Does 'gentle parenting' work ?

[flowermo]

Let me start by saying that I am not an expert at parenting styles.

I know bits and bobs from reading articles, books, talking to other mums/ grandmas and a lot of reading on Mumsnet.

I understand there are a lot of misconceptions about gentle parenting. However let me summarise my understanding- it's about firm boundaries, but doesn't promote shouting and hitting etc and generally using fear to get your kids to behave. It encourages understanding a child's development phases and what can and cannot be expected of them at any particular stage. Helping them understand and validate feelings, negative and positive ones etc.

Another style of parenting, perhaps the authoritarian style or ' traditional ' style that was used a lot in our parents generation, is a lot more shouty. Perhaps even hitting. Children are scolded for having tantrums and punished. Parents rule with fear of shouting / hitting / scolding. Kids are often scared of their parents. I remember growing up in this kind of household, as did all of my friends really.

I would say I use something in between the two styles with my children. But more on the gentler side. I don't hit but sometimes I do shout for example. I try to understand the stage of development they're at and what I can reasonably expect from their behaviour. I try to use consequences like taking toys away or denying them treats they wanted. I don't think my kids are afraid of me. I don't think I'm a particularly good parent. Or that I'm doing things right. They misbehave and I'm often stressed out. They're still small, 2 and 4 and I'm just trying to find my way.

Anyway what I'm trying to say is. I've been speaking to some other mums of slightly older kids who are also teachers. They really think that the gentle parenting approach is hurting kids and kids are out of control more than they were in the past. More authoritarian methods work better apparently and kids should be scared of their parents and should be worried about getting in trouble ( not violence ) at home, if they mess around at school. Teachers are leaving the profession because kids are so badly behaved and parents have no control over their kids.

What do you think about this? Is gentle parenting working ? Is it true that kids are so badly behaved now ? ( doesn't every generation say that about the new generation? ).

One thing I've noticed is that if I discipline my kids in public, by slightly raising my voice, people do stare. I never see any parents doing that nowadays. It was normal to get a telling off if you messed around in public when I was a child.

I'm not trying to be divisive or judge either side of the debate. I don't know what I'm doing or whether it's right. I guess I spend most of my time thinking I should be firmer, then feeling abusive when I do shout at them. I'm also lost. I really don't want to piss anyone off. So please be kind.

How does all the sitting and cuddling and validating the Big Feelings of a child that's just hit another work if the child that's been hit is a sibling?

Because my mum was a big fan of Gentle Parenting the crap out of my sister when she hit me, and ignoring me when I was crying because I'd been hit.

She couldn't sit and cuddle and validate both of us, so she picked the youngest, always.

I've posted this on a number of threads on the topic and nobody has ever been able to answer - I assume because what happens is what happened to me when I was little, and nobody wants to cop to that.

@fitzwilliamdarcy but that's not particularly gentle parenting either, the child who is hit should be comforted first, the hitter should apologise and then a discussion as best as possible between the two on what to do next time.

People picking and choosing is what gives any method of anything a bad name things work if you don't it properly but if you do it half arsed and pick the bits you like and ignore the bits you don't then it doesn't.

Yep. It sucks. It centres the perpetrator always at the expense of the victim. Because, of course, the theory goes that the hitting child is merely expressing himself and his Big Feelings (let's be honest it's often a boy doing the pushing/hitting.)

Nevermind the Big Feelings of the kid who's just been pushed over, who sees the pushing child get away with it scot free and even get cooed at and listened to.

If it makes me Authoritarian to have a zero-tolerance policy to violent behaviour, then ok I'm Authoritarian.

Everyone always says it's never OK to smack a child, and I whole heartedly agree.

It's also not ok to condone a child hitting another child.

So many on here have flamed me for this saying "hitting and biting are age-expected behaviour". Ok, maybe so (I don't necessarily agree) but just like toilet training, it is something you must actively train your child not to do, in a prompt and effective way.

I've never seen children who hit and push, trained out of it effectively the Gentle Parenting way.

I'll try to answer it...

It's because she didn't know what to do. She didn't know how to stop your sister from doing it.

Maybe she thought your sister was communicating an unmet need in herself and she was trying to meet that.

Maybe you sister had a more voliatile personality and she was scared of excalating her behaviour.

