Gentle parenting?

I like mommacusses on Instagram. She gentle parents - no hitting, minimal shouting, but there are consequences and no's alongside the choices.

I always wonder if the work environment will change because the masses of people growing up unregulated like this. I hope my previous career still need well adjusted resilient people because tbh if people raise their kids weak, it just gives my kids the upper hand and makes the playing field less competitive. That works for me. That's why I've never honestly been that bothered by gentle parenting, let them 😂 or permissive or whatever people want to call it. People change the names of shit every decade or so once the current word gets "offensive" because people misuse etc - whatever you want to call that type of parenting.

Focus on your parenting op and what yields best results for their dreams, your dreams and peace in your household.

Yes exactly, they have to face the world at some point. The idea of co-regulation is helping them to eventually learn to self regulate. I’m not sure that works really, most if us learn to regulate enough by ourselves by being around people who just went “pack it in” rather than anyone actively co-regulating with us.

I think I acknowledge my DD’s feelings rather than validating them actually. I absolutely believe she feels they way she does but I don’t always agree they are valid iysiw.

We tried gentle parenting and the shock worked on DD temporarily. After that though we came to the conclusion she does need a firmer hand. I think a lot of gentle parents just slide into permissiveness. I also think some of it damaging, trying not to show anger etc. your kids will piss someone off at some point and they will be the target of anger and they need to know how to deal with that. They need to know people can get angry with each other and repair and forgive. Now I just tell mine I’m getting angry and she can see it, before it was worse because it was clear I was furious but trying not to show it so I’d have this horrible gordon brown rictus grin on my face.

Not a perfect parent by any means, but I give my kid plenty of opportunities for choice (she can take it in turns to choose restaurants etc) but there are times when I have to be very blunt and very strict and I think thats fine. It just didn’t work for us, mine definitely has what is euphemistically referred to as a “strong personality”. If you have a sensitive calm child it may work very well. I would say we do validate feelings, they exist, it’s fine to be angry about stuff for example it’s what you do with that anger that matters, it’s not an opportunity to lash out. It’s fine to be sad, everyone feels like that at some point. I do expect her to get a grip and get on with it.

That's the other thing that made me cynical. I might be willing and able to validate all their emotions and co-regulate them (after doing my own inner child work so I can surpress my own emotions perfectly) but it was obvious to me that other adults like teachers or their peers weren't going to do that.

I feel like teaching them how to manage disappointment and conflict in a way that transitions to real life made more sense.

Gentle parenting only works on certain kids. My LO needs to be corrected in the moment, these long and wordy conversations do nothing to teach him not to do something again. He gets one warning and then if he does it again he’s removed from the fun or whatever he is doing, probably has a tantrum and when he’s calmed down he can go back.

Teacher here. Gentle parenting is leading to an an almost impossible situation in the classroom. How do gentle parents think that one teacher can use this method with 30 children? We see more and more children who can't accept a simple no, who argue every decision, who expect to be the exception to the rule.

I am a firm believer in ' what you permit, you encourage' Pupils feel entitled to act out, rather than being regulated. It leads to more dissatisfaction. There is a mental health crisis because of the dissonance between what a child / teen feels life should be (ie centred around them) and the reality of life and especially school life.

I have 2 very lovely respectful teens who are resilient and polite. I didn't use the method in the video. I used distraction, some consequences, eg if they didn't do something, I would count to 3 and if they still didn't, I woul do it. Eg sit them in car seat, at the table, turn off TV. It was Very effective. Holding hands was non negotiable, as was wearing reigns in a busy place. They are both brave, confident, adventurous older teens.

Having said all that, I do understand that the complete and utter break down of school life is a very complex issue which also centres around, children being allowed too much screen time/ phones/ social media. Parents being too stressed, overworked to parent properly, parents own addiction to phones, and the lack of SEND places in specialist schools.

My school is almost unrecognisable to what it was when I started teaching and children are NOT as happy as they were.

Gentle parenting done properly assumes a rather docile child who responds well to conversations about feelings and tends on the calm/chilled out side.

With a spirited, impulsive, stubborn child who tends to rage/anger, it isn't very effective.

