Josiah and Lauren 15: The Drama Llama Rolls On

[KeepingChrysanthemum]

With regards to Bella, I adore the name, though I prefer it as a nickname of Isabella as opposed to a given name. 

All the Twilight talk reminds me of how mad I was when those books became popular. I was in my early 20s and had planned since at least sophomore year of high school naming my children Isabella (nicknamed Bella) and Edward. 

Obviously that is no longer my plan. ?

[MoonFace]

2 hours ago, Screamapillar said:

Between 9 months - 18 months, both of my kids have been obsessed with shape sorting toys, stacking toys (like nesting cups), and Mega Blocks. My 14 month old son in particular loves Little People. I can sit him down with a dozen Little People and a couple of empty boxes and he will amuse himself for a solid 15 minutes or more putting them in and out of the boxes.

I usually gift the Classic BabyLit book collection for friend and family's new babies.

We bought the granddaughter one of those sorting toys - a bucket with a lid that had different shaped holes for the blocks to fit in.   She was about 16 months.   I showed her how to fit the shaped blocks in the holes.  She looked at me and took the cover off the bucket and tossed the blocks in.   Then she smiled at me.  

[Maggie Mae]

15 minutes ago, KeepingChrysanthemum said:

With regards to Bella, I adore the name, though I prefer it as a nickname of Isabella as opposed to a given name. 

All the Twilight talk reminds me of how mad I was when those books became popular. I was in my early 20s and had planned since at least sophomore year of high school naming my children Isabella (nicknamed Bella) and Edward. 

Obviously that is no longer my plan. ?

Until about 9 years ago, I really liked the name Aria. Apparently so do a lot of people, as it's been used on two tv shows with two different spellings. 

[Glasgowghirl]

11 minutes ago, Maggie Mae said:

Until about 9 years ago, I really liked the name Aria. Apparently so do a lot of people, as it's been used on two tv shows with two different spellings. 

I love the name too, my niece's middle name is Aria. 

[libgirl2]

On 11/12/2019 at 7:33 PM, Pibblesmiles said:

For the love of Rufus, do NOT get a popper (one of those toys kids push while walking that has little balls that go pop! pop! pop!).

I never had one. Or if I did, my  mom got rid of it real fast. . 

40 minutes ago, MoonFace said:

We bought the granddaughter one of those sorting toys - a bucket with a lid that had different shaped holes for the blocks to fit in.   She was about 16 months.   I showed her how to fit the shaped blocks in the holes.  She looked at me and took the cover off the bucket and tossed the blocks in.   Then she smiled at me.  

Simple puzzles are always good too. 

4 hours ago, viii said:

OMG the amount of times I read these two books to my nephew! 

I had Chicka Chicka Boom Boom memorized. 

[JermajestyDuggar]

On 11/12/2019 at 4:15 PM, VBOY9977 said:

It was 4 months, Lauren...

  Hide contents

https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-moms/news/lauren-josiah-duggar-tried-conceiving-for-a-while-after-miscarriage/

 

I just keep thinking Lauren is one big cautionary tale on how not to raise a child. She just seems like an incredibly sheltered fundie girl who is so ignorant and immature. She has no idea that 4 months is actually a totally normal amount of time when trying to conceive. Her parents did her zero favors and I hope none of her younger siblings are as bad as her. I’m afraid she’s going to have a laundry room breakdown after only 2 children.

[Georgiana]

13 minutes ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

I just keep thinking Lauren is one big cautionary tale on how not to raise a child. She just seems like an incredibly sheltered fundie girl who is so ignorant and immature. She has no idea that 4 months is actually a totally normal amount of time when trying to conceive. Her parents did her zero favors and I hope none of her younger siblings are as bad as her. I’m afraid she’s going to have a laundry room breakdown after only 2 children.

There's always a lot of discussion over when sheltering goes too far, and I'm not sure where the line is exactly.  But I know that with Lauren, the line was clearly crossed.  She's not sheltered.  She's stunted.  She's in almost every way a young-ish teenager in an adult's body.  

I've written this before, but I think Lauren got the worst of the worst.  In mega-families, the daughters at least are forced to mature either because they're responsible for raising multiple siblings OR because they're responsible for raising themselves (or both).  In smaller families, the kids still get parental attention.  But Lauren's family was too small to force her into maturing by foisting parenting duties entirely onto her.  She likely had an elevated chore load, but 8 kids well-spaced is not so much that her parents were forced to relinquish parenting duties.  Lauren's mom was not passing off kids onto her elder daughters entirely.  Lauren did not seem to be totally responsible for running aspects of the home.  

