To ask if Gentle Parenting works or is it a fad?

[Overthinker1988]

I'm a member of a few FB groups about baby wearing and alternatives to sleep training, which led me to Sarah Ockwell-Smith and her "gentle parenting" methods.
It sounded appealing, because when my baby gets older I want to avoid the kind of parenting I got as a child (lots of shouting, smacking and stress all round).
But after reading her book I'm confused. She says boundaries should be enforced but doesn't actually say how to do that, other than vague advice to "communicate" with your child.
Ok but what if they just refuse to do what you say? Time outs and removal of privileges are banned, so what then?
Praise and rewards are also bad apparently. So instead of saying "well done" you should say "I bet you're proud of doing XYZ". I'm not sure I'd ever speak like that, seems a bit robotic.
It seems that gentle parenting is becoming more and more popular though. Is anybody here doing it, and does it work? Or do you think it's just the latest trend?

Of course you had ‘parenting styles’ - everyone does!

You just didn’t label it.

Leah there is a lot of crossover between the principles of gentle parenting (which I love) and the writing of Janet Lansbury, who has criticised so-called "gentle parenting" for being anti-conflict and not giving parents very good instruction around the area of boundaries.

IME, gentle parenting sites/books/authors seem to think that boundary testing is not a thing, that it's a myth. They would say that behaviour always has a reason behind it and so the hitting you might be frustration or whatever and the stone throwing etc is curiosity and you should find a way to fix this or allow your child to express their curiosity/frustration/etc in a way which is more acceptable to you.

Over time it becomes very exhausting and stressful trying to accommodate a child's every whim when really it is absolutely fine to tell them no, I'm just not going to let you do that and move on.

I have had to use parenting books. I don't know anyone else dealing with the issues we're dealing with and some of them are embarrassing to raise with others anyway. It's such a relief to see issues you're dealing with covered in a book. It makes you feel less alone. By the way, my now 7 year old was a really easy baby and not a particularly difficult toddler! Some kids get harder the more articulate they get.

Sometimes you have to just parent the child you are given without the help of a book

This is so true. Gentle parenting might work well and be ideal for gentle, sensitive, naturally compliant children. It would have been a fucking disaster for mine. I am much less strict than my own parents and I do encourage my children to express their views and voice their feelings. But they need very firm clear boundaries.

My eldest was diagnosed in his teens with ASD and ADHD. It came late because he's high functioning and didn't present in some of the obvious ways - very verbal, adventurous, no food or sensory issues. But he was incredibly impulsive and no amount of gentle explaining would have kept him out of danger so I had to be very firm. I am sad now that I didn't realise as I would have understood him a lot better - I used to get very exasperated - but the boundaries he had seemed to make him feel safe and secure. (He would moan about having to do things - healthy dinner instead of biscuits but if we didn't do it one time - ie I gave him biscuits for a meal as I had a d&v bug and didn't dare do any food prep he would seem a bit panicked.)

My youngest is NT but completely fearless and terrifyingly determined. If I politely ask her to do something and she doesn't feel like it she will just ignore me or politely reply "no thank you" (not an option when we need to get to school for example). So I need to be firm and make clear there will be consequences (not smacking). If we gentle parented her she would rule the house and be a total brat.

Mine are in their twenties now and didn't seem to suffer any harm from some fairly firm boundaries, mainly around how they behaved to other people in the family. They were also gently sleep 'encouraged' from around six months and have always been good sleepers. Nature or nurture? Not sure. We went through a few nights of discomfort with them them--not more than that.

I took the view that to be the energetic and encouraging parent I wanted to be, meant I had to sleep. Without them in the bed--unless they were ill or upset, of course. I also had to work and my job was impossible if I didn't sleep.

@BertieBotts Thanks for explaining this further, that makes sense.

PP - For what it's worth I think no-one would deny that all children need "firm and clear boundaries" as @honeylulu put it. The question is how those boundaries are enforced. Being authoritarian isn't the only way to establish and enforce boundaries. As far as I understand it, the gentle parenting philosophy doesn't deny the need for boundaries at all. So it's not gentle parenting versus firm boundaries.