Maybe she was scared of your sister becoming aggressive to her in the future.

Maybe she was scared of having an aggressive child (esp a daughter) full stop.

Maybe she was just trying to calm the situation in the only way she knew how.

Maybe she was just a weak and ineffectual parent who didn't know any better. But it wasn't right and it shouldn't have happened.

A lot of the confusion around 'gentle parenting' is that l, as many have said, it does become confused with permissive parenting - no rules, no boundaries, no consequences, never saying no etc. That's not what it means. It requires hard work, a lot of investment and the adult being able to manage their own emotions. It doesn't mean excusing, ignoring or facilitating poor behaviour.

How did you remove the car from your son? Did you ask his permission before taking it back? What would you have done if he had refused to give it to you?

I've never seen children who hit and push, trained out of it effectively the Gentle Parenting way.

I have.

First step was removing the aggressor (for want of a better word). Making sure they were safe and in view but returning to the hurt child.

If the aggressor returned for attention, the adult spoke gently (rather than angrily or to make them feel shame) to the child but made it clear their focus was on the hurt child because, eg "i can't cuddle you right now because I'm cuddling X. You hurt them l and upset them when you hit them and I need to make sure they're OK."

Rather than a more aggressive, "Go away, I don't want to look at you right now because you made your sister cry!"

It takes the focus away from the aggressor and puts it onto the victim. When the hurt child was consoled (which, tbf, happens quite quickly in young children if they feel heard), they returned to the aggressor.

No shouting and dealing with the situation with empathy and without criticism meant that the aggressor responded to the soothing tones and calmed down more quickly. There was no, "I know, the mean, nasty boy hurt you" type comments and nothing that would affect the child's self esteem.

The behaviour escalates when the child feels shame. If they believe that they are still loved, even though they made a mistake, their self esteem is in tact and they are able to develop empathy.

The problems arise when you encounter that behaviour from a child with crap parenting who focuses on how their 'poor baby' is feeling and doesn't address the unacceptable nature of it. They don't learn then.

At it's core, gentle parenting should be about raising children without feeling shame. That is not the same as raising them without feeling responsibility.

One's son calls her a useless cunt and punches walls next to her head! He's 14! She keeps trying to take his hands and tell him that it's OK to be angry but it's still no then he pulls away and puts a dent in the wall and screams abuse in her face. He was never disciplined when he was young and now she physically can't control him.

Again, that's not a result of gentle parenting though. That's a result of an absence of parenting.

If your child behaves like that, you've failed as a parent regardless of whatever ethos you think you've followed.

I don't understand why parents can never show anger

@flowermo Parents can show anger but it shouldn't be scary or intimidating. And if you wouldn't want a teacher to react in the same way to your child you shouldn't either

It makes no sense that we are supposed to allow children to express anger and validate it but we have to suppress our own natural anger! Is it any wonder why we have groups full of furious crunchy Mums berating other Mums for doing gentle parenting wrong on facebook, being entirely ungentle as their suppressed rage erupts?

I was stricter and less patient and shouted more with my first she's 7 and a great kid. I was calmer and more relaxed with my youngest shes 3 and she's a right little madam. Obviously we haven't got to the teenage years yet so don't know what fresh hell that will bring. I think parenting is only part of it though and it depends of personality any underlying mh and nd issues that haven't arisen yet, environment ect. They've unfortunately both had a bit of a shit start in life and not the most stable upbringing so I think that may also influence what type of people they become in the future. I think its that kind of nature/nurture argument

I'm completely happy for any teacher or adult care taker to speak to my children the way I have. Even for them to show the level of anger I've shown, I have absolutely no problem with that. In fact, I encourage it.

I've stood outside the nursery before and heard the staff in there use a louder voice with the kids and dare I say, even a slightly angry tone.

Nothing extreme. But for kids to see anger sometimes and to see that their behaviour makes you angry, is a normal reaction. We aren't cold, calculated robots.

Because I tried telling her she needed to behave if she wanted to do her activity but it wasn’t working- she was getting more wound up.
I felt like following through and banning the activity altogether would be too punitive- it was everything she was looking forward to and the other kids were all going to do it anyway, so she would have had to sit out and watch. It would have ruined the whole day/ her entire trip and I didn’t think she had the capacity to understand the full future consequence and immediately calm down.
So the compromise I settled on was delaying the activity for 10 mins. She was still really wound up about that, as it meant the other kids got “more time” but it felt more proportionate.
God knows what is right- I struggle with what are appropriate “consequences” and I don’t find the “gentle parenting” advice very helpful/
practical. There are lots of situations where the natural or logical consequences are far too long term or abstract for a small child to easily understand.