But with so many kids, her parents likely didn't have time for a lot of one on one time with their elder kids once they reached a more independent stage.  They likely focused their energies on the littles.  This meant that once Lauren and her sisters reached an age where they were mature enough to no longer be tightly reliant on their parents, they were likely largely left to their own devices.  And without anyone encouraging them to mature or situations forcing them to mature, there's no guarantee they would mature.  

And I think this is what happened.  From age 15 onward, there was likely very little in Lauren's life to encourage her to continue to develop and mature.  So she stopped.  And now, she's a grown woman who is stuck stunted mentally and emotionally at 15-16.  Adult experiences MAY encourage her to continue to develop.  Or it may cause her to break down.  At this point, I think it's roulette. 

But we're seeing in Lauren unrealistic expectations of success.  She's been lead to believe that by leading the right life, God will remove any struggle from her path.  And that's just never going to happen.  There are normal struggles in life, you have to be prepared to deal with them, and Lauren just isn't prepared at all to handle any sort of struggle....or even just delayed gratification.  If she's struggling with 4 months to conceive, which is perfectly normal but not "blessed", what happens if she actually struggles to conceive?  Secondary infertility is not uncommon.  What about a difficult child?  Or a difficult pregnancy?  

I think we could have a 1 kid laundry room meltdown from Lauren if Bella is colicky, a bad sleeper, fussy, or strong willed.  She's simply not prepared to handle adult life, and there's no way around parenting being a very adult task.  

[VeryNikeSeamstress]

I just walked my dog, and both dogs we interacted with on our walk were named Bella (one was pronounced like 'Bay-la').

[JordynDarby5]

2 hours ago, KeepingChrysanthemum said:

With regards to Bella, I adore the name, though I prefer it as a nickname of Isabella as opposed to a given name. 

All the Twilight talk reminds me of how mad I was when those books became popular. I was in my early 20s and had planned since at least sophomore year of high school naming my children Isabella (nicknamed Bella) and Edward. 

Obviously that is no longer my plan. ?

Same here. Although for me it was 50 Shades of Grey, I've always wanted to name my daughter Anastasia. I've loved that name since I was a pre-teen. Its such a pretty name and it used to be uncommon. Now if it ever happens I'll be asked constantly if I named her after Ana Steele. Which no!  Sure I first saw it in my first Romanov book and then the Anastasia Krupnik books and Anastasia from the Baby-Sitters Club although she always went by Stacey and I wished she went by Anastasia. 

[Cheetah]

1 hour ago, Georgiana said:

There's always a lot of discussion over when sheltering goes too far, and I'm not sure where the line is exactly.  But I know that with Lauren, the line was clearly crossed.  She's not sheltered.  She's stunted.  She's in almost every way a young-ish teenager in an adult's body.  

I've written this before, but I think Lauren got the worst of the worst.  In mega-families, the daughters at least are forced to mature either because they're responsible for raising multiple siblings OR because they're responsible for raising themselves (or both).  In smaller families, the kids still get parental attention.  But Lauren's family was too small to force her into maturing by foisting parenting duties entirely onto her.  She likely had an elevated chore load, but 8 kids well-spaced is not so much that her parents were forced to relinquish parenting duties.  Lauren's mom was not passing off kids onto her elder daughters entirely.  Lauren did not seem to be totally responsible for running aspects of the home.  

But with so many kids, her parents likely didn't have time for a lot of one on one time with their elder kids once they reached a more independent stage.  They likely focused their energies on the littles.  This meant that once Lauren and her sisters reached an age where they were mature enough to no longer be tightly reliant on their parents, they were likely largely left to their own devices.  And without anyone encouraging them to mature or situations forcing them to mature, there's no guarantee they would mature.  

And I think this is what happened.  From age 15 onward, there was likely very little in Lauren's life to encourage her to continue to develop and mature.  So she stopped.  And now, she's a grown woman who is stuck stunted mentally and emotionally at 15-16.  Adult experiences MAY encourage her to continue to develop.  Or it may cause her to break down.  At this point, I think it's roulette. 

But we're seeing in Lauren unrealistic expectations of success.  She's been lead to believe that by leading the right life, God will remove any struggle from her path.  And that's just never going to happen.  There are normal struggles in life, you have to be prepared to deal with them, and Lauren just isn't prepared at all to handle any sort of struggle....or even just delayed gratification.  If she's struggling with 4 months to conceive, which is perfectly normal but not "blessed", what happens if she actually struggles to conceive?  Secondary infertility is not uncommon.  What about a difficult child?  Or a difficult pregnancy?  

I think we could have a 1 kid laundry room meltdown from Lauren if Bella is colicky, a bad sleeper, fussy, or strong willed.  She's simply not prepared to handle adult life, and there's no way around parenting being a very adult task.  