It's becoming more popular and the general consensus is that kids are getting more badly behaved. There's a correlation.

Gentle parenting in theory doesn't have anything against boundaries, but also very rarely offers any actual examples of how to enforce them (except for the hilarious "just take them by the hand and gently lead them away while explaining" :o) and I've never seen any troubleshooting as to why your gentle attempts to enforce boundaries aren't working, except for telling the parent to spend more time with the child in general, which while is sometimes the problem, is not always the problem.

IME, you need quite a strong sense of where your boundaries are, and to be quite happy and confident with holding them for gentle parenting to work intuitively. And I do think that a lot of people advising on it often have these qualities. They tend to be older when they become parents, they tend to be highly educated. Neither of those things automatically gives you a better sense of boundaries, but IME it's much more likely to.

If you do not have this strong sense, you can tie yourself up in knots, hugely so if you've come to parenting with lacking skills in upholding boundaries in general, possibly if you're young, if you're afraid/anxious around conflict, if you struggle with your child being upset or angry - and I'd add - attachment parenting (which often precedes gentle parenting) kind of encourages this sort of discomfort with (or even guilt over) children/babies/toddlers being upset. I struggle with this a lot actually.

And add to this that some gentle parenting sites/books have confusing statements about boundaries - I am not going to go back and read every post to see if it was this thread or another current one, but somebody stated that one of the tenets is that you "should always say yes, unless you HAVE to say no" and I've definitely come across the mindset/feeling in these circles before, that boundaries are for safety issues and anything else is fair game, and even (sometimes) a mark of how enlightened and caring a parent you are, to accept all of your DC's foibles rather than trying to fix them like those other parents.

I feel like the biggest omission (or even taboo if you like) of all in gentle parenting is the fact that boundaries in the right place can make parenting easier or more difficult - a lot of times the focus is on how too-tight boundaries are a problem, but very rarely (never?) on how too-loose boundaries cause a problem, and they do, not so much for the children directly, but for the parents, because if you're constantly dealing with behaviour which is making you drained or annoyed or resentful, then it's really hard to maintain the calm and fair and empathetic and intelligent demeanour that you really need to make non-punitive discipline successful.

@BertieBotts That's interesting food for thought. I don't fully agree - to me it's the "oh it's normal for a child to be upset" line that I've always found a bit suspect in Janet Lansbury.

The bit about saying yes when you can was actually me So, what if the rule of thumb was "Say yes unless it's unsafe, hurtful, or would leave others annoyed, drained or resentful"?

Tbh what I struggle with is the thought that a child needs fixing.

Oh no, exactly, of course they don't need fixing! I should have put that into quotes, because I didn't mean to express that as being the alternative, more that sometimes, it can come across a bit "us and them" with the gentle parents being "us" and the "them" being a type of parent who just makes up boundaries for the sake of it on a kind of power trip, or because they think that behaviour is something wrong with their child that they need to fix, etc.

Which I think is a fallacy anyway - hardly anybody is parenting in the "them" way (although I do think most people see behaviour issues as something which needs fixing - not the child themselves, but the behaviour).

My point being, within this dichotomy, to be more "gentle parent", more "us" if you like, it becomes almost virtue signalling to go as far as possible in the other direction, to be able to say well we don't even have boundaries around X because we believe the child can decide. Maybe the motivation is different and it genuinely works for some families to have very few boundaries at all, or maybe (I think, more likely) the parent is actually quite good at making their personal boundaries clear and is perhaps so good at it that they don't even realise that's what they're doing. But I think people can get caught up in this whole "unnecessary boundaries = bad, freedom = good" mindset, and I know I have probably in the past. Or I've admired people who are laid back about things which I struggle with, whereas really boundaries don't need to be a dirty word. It's OK and healthy to have needs and even wants as a parent too! Modelling healthy boundaries is one way to help children learn to be assertive which is something we probably want them to learn.

