"No Fuss" Method

[Eulaha L. Long]

A week ago, my 3-month old daughter woke up screaming (not crying loudly, I mean SCREAMING!!).  I jumped out of bed to see what was the matter, and I automatically put my hand over her mouth.  Wow.  Even though I wasn't an AK, I spent lots of time around them, and witnessed firsthand the "no fuss" method used on them (the little ones).  I guess that's why my first inclination was to put my hand over My daughter's mouth when she screamed.  I felt terrible for the rest of the day, and told myself I'd NEVER mistreat my child the way a lot of children were mistreated in the Assembly.

Does anyone know where the "no fuss" method originated? 

[Margaret]

I do, unfortunately. It was me. We were at Westmoreland Chapel when Lee was born. A couple there who had five well-behaved children growing up in a strict but very loving home gave us a pamphlet called "Children - Fun or Frenzy" by the Fabrizios. G and B visited Westmoreland when Lee was about 18 months old. Betty was thrilled, of course, that we already had the approved approach to child training, and amplified on it from there to include training babies to be quiet in long meetings. The rest is history.

[Oscar]

Margaret,

So that is where Betty got her nutty ideas...."Children, Fun or Frenzy".   I remember that booklet.  Al Hartman got some copies and passed them around in the Valley.  I remember that when I read it one thing stood out to me as quite strange.  It said that if you found out that your kids had disobeyed during the day that you should spank them for it immediately, even if they had gone to bed.  You were supposed to go wake them up and then wallop them!

I remember thinking that that was way over the line even then, which was probably around 1968 or 69.  So, we did not adopt that practice.  As you know, I got plenty of criticism for not following Betty's ideas, especially when my oldest began rebelling.  I've had to do some apologizing to my kids for dragging them through the assembly system.  But not for getting them out of bed to whack them.  I don't think we did the pillow thing either.

Tom M.

[outdeep]

We just put electric wires through my son's mattress so that if I found out something late at night, I could press a convenient button and not interrupt my Evening time with God. 

Today my son is grown and a model citizen though the nurses in his psychiatric ward says they sometimes have trouble with him sleeping on the floor.  Not sure if there is a connection.

[Margaret]

Tom -

I don't think Betty got her ideas from the pamphlet. I don't know that she ever saw it. But she saw that what we were doing would work to keep children with their parents in George's meetings, and later on could be justified as teaching the children to "go the way of the cross."

By the way, we never got our kids up in the night either. I did do the hand-over-the-mouth and the pillow thing, though, which I seriously regret. I gave the kids normal times to breathe, but when it was imitated that part was often left out, with the result that kids sometimes felt like they were suffocating. My kids actually liked the hand or pillow over the mouth and would reach for me to put it back on until they got calmer. One of them was very attached to the little pillow and slept with it. I didn't think anything was wrong at the time i was doing it, but when I saw how it was being used later as a punishment instead of a help that allowed them a few yells without disturbing things too much, I was horrified.

[juststarted]

I never knew where all that stuff originated. I never did the pillow or the taking out of bed to spank but the hand over the mouth was quite efficient. I think in raising our kids there are many tools and we need to decide as parents which to use. The bible is clear on many things. The others we need to let God lead us as parents on what to do. It's always easy to look back at what you did wrong. We have to continue to walk by faith and let God lead us. Remember he has given us the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth.

[Joe Sperling]

Today my son is grown and a model citizen though the nurses in his psychiatric ward says they sometimes have trouble with him sleeping on the floor.  Not sure if there is a connection.
[/quote]

Dave----

 

[Eulaha L. Long]

What is the "pillow thing"

[Oscar]

Eulaha,

What is the "pillow thing"

Some assembly parents took a small pillow to the meeting with their small kids.  When the kid would try to cry in the meeting they would cover the mouth during the "crying out" part, then lift it for the "breathing in" part.  Some parents kept the pillow on for both cycles, apparently, which would probably cause the child to panic.  That would just cause the disturbance to get louder. The parent then had to take the kid to the restroom for "discipline".  Then tongues would wag about how "some people" were not faithful in child training, and perhaps the husband of the family would be "spoken to" about how he needed to train his wife.  The assembly had an adequate amount of shame so that everyone could receive an abundant portion.

It was another aspect of the dysfunction of that place.  It was hell.

Tom Maddux

[moonflower2]

I never heard of the "pillow thing" either. That's rather disgusting. Did she hope the kids would pass out from lack of oxygen and become the perfectly behaved child they were meant to be??

Until I read the revelations on this BB, I used to think that the California folks were more laid back than the Midwest crew. Maybe their personalities were more laid back than the conservative Midwest, but they seem to have had stricter surveillence of behavior. Suffocate your kid into "obedience". What a life.

[juststarted]

I started coming out in 1989 and parents were not doing that. I think that maybe they started doing the pillow thing, saw it was too intense and stopped. I do know that in spite of what is being talked about here most parents did do a good job with their kids. I remember thinking at times that my kids were the worse of all kids, then going somewhere and people telling me how great my kids were. There was some gain in the things we were taught.

[Explorer]

juststarted,

We all know that there were a few good things that came out of the assembly. But we need to be careful that we don't go around waving a banner that says "The Assembly Wasn't That Bad". One thing you have to understand is that the degree of how bad it was depended to some extent on the assembly, as some were less radical than others.