I know we haven't seen all that much of Lauren's parents but this is a snark board and I'm going to say that from the little I've seen of Lauren's mom, she doesn't seem very bright.  Maybe she's just quiet or not comfortable on camera but I don't think there was a lot of motherly wisdom being passed down.

[BernRul]

1 hour ago, JordynDarby5 said:

Same here. Although for me it was 50 Shades of Grey, I've always wanted to name my daughter Anastasia. I've loved that name since I was a pre-teen. Its such a pretty name and it used to be uncommon. Now if it ever happens I'll be asked constantly if I named her after Ana Steele. Which no!  Sure I first saw it in my first Romanov book and then the Anastasia Krupnik books and Anastasia from the Baby-Sitters Club although she always went by Stacey and I wished she went by Anastasia. 

I doubt it. Most millenials think of the princess and FOX cartoon.

I don't think people know Anastasia Steele the same way that people knew Bella and Edward's names. Most just know it's the weird smut book, without knowing more details. 

[TheRadleyPorch]

I agree that Lauren’s mom doesn’t seem very bright, but there’s something else about her too, a sort of helplessness and little-girlishness. I remember in the wedding episode when she was trying to have a motherly discussion with Lauren before the wedding, talking about how she was scared to get married but Dwayne has been her rock, etc. Meanwhile Lauren was putting on a performance (as always) about how she wasn’t nervous at all because she’s just so in love with Josiah and trusting in The Lord. It struck me as a very weird dynamic, more peer-to-peer than mother and daughter. I thought it was especially odd that she referred to Lauren’s dad as “Dwayne” rather than “your dad” or just “dad.” 

[oldfashionedgal]

34 minutes ago, TheRadleyPorch said:

 I thought it was especially odd that she referred to Lauren’s dad as “Dwayne” rather than “your dad” or just “dad.” 

Yes! My in-laws always refer to my parents by their names rather than “your mum / dad”, which I think is odd enough. I got over it when I realised MIL always refers to FIL by name, even when she’s speaking exclusively to her children. It’s just sounds so strange to me!

[Iamtheway]

5 hours ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

She has no idea that 4 months is actually a totally normal amount of time when trying to conceive. 

I remember when our friends announced they were expecting and told us how relived they were becuse they had been trying for six months. It was so hard to be happy for them and I cried so much when we came home. We had been trying for 4,5 years and done five failed ivf:s at the time. They didn’t know that so they were not being mean or thoughtless but it hurt so much. And even though most of our friends had time to have two kids during our struggles that one is the one that hurt the most because of that comment. 

50 minutes ago, oldfashionedgal said:

Yes! My in-laws always refer to my parents by their names rather than “your mum / dad”, which I think is odd enough. I got over it when I realised MIL always refers to FIL by name, even when she’s speaking exclusively to her children. It’s just sounds so strange to me!

We live close to my parents and see them quite often so we don’t call eachother much and my dad almost never calls me. But when he does he always starts with: ”Hi it’s Carl!*” And it always confuses me. Who’s Carl? I have never refered to my parents by name and they don’t refer to eachother by name when speaking to us. Not even now when we’re all in our 30s.

Extra confusing lately since I have a boss named Carl that calls me sometimes.

*Not the real name.

[JermajestyDuggar]

15 minutes ago, Iamtheway said:

I remember when our friends announced they were expecting and told us how relived they were becuse they had been trying for six months. It was so hard to be happy for them and I cried so much when we came home. We had been trying for 4,5 years and done five failed ivf:s at the time. They didn’t know that so they were not being mean or thoughtless but it hurt so much. And even though most of our friends had time to have two kids during our struggles that one is the one that hurt the most because of that comment. 

We live close to my parents and see them quite often so we don’t call eachother much and my dad almost never calls me. But when he does he always starts with: ”Hi it’s Carl!*” And it always confuses me. Who’s Carl? I have never refered to my parents by name and they don’t refer to eachother by name when speaking to us. Not even now when we’re all in our 30s.

Extra confusing lately since I have a boss named Carl that calls me sometimes.

*Not the real name.

When we were having trouble getting pregnant and I was heading toward IUI, my good friend told me she was pregnant. I was already so frustrated with trying to get pregnant and I just burst into tears when she told me. I felt so bad for crying at her good news. I apologized profusely and she understood. Thankfully it was just the two of us so no one else witnessed my bawl fest.

[grandmadugger]

Lauren puzzles me.

She went to college so she’s been exposed to others. Yet she lacks basic social skills. She appears to not think or know how things will be received by others  

She is from a large family but she acts like a spoiled princess. It’s like she’s never been told no before. She acts like everything should be handed to her  

She’s stunted but I’m not sure she’s even at the maturity level of a high schooler. 