I also think some of its key tenets:

• validating all emotions
• tending to the emotional state of the child before addressing the behaviour

Lead to older children/adults who can be rather selfish with unrealistic, self indulgent expectations that everyone around them must put their feelings above all else. I think this has contributed to the mental health crisis we are seeing among younger people.

The reason we don't validate all young children's emotions is to teach them perspective - many of their emotions are excessive and self centred. Its how we socialise children to what is a reasonable level of reaction to minor injustices. We should not be validating that its ok to be devastated about a cutted up pear.

In many instances of adult life we need to "power through" to get jobs done and need to be able to put our feelings aside at times a little to deal with crises, focus on solving a problem. We can't always stop and have a chat about our feelings before dealing with an issue.

I agree OP, I've tried gentle parenting and I have kept some of the bits that worked for us but definitely remember feeling panicky and angry whilst doing the fake positive demeanor. For me it was when I was going over all the times I lost my shit with my kids and realising that most of the time the lead up involved either that fake positive demeanor or some long wordy attempt at negotiation. I think these concepts made me a much worse parent.

He is conveniently in an empty park with no other people or cars. Did he provoke her to get his well timed tantrum footage? I would never take advice from someone who films their child having a tantrum for the sake of online views.

There's a difference between gentle parenting and being a lazy shit useless parent.

I think children need to know parents are in control and that parents’ decide. I think for teens it’s slightly different as they need real responsibility to prepare and learn to make decisions. I think screens for young children eg under 10 aren’t ok. I think if you give your child an iPad during ‘another activity’ eg restaurant, this is poor parenting and damaging to your child’s long term development. Some negotiation is ok but there are times you simply need to be firm and hold the boundary. Them running into roads etc is clearly one of those times!! I would do whatever was required eg hold hand and restrain them where danger and injury was a risk. I think gentle parenting is a lot of rubbish and I think will lead to people who have no resilience as adults.

When my dd was in reception there was a child whose parents were very much of the gentle parenting school. Their dd didn’t like having her hair brushed so they didn’t brush it. We now have a class picture with her at the front with what can only be described as a birds nest of hair - she looks deranged - and 18 years later I often wonder what she is like now.

Common assault in other words.

The YouTube guy is right that there is no need to shout at the kid and force them to zip up the coat. And in the context of that park, running off isn’t too bad.

but there are definitely other contexts that need stricter parenting.

Other poster does have a point...

I agree, I know someone who says she gentle parents, she doesn't. It's somewhere between permissive parenting and letting the kid be in charge. She asks him if he wants to do schoolwork, she asks him if he wants to go to bed, she asks him if he wants to brush his teeth and she asks him what he wants to eat which would be fine but if he says chocolate or dominos or ice cream that's what he gets, night after night.

Well done OP, you win the award for being the most perfect parent, and not smug about it at all either. These gentle parenting bashing threads have been done to death. You do you, let others parent how they want.

Just call a spade a friggin spade.

A four year old doesn't get to decide what to have for dinner. They need to hear the word no, have expectations and consequences, because that's what living in the world means.

I'm the parent. I'm the adult. I know better. You're the child, you haven't had chance to learn, so I'm here to guide you so you don't hurt yourself and you learn how to be a good human.

And no, you're not neuro diverse cos you can't follow the rules. You're still learning how to behave is all.

I do think parenting with a go-pro on and posting your kids lives online like this is despicable. That's the biggest problem with that clip.

The narration is unbearably smug, but I don't mind the way he dealt with tantrum actually.

What's the alternative? That he chased her, potentially making her run into the road and then dragged her kicking and screaming? That's not ideal either.

Tantrums are normal, age appropriate development. Dealing with them is hard work whichever way you do it. I think you're kidding yourself if you think he'd solve the problem of having a stroppy four year old by shouting at her/physically dragging her away.

I don't think the problem is 'gentle parenting' really. I think it's a lack of knowledge of HOW to parent. So few parents have any experience with children before being sent home from the hospital with one, no knowledge of behaviour management or child psychology or what normal development looks like. Of course there's lots of bad parenting, most people are doing a job they're completely unqualified for.

There can't be one definition on any parenting as for one there is not one type of child and even of there was the children have not go ro manual

Children are not robots parents can only parent the child/ren they have in front of them