Ah in that case I do agree. I don't think boundaries are a dirty word at all. That's really interesting what you say regarding maybe it just happens naturally without the parent really noticing. Because I tend to think of gentle parenting (or related styles) not as a set of "rules" but it rather starts with a particular kind of relationship you have with your child - how you see your child. I feel DD and I have a relationship that's really comfortable generally on both sides, and I could imagine that because of this I may be setting appropriate boundaries without realising, like you say. Since there is no need to prove anything, there's less chance of veering too far off course in either direction. Is that what you mean?

Anyway - thank you for the food for thought!

Maybe, it's hard to tell really without knowing you as a person. But it sounds like it's working well for you and you have a lovely relationship with your DD which is the important part really, isn't it? :)

Who knows if gentle parenting works OP, but I can 100% confirm from my own experience that the opposite sure as fuck doesn't.

I have been interested in gentle parenting, but it doesn't work (in the way often described online) for us at all.

I have 3 DC close in age with some special needs that affected communication. I do think we are a really close unit but very firm boundaries and routine are incredibly important.

You have to parent the kid you have, not the child you assumed you would get.

Well I never knew what I did had a name...but I have never smacked my children, rarely shout. Do not have many 'issues' really. Being with my children is a delight.

We do have a sliding scale of consequences: Naughty step, room, lose a story at night (the third one never ever happens). They also have logical consequences eg have to tidy.

The naughty step technique has always been done with a reflective conversation: What happened? Who got upset/hurt? What do you need to do to put it right?

We have done that since they were tiny tiny and it appears to have created mature children, who are able to discuss and identify their feelings plus take responsibility.

They are not robot children and we all have our moments but really my point of view is rooted in a deep respect for them as individuals and not as 'children'. Plus trust in their own ability to work it out/feel remorse and put things right.

I definitely have boundaries - I got slated on mumsnet recently for the time I put the children to bed! I do not see the implementation of the way that I parent as easy or permissive. More firm, clear and kind.

Not sure about the label gentle parenting but we didn’t really do rules or bedtimes (more go with the flow Unless we really couldn’t in which case we explained why not) and our DCs turned out OK. I always remember that one of the (very sought after) prep schools we looked at when we were in London claimed only to have 2 rules ‘be kind’ and ‘don’t run in the corridors’. That sounded fine to me.

I think kids have to learn the emotions associated with "you can't always get what you want" and that neither attachment parenting nor gentle parenting really do that. These approaches spoil children into thinking that their needs and emotions come before everyone else's. Setting them up for big disappointment later in life and fragile mental health.

@Wearywithteens

‘Gentle parenting’ doesn’t work because the people who subscribe to it are just looking for ways to avoid being the bad cop in their relationship with their preciousness. Kids who never hear the word ‘no’. This is what leads to the sort of entitled bratty kids teachers, and the rest of society, don’t like.

I’m a gentle parent most of the time. I’m empathetic, I put the child first, I think about how they see the world and don’t believe in too many hard and fast rules. I believe in lots of love, laughing and praise. But - I also have zero tolerance for any dickish behaviour. I’m not afraid of being ‘bad cop’ and a shouty mum when I have to be. As a result my kids (now teenagers) are amazing people and always have been. I could take them anywhere when they were young. No tantrums, no surprises.

You should avoid joining rigid parenting cults and just go with your instincts. If the child is an angel be a gentle parent, if they’re not then they need strict boundaries and discipline (with equal amounts love and praise when they behave).

This nails it. To be a parent you have to accept that you won't always be popular with your children. You won't always be their friend. You will make them angry, upset and sad. But it's for a great cause: bringing up a rounded human being who can cope with negative emotions and accept that actions have consequences.

On a more practical note, you don't want to have one of those children that other parents dread having in their house because they are impossible.

Apparently gentle parenting doesn't get instant results and the book says it can take years for it to work and that lots of the poor behaviour described is "developmentally normal", which seems a bit of a cop out

I think that often translates as 'Don't worry about be, just be kind and your child's teachers will deal with their shitty behaviour and lack of boundaries for you'.