 

[kmachete14]

Someone that young should not be "trying" to get pregnant!!! I mean you just discovered sex and are in the "honeymoon" phase of a relationship. Shouldn't you just be going at it like bunnies and discovering how to orgasm in every which way??? I can't imagine the drudgery of "trying" and tracking ovulation and all that at an age where I was so horny I was basically wet 24/7 and would jump my boyfriend (and vice versa) any time we were alone . . . 

so sad they've already reduced such a fun and bonding activity to an anxiety-ridden means to one end

I don't have an insight into the sex lives of the other fundies but it seems like the other young couples get pregnant "on accident" from just too much lovin -- not because they are TTC !! 

[squiddysquid]

9 hours ago, MoonFace said:

We bought the granddaughter one of those sorting toys - a bucket with a lid that had different shaped holes for the blocks to fit in.   She was about 16 months.   I showed her how to fit the shaped blocks in the holes.  She looked at me and took the cover off the bucket and tossed the blocks in.   Then she smiled at me.  

Now that's an intelligent toddler. Mark my words, that kid is going places

 

[Cheetah]

1 hour ago, grandmadugger said:

Lauren puzzles me.

She went to college so she’s been exposed to others. Yet she lacks basic social skills. She appears to not think or know how things will be received by others  

She is from a large family but she acts like a spoiled princess. It’s like she’s never been told no before. She acts like everything should be handed to her  

She’s stunted but I’m not sure she’s even at the maturity level of a high schooler. 

 

I don't know much about where she went to school but my perception of community college classes is that they don't necessarily have the bonding potential of either high school or residential college.  They can draw from a much wider age range and from people who are only there for one semester / one class in some cases.  So it might be a lot easier to make it through a few classes without ever being really challenged in your world view socially.  

[TheRadleyPorch]

@kmachete14 I find it very difficult to believe that these two actually enjoy having sex with each other. Maybe Lauren does in the sense that it allows her to feel like a Good Christian Wife and Very Mature Woman. I don’t doubt she performs enjoying it for Josiah as well.

[grandmadugger]

7 minutes ago, Cheetah said:

I don't know much about where she went to school but my perception of community college classes is that they don't necessarily have the bonding potential of either high school or residential college.  They can draw from a much wider age range and from people who are only there for one semester / one class in some cases.  So it might be a lot easier to make it through a few classes without ever being really challenged in your world view socially.  

I’m not talking about her world view just basic social skills with other humans. Like Jessa knew that her pregnancy might be rough for Lauren so she took Lauren's feelings into account. Lauren has shown none of that kind of decorum.  Normally that’s learned from being around others. 

Edited November 15, 2019 by grandmadugger
Finished thought

[Melissa1977]

On 11/13/2019 at 1:54 AM, Satan'sFortress said:

Little thread drift here---but I am going to a bday party for a 1-year old girl.  I have no idea what to bring for a present.  She is their first and only. 

Any suggestions from moms/grandmas?

Usually 1 year olds just don't care for presents, but moms do, specially if it's clothes haha.

Anyway, at that age they like big building bricks (like lego, but much bigger) and vehicles. Animal toys are very appreciate, too. And books!

[Someone Out There]

1 hour ago, Melissa1977 said:

Anyway, at that age they like big building bricks (like lego, but much bigger) and vehicles. Animal toys are very appreciate, too. And books!

Duplo is the name for the big lego.

[just_ordinary]

I find it depends a lot on where they are developmentally. The range is really wide  at this age. Some are walking, some just started crawling, some have already a big vocabulary, some are just repeating syllables without real meaning. Some have great fine motor skills others can read or sing with you for hours. Some are active some are watchers. If in doubt ask the parents for a specific tip. They (should) know their child best.

At that age, they might not even need more stuff but financial help for the next car seat or winter clothes, first pair of shoes or a family foto shoot would be appreciated. If you see the child a lot and babysit regularly, maybe a season pass for the zoo or something else. The parents might be happy to have some time alone and it’s a great way to build a strong relationship.

[Jody]

10 hours ago, Iamtheway said:

I remember when our friends announced they were expecting and told us how relived they were becuse they had been trying for six months. It was so hard to be happy for them and I cried so much when we came home. We had been trying for 4,5 years and done five failed ivf:s at the time. They didn’t know that so they were not being mean or thoughtless but it hurt so much. And even though most of our friends had time to have two kids during our struggles that one is the one that hurt the most because of that comment. 

We live close to my parents and see them quite often so we don’t call eachother much and my dad almost never calls me. But when he does he always starts with: ”Hi it’s Carl!*” And it always confuses me. Who’s Carl? I have never refered to my parents by name and they don’t refer to eachother by name when speaking to us. Not even now when we’re all in our 30s.

Extra confusing lately since I have a boss named Carl that calls me sometimes.

*Not the real name.

That’s so awful. Did the ivf work in the end/are you still trying (I am). Best wishes.