This!

OK. Prepare for a long response... (sorry!)

Firstly, anger is a human emotion as normal as happiness, sadness and love. So there's nothing inherently wrong with it.

Secondly, I've certainly felt crossness towards my children's behaviour at times, frustration, disappointment very occasionally but never 'anger'.

I admit there's an element of semantics here so, to clarify, to me, anger is a very extreme emotion. Crossness, displeasure, irritation, frustration are all milder emotions. To me. Some situations make us feel angry and we can experience a sense of loss of emotional control. But those should be reserved for the greatest injustices. Not a small child's behaviour (but that's just my take on it).

So, as an emotion, it's perfectly normal, and we can't control the emotional response we have to a situation. But we can control our behaviour - verbal and physical - in response to that emotion (eg you don't have to shag that married man just because you fancy him).

However, I think a lot of people misidentify their emotions because we generally have poor emotional literacy.

Essentially, the physiological response to all emotions is the same and we identify them according to context - excitement on Christmas Eve vs nervousness before an exam - the physiological response is the same). It's one of the reasons why women post on here in really shitty relationships claiming to love their partner. They're certainly feeling a big emotion but is it really love? But we can only identify the emotions we understand.

A lot of anger is actually shame. Shame is the bigger problem. But it's an emotion that isn't really discussed.

As an example, imagine your small child misbehaves in public.

It's a bit irritating because you've had to deal with one tantrum this morning already so you're behind in what you need to do (frustration and pressure of expectation). What makes it worse is that you feel like everyone else is watching you and judging your parenting and you're embarrassed by how your child is behaving (shame). This feels intense and you experience the intense emotion as anger. And the source of that anger as your child.

You feel 'angry' with the child in case other people are watching and you think they're judging you to be a shit parent who can't control their child. So you shout at your child to get them to stop. It doesn't work. The shouting escalates the child's behaviour because your child doesn't have any labels for their emotions. They just feel bad and intensely something. You might find yourself throwing out a threat or two, "If you don't stop... then..." Your child reacts more. They've got no space to calm down. They feel horrible and their safe person is shouting at them.

At this point, everyone has lost it because the parent has misidentified their emotions as anger towards.the child when it's actually frustration and shame. And are trying to manage those feelings in themselves by controlling their child's behaviour. Parent and child are both dysregulated. No one wins and the parent is expecting a degree of emotional control of a child that they don't have themselves (or they wouldn't be feeling so 'angry').

It's far better to acknolwege the initial emotion as frustration (circumstantial) and the second emotion as shame (down to societal expectations) because then it's easier to see, with clarity, that your child is struggling and, actually, it's not appropriate to be 'angry' with them.

It's the same when your child won't give up a toy someome else had first or hits another child. You feel frustrated by their behaviour and shame at how you and your child might be viewed by others/the fact you couldn't stop it.

So, to go back to your question, is 'anger' really what you are feeling or is it something else? And is there a better way of responding than 'showing anger'.

I don't know how well I've explained that. I was trying to keep it short!

None of that is to say you shouldn't address it but know what it is you are addressing.

Maybe you've never spent all day with a crotchety over-tired child who kept you awake for most of the night before and has gone beyond uncooperative and into downright obstructive to everything you've attempted to do, whilst over-stimulating you to the max with a constant stream of noise and touch. Because I definitely would not describe myself as a bit cross or irritated after a day of that.

The classic idea of gentle parenting as explaining WHY everything at GREAT LENGTH does not work IMO because it's way way too much information for a toddler.

your explanation was really good and makes a lot of sense. But the bit I struggle with is how to address it?
With a 2 year old it’s one thing. They are angry/ disregulated- just need a hug. My 5 year old it’s more calculated- she wants her way, she’s pushing boundaries, she wants to “win”. What to do? Gentle parenting says consequences- but what consequences? You are not allowed to punish or withhold, ignore or do time out. So how/ what to do???

