The One Where I Rant About the Pearls

With the recent death of Hanna Williams due to her adoptive parents' extreme use of the Pearls' child-rearing methods in To Train Up a Child, there has been justifiable outrage among the forums of which I am a member. ATI does not officially condone the Pearls' ministry, but it does not condemn it either. I was raised on the methods that the Pearls suggest. The basis of "training up a child" is breaking that child's spirit so that they will follow you blindly and have no discernible personality.

I left this comment on the Amazon product page of the book: "I was raised on this book and now that I'm out of my parents' house I can honestly say that the methods outlined in this book and by the Pearls in general are the reason that I have nothing more than a civil relationship with my parents. The control issues that require a need to "break a child's will" will not only break that child's will, but also break their character and any hope of ever having even a semblance of a good relationship with them once they reach adulthood."

I know this is a little late - like almost 2 weeks - but the effect that this book had on my relationship with my parents is astounding and a little disheartening. My parents still have control issues that make having a relationship with them difficult. They insist on having a say in every decision that I make - whether big or small. This is why I find it incredibly difficult to talk to them about anything of substance.

The Pearls' methods and the entire No Greater Joy organization is founded on the need to control every aspect of your childrens' lives from the day they are born. For a child who already had a compliant nature, my parents' constantly bringing the hammer down on little infractions made me into a sneak. I felt the need to hide everything about myself from my parents because I didn't know if they would approve or not and I didn't want to deal with it if, by chance they didn't.

I can remember the few times that I actually opened up to my parents about what I was having problems with as a teenager and getting a lecture. Had they found out about it from someone else, the lecture would have been completely warranted and, while I wouldn't have liked it, I would have understood the reason for it. But because I went to them, looking for advice and help, the lectures did far more harm than good.

The methods outlined in No Greater Joy give no guidance of how to wean yourself from treating your children like wayward toddlers, as evidenced by the fact that my parents insisted on spanking me until I was almost 18. At that point it borders on abuse. A teenage girl should not be getting spankings from her father. Even when I was in community college at the age of 18, my mother would consistently say "you know, you're not too old to spank," to which I would just walk away. I believe that spanking is perfectly fine in the right context. But this, most definitively, was not the right context.

The need to have control drove a wedge between me and my parents that I don't see going away anytime soon and I can honestly say that I hate the Pearls for that.