To wonder if this is what people mean by gentle parenting

[pleasemothermay1]

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3699191/Outrage-parents-allow-child-toilet-Morning-floor.html

Not sure why a one year old wouldn't have a nappy on as she clearly is not Notts trained at that age my one year old would be become destressed to be constantly wet

And what's the no medication about surely social service would become involved if they got very ill and parents did noting

Very odd

I'm surprised they wanted to go on national TV and the Mail given the abuse they were likely to get. I think extended breastfeeding, co-sleeping and homeschooling are all great if that's what suits your family, and there's no harm in these aspects of parenting getting some airtime, but I object to their anti-vaccination stance. Children didn't always just fast their way through serious illnesses like measles, but died of them.

wits she hates her parents. She moaned frequently about her upbringing.

Quite interesting to read the article and the thread. They don't sound terribly off grid to me, living in a flat in Brighton! Presumably they have all mod cons, and I guess Brighton is a good place to be if you want to buy things like organic t-shirts, vegan shoes etc. They don't particularly seem to be opting for a radical lifestyle, just not bothering with anything they don't want to do. The natural medicine thing strikes me as a bit of a posture really. Their kids are healthy, and so don't actually need medicine,, it is easy to be 'against' using it. As they're not in school or nursery, they probably don't pick up many bugs. And the vaccination thing, well, as long as everybody else bothers they will be largely protected by the herd immunity. But, as they took the child to hospital with his asthma ( so actually all the good food and breast milk doesn't cure all), I would imagine at the first sign of a serious illness such as meningitis or whooping cough they will probably be lapping up any medication the NHS can provide. Good luck to small holding in Costa Rica though, without any vaccines very foolish. Why Costa Rica though? I'm sure you could get an off-grid smallholding in the UK for 100K.

The toilet accident is totally understandable we are nappy free too, kids have occasional accidents especially

I totally agree with this too. But surely it isn't understandable to leave them in said wet clothes, with the wee puddle still on the floor and carry on with whatever they are doing?

hygellig I think extended breastfeeding, co-sleeping and homeschooling are all great if that's what suits your family

I think there is a danger that in an anonymous urban environment where there isn't a lot of scope for independent "free ranging" in a safe community with other children brought up in a similar way, it can all get a little bit too insular and inward-looking though.

I have a lot of sympathy with the motives of people like the Allens; I am very much that way myself, but I would really hesitate to try and live to these principles whilst living in a small flat in Brighton. There's a danger that your world and that of your children can get very small.

I suspect it would have been different at home to how it was on live TV.

I fail to see how they will live off-grid in CR, when they aren't living off-grid right now

I think there is a danger that in an anonymous urban environment where there isn't a lot of scope for independent "free ranging" in a safe community with other children brought up in a similar way, it can all get a little bit too insular and inward-looking though.

Why assume they're only socialising with other families doing the same as them? My friend's HE child has as many schooled friends as HE.

It's their smug grinning which gets me. I couldn't care less how they parent but farming in Costa Rica. Why? And asking people to pay for it. They live in a one bedroom flat and their garden doesn't look as if it has any produce in it. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

It's so easy to be against modern medicine when your children are healthy. As soon as their child was actually ill they raced to the hospital - that says it all

So many things wrong starting with the names!!! then

Instead, Adele carried the attached placenta in a cool bag - scattered with salt and rose petals to disguise the smell - around with her until it fell off naturally.

She said: 'With both my births it took six days for the umbilical chord to fall away naturally.

'You wrap it up and keep it clean and it falls away and forms a perfect belly button.

And all 4 of them sleep in the same bed?

A 5 year old being Bf?

Even if they had cancer they would take the natural path? yet one of them went hospital for an asthma attack and surely this is a medication?

I see feral children in the making!

I haven't read the whole thread, but..

They did take their DS to hospital when he had an asthma attack.

They've said if the children want to go to school at any point they can.

They home educate.

I don't think they're as freakish as people seem to think.

Gentle parenting sounds very much like an excuse not to parent your children, no boundaries and let them do what they want. It's been around for years.

If you are working class and live in a council house and choose this type of parenting, you are a crap parent and will end up with feral kids.

If you are middle class, with a bit of money and a nice accent, this is applauded, as you will bring your children up to be free spirits, who are creative.

Lazy parenting for me, whichever way you look at it.

They are currently getting a flaming on their fb page, the just giving post was a bad idea tonight

This is turning into a right bitchfest isn't it?

does anyone have a link to their blog or go fund page

thanks

I don't think judgement is always wrong. A lot of people have said they have no issue with extended bf, home schooling etc or that they do it themselves. The 'judgement' has been a near consensus on antivax. I don't think it's wrong to judge this as selfish and irresponsible.

I was thinking it would surely be important to get reading, writing and maths sorted then the actual business of learning how to live off the land could begin. changez you should write a book, that upbringing sounds so interesting.
As for the Allens, well I suppose it's one thing to do extended BFing and cloth nappies whilst sipping at a soya latte off The Lanes. It's another to actually commit to living 'off grid'.

It's their smug grinning which gets me.
Presumably they were asked to smile for the camera. I can't see how it's a smug smile, they probably don't have any other kind of voluntary smile.

I have to laugh when people live a lifestyle different to 'societal norm', they're always considered smug. Why is that? I've known quite a few people live similar lifestyles and not one of those were smug nor were their kids feral. In fact of the families I know who chose similar upbringing for their kids, every single child grew up into kind, considerate, extremely clever and well behaved as teens and adults. Not sure I'd make the same choices for my family but that is as much my prerogative as their choices are theirs.

They sound thick

i could pee on the studio floor with rage myself, reading this! For heavens sake! Their unvaccinated children are only safe because the rest of us have our kids "jabbed". Only medical reasons should prevent vaccination. What if their child carries/catches a "childhood" illness, and then they come into contact with a child who CANNOT be vaccinated because they have a vulnerability - and that child contracts measles/chickenpox/whatever from their unvaccinated child? These illness are DANGEROUS! We have lost our fear of them because we encounter them so rarely, and think they are just a few spots. Measles, for example, can kill; it can leave children brain-damaged, blind, deaf. A few idiots like these and we can see these notifiable diseases coming back.

And a five year old breastfeeding borders on incest to me (I know, I know - I have a bad mind . . . ). And I am not against breast-feeding. I fed both of mine until they were 18 months, but this is not nice, and in public, many people (including me) would find it offensive.

As someone else remarked - if this family were from a sink estate, there would be an outcry, but because they are middle-class, it's okay.

They're on TV, telling the nation about how they live their lives (assuming the nation wants to know). How could you do this without being smug?

Bloop, I think it's the idea that negativity causes illness that people perceive as smug. No parent of a child with cancer brought it on by negativity. Autism is not caused by whatever nonsense they say it is and any parent of an autistic child or person with an autistic friend, colleague etc or just a person with compassion would surely think this is an awful thing to say.

"This is not nice"? Jesus wept.

Presumably they didn't get up and sort the wee because they were on live TV...mid interview. At home, it is unlikely they would leave it! The Costa Rica thing is as delusional as most things that people ask for Gofunding for, but the educating/bedsharing/breastfeeding etc isn't in the least odd to me.

No parent of a child with cancer brought it on by negativity

Exactly. I was having radiotherapy for breast cancer and I got talking to a lovely mum and her teenage daughter. The daughter had a brain tumour which was getting progressively larger despite treatment. They were two of the nicest and most positive people I've ever met. However the situation was very serious. The mum and I had a little cry together.