But you have to admit that there was a reason why a lot of the children, especially young men like Ben Miller, took off as soon as they were old enough. Ben was not a rare case. There was something really wrong. Yes, maybe the kids behaved because they knew what would happen if they didn't, but that doesn't mean that there wasn't some major damage done by the techniques used, etc. Even some kids that seemed like success stories, after they grew up or had their own families had (have) some real major issues and problems because of the assembly and how they were forced to grow up. 

The best thing you can do with the child training stuff that you learned in the assembly is throw it all in the trash. Remember, most of it came from the mother that raised David G. Is that a success story?

[Mark C.]

juststarted,
 But we need to be careful that we don't go around waving a banner that says "The Assembly Wasn't That Bad".
But you have to admit that there was a reason why a lot of the children, especially young men like Ben Miller, took off as soon as they were old enough. Ben was not a rare case. There was something really wrong. Yes, maybe the kids behaved because they knew what would happen if they didn't, but that doesn't mean that there wasn't some major damage done by the techniques used, etc. Even some kids that seemed like success stories, after they grew up or had their own families had (have) some real major issues and problems because of the assembly and how they were forced to grow up. 

The best thing you can do with the child training stuff that you learned in the assembly is throw it all in the trash. Remember, most of it came from the mother that raised David G. Is that a success story?

  Very well said Explorer, and what you say above has a huge volume of supporting evidence that can be brought forward (my youngest daughter Becky is still struggling with these things and we left in 1991).

  I wasn't around when Ben left and since he has posted here recently it would be informative to hear how he has done since leaving.  It is both good and courageous that he has been willing to engage himself in talking about these things.
 
---- Ben, if you remember you lived with us (the Campbell's--Sindy, Deborah, Becky and Me) in the Valley for a couple of years---

  Your Father and Mother were just as deceived as we were, and were sincere about their desire to serve the Lord.  The only difference may be how much they recognize the facts of that deception.  To your Dad's credit he was involved in the "outing" of GG via the excommunication process, but I don't know if he sees the problems in the group as only a GG/Betty problem vs. understanding the group cultic dynamics that were in force there.

   Without understanding the dysfunctions that allowed the Assm. to work in my individual life I will carry these same false concepts forward in my post Assm. life.  It can be difficult to deal with these things even when we are aware of them, but impossible if we are living in denial of them.

  For the kids:  Most of these were along-for-the-ride, and so never "drank the Kool-aid" of the true Assm. believer.  These children, however, grew up in an environment where hypocrisy was rampant and a false view of God was observed in how the group functioned.  It's not hard to see how this could produce a great deal of cynicism re. faith in any God, even if the parents avoided the heavy guilt/shame system that tried to discipline the kids into the Kingdom that Betty advanced.

                                                                                                    God Bless,  Mark C.

[Eulaha L. Long]

Eulaha,

Some assembly parents took a small pillow to the meeting with their small kids.  When the kid would try to cry in the meeting they would cover the mouth during the "crying out" part, then lift it for the "breathing in" part.  Some parents kept the pillow on for both cycles, apparently, which would probably cause the child to panic.  That would just cause the disturbance to get louder. The parent then had to take the kid to the restroom for "discipline".  Then tongues would wag about how "some people" were not faithful in child training, and perhaps the husband of the family would be "spoken to" about how he needed to train his wife.  The assembly had an adequate amount of shame so that everyone could receive an abundant portion.

It was another aspect of the dysfunction of that place.  It was hell.

Tom Maddux

Wow...I had NO idea.  It's scary that the kids had to go thru such treatment. 

[outdeep]

Eulaha,

Some assembly parents took a small pillow to the meeting with their small kids.  When the kid would try to cry in the meeting they would cover the mouth during the "crying out" part, then lift it for the "breathing in" part.  Some parents kept the pillow on for both cycles, apparently, which would probably cause the child to panic.  That would just cause the disturbance to get louder. The parent then had to take the kid to the restroom for "discipline".  Then tongues would wag about how "some people" were not faithful in child training, and perhaps the husband of the family would be "spoken to" about how he needed to train his wife.  The assembly had an adequate amount of shame so that everyone could receive an abundant portion.

It was another aspect of the dysfunction of that place.  It was hell.

Tom Maddux

I am very thankful for the child training trainers in some sense.  I had struggled with doubts about the Assembly for some time but never really had a discussion with my wife or considered leaving.  The heavy-handed do-it-this-way-or-we-will-pressure-you-with-consequences way was what got my wife thinking.  I had the exhortations from the leadership about training my wife so that she won't be so rebellious and handle her kids correctly in the meeting.  (I tried that once and it didn't go so well).

Yet my wife wasn't being rebellious.  She just wasn't getting their method and she was filled with internal reluctance that this is what was best for her kids.  Yet, any resistance was not treated with compassion but with "if you don't do this, you don't love your kids.  You only love yourself".  And "if you want to be a leader, you better get your wife in order now."
Some mothers, of course, just had their kids sick all the time so they didn't have to deal with it.

It was a good lesson for me to finally figure out that my wife's resistance was not rebellion and "refusal to submit".  My wife is not a rebellious person.  She is not going to resist just to be an ass.  If there is a reluctance on her part, it means there is an issue we need to talk about and work out.

But anyway, in 1989 while away on business, we had our first conversation about our concerns with the Assembly.  Our only problem was the fact that I worked with the #2 man in the Assembly.  Of course, that corrected itself over time.