I'm exactly like you. Very gentle but I do raise my voice a bit and I have slapped a toddler hand away from something very dangerous on occasion over the years but that is it. I talk to my kids, I explain how their behaviour hurts others and I implement the teachings of our faith. I truly do not believe that children need to be ruled by fear or physical assault. They're little children, eager to please who just love their parents and think they're the sun moon and stars. They love praise and will act in a way that they know makes their parents happy in order to get it. Do that enough with them when they're small and it becomes a habit so that once they're older and don't need the praise so much, they do it because it's the correct thing to do and yields the best results.
We are a very happy family. No shouting or fighting. We're all a very laid back, giggly, easy come easy go type of people. My husband and I are both like this and the children are too. Everywhere we go we are praised on how well behaved they are and I put this down to consistency. We aren't neglectful to our teachings. If they're old enough (and capable of understanding) to be told not to be loud or disruptive in a restaurant for example and they continue the behaviour they'll be taken outside until they behave whether our food gets cold or not. They see us take a baby out of Mass if we're disturbing the congregation and settle them in the car or wherever before coming back in and they quickly learn what behaviours are expected. We do not allow running around screaming in places where it isn't appropriate, we insist on good manners and being well spoken and polite. Our older children know to help an elder or clean up after themselves.
I truly believe it has nothing to do with harsh punishments or threats when it comes to children. They're pure souls who need nurtured and sculpted into the adults we need them to be not by fearing what happens if they don't, but having the happy stress free life to experience the joy and satisfaction of choosing the correct behaviours. I love kids and all of them deserve not to be hit or frightened for any reason.

Well I have two children (26 and 18) so I do have some experience of it. And how it makes you wonder how you're ever going to get back to normal with them.

But what I would say is, look at how you have phrased it and the language you have used (and I know it sounds wanky so apologies if that how you're feeling right now!)

The child is crochety and overtired. OK. A factual description.

But the child kept you awake.
The child is beyond unco-operative.
The child is obstructive.
The child has overstimulated you.

You've put all the responsibility onto your child who has no capacity to regulate their emotions if they are very young.

Yes, of course, I've been on the end of a child who is overwhelmed for whatever reason but I understood it in terms of how they were experiencing the situation not how I was experiencing them/their response to it. Your child isn't doing anything to you they are just experiencing their world right now.

Obviously, that doesn't lessen the impact of feeling tired, frustrated and overstimulated but language is powerful and can drastically change how you approach it. And it does help you to feel empathetic towards their experience rather than feeling angry about your own, which makes it a hell of a lot easier to deal with!

Couldn't agree more. When my daughter was about 2 I wasn't watching her properly and we were at my Mum's house. We'd moved anything breakable to higher cupboards and were quite relaxed about letting her rummage through our pots and pans and play with them in our won home. She went into a lower cupboard and got out a Denby gravy boat and broke it, and my Mum shouted at her. My daughter immediately burst into tears and was obviously devastated.

My Mum asked why she was so upset and said it was like no-one had ever shouted at her. I thought about it and said that no, no-one ever had- why would we? She was just a 2 yo exploring. The whole house is full of breakable things all within easy reach of a toddler and it's quite hard to be monitoring them full stop. I asked whether we couldn't put some baby-proofing in place so this kind of thing didn't happen, e.g. expensive crockery on higher shelves or catches on the cupboard doors, just whilst DD was little. She talked a lot about how in their day, they didn't baby-proof the house, they taught the baby not to touch things. What was unsaid is that they did that by shouting, smacking and making them feel less valuable than a Denby gravy boat.

It is semantics. The poster is using crossness to mean what most of us would call anger. She sees anger as when someone totally loses it.
When most of us if we used cross, we would mean slightly irritated, or even I have got to pretend to my DV this is wrong even though I emotionally feel fine with it.

Well the only person you can discuss that with is your mum. We can’t answer the whys of that for you.

in my home, the person who is hurt is the one who always gets the attention first. Once that child is ok, we move onto the other one. That’s how it works.

Do you expect society to ensure the world is safe, secure and tantrum-proof?
It isn't.
How much time is expended waffling on to toddlers and children when they have to comply regardless of whether they want to or not? The workplace is full of adults drifting around taking offence because what about feelings?
This is a problem and it's being exacerbated by 'gentle parenting'.