long time.”
“I see,” I said, watching him back-bend away from her. “And so the back-bending–mother-seeking–probably started at birth?”
“Yes,” answered Dad, suddenly able to see the trend. They had just never made the connection before.
The treatment was over. Energy had been cleared. Thoughts and problems had been identified and allowed to start seeping away. Mom and Dad knew they could do this parenting thing TOGETHER.
I told Mom and Dad to call me in 6 weeks if there was still any problem. I never heard from them again. But I do know that a smiling Dad walked out of my home with two very important souls in his care–his wife’s and his son’s–and all the tools he needs to be there for them.