Parents Begging Their Children… What Happened to Parenting?

[Katherina198819]

Every time I’m out with my children- playgrounds, shops, playgroups, nursery pick-ups- I see it: parents begging their kids. A 3-year-old is playing happily in the sand, having the time of their life. The parent comes over and says, “Would you like to go?” Of course the child shouts “No!”—why wouldn’t they? They want to stay. The parent keeps pleading: “Please, let’s go… Would you like to put on your shoes?” The child gets frustrated; why would they want to put on shoes if they don’t want to leave? It goes on for 15 minutes, sometimes longer, until the child is finally dragged away screaming.

This isn’t a one-off: I see it constantly. We’ve entered a world where parents don’t really parent. They call it “embracing emotions” or “teaching moments”, but in reality, they’re not guiding their kids. Not everything has to be a lesson or an emotional workshop. Sometimes parenting is just about doing, not negotiating.

I think expecting children to make decisions like this sets them up for failure. They don’t understand that you need to go home, cook dinner, or do your tax paperwork; they only know you asked if they wanted to go, and they said no. Parenting isn’t therapy. Sometimes it’s just guidance, plain and simple.

I do love when the parent of a 3 year old knows everything there is to know about parenting, and pat herself on the back on how brilliantly she is raising her little darling.

Good luck with that😂

I am genuinely concerned both by your beliefs and your reading comprehension.

If you think that preventing children from licking electrical plugs falls under “parenting/discipline,” that is shocking to me. I guess I should give a medal to every parent who keeps their child alive these days.

Also, I already explained in my earlier comments that discipline itself is not a parenting style. There are parenting styles that influence how discipline is applied, depending on the parent and the child. I’m not sure why that hasn’t come across, but I’ll admit defeat.

If you want to insist on what you think you read rather than what I said, be my guest. Good for you.

And if that child kicks off you’ll probably say they are a shit parent - most people are just hyper aware of potential judgement so will do anything to avoid causing a scene (mum of 2 autistic children here!)

if you insist on pretending not to understand my point because it doesn't fit your narrative, I won't stop you.

I am genuinely concerned both by your beliefs and your reading comprehension. I am sure you are 😂

You are a better parent than everyone else, I got that, and obviously more intelligent and educated than the rest of us. Congratulations?

I did not once say that I know everything, nor that I am a good parent. I only said that I discipline my 3 year old. Seems like the bar is so low for you that you think disciplining equals good parenting.

As per my posts up thread - the kids survive. Sometimes their parent's eye sight does not, and neither do baby animals.

You may find it acceptable for children to be undisciplined to the degree that they shove a stick into their parent's eye. I don't.

I would not say that at all. As I mentioned earlier, I used to work with autistic children, so I am fully aware of the challenges; as much as a teacher can be, though I don’t have that experience 24/7.

The child I was talking about was just playing: the parents offered a choice, and the child said no, as a 3 year old would when given an open question. Yes, I am judgmental, because I feel that asking open questions repeatedly and then blaming the child for responding exactly as a 3 year old would is not right, in my opinion.* *

Please, tell me if I am wrong, but there are many different techniques that parents use when they talk to autistic children: giving warnings, supporting transitions, using a visual schedule, and so on. At school, I was always told to give them clear instructions and never use open-ended questions. I did not see any of these techniques applied, which is one reason I might think this child did not have autism.

Thing is if you don’t teach your children to follow reasonable instructions then someone else will have to do this - teachers and other adults.

I used to host overseas teens. One group asked if they could smoke in the room. I said absolutely not! They did anyway. So I politely but firmly kicked them out. They were absolutely gobsmacked - don’t think they had ever experienced a direct consequence of their blatant disobedience.

I work in schools and its blatantly obvious which kids have discipline and rules at home and which ones rule the roost at home.

Why does it need a label? This is just parenting. It's how most parents I knew were talking to their children over 30 years ago.

As an educator I agree that permissiveness is on this rise. I wouldn't mind so much, but there are definitely a set of parents who don't understand that I don't have time to explain to Jimmy why he needs to follow the rules.Sometimes he just does. Sometimes it's because I say so.

I've seen it personally recently when a probably 6 year old and 4 year old were allowed to talk loudly about 'that lady's big bald head'. 'maybe it's a man' they pondered while walking behind me. Mum made a few ineffectual shush sounds and gave up. I'm wasn't expecting her to shout at the kid but certainly reprimand them and/or apologise.

Don't get me wrong, I'm glad that there is a greater understanding of mental health and absolutely advocate for calm approaches, but not at the expense of discipline when it's needed.

Well this thread has 'descended' into a fairly hard hitting mud slinging match, and the first victim in any war is the truth.

The truth is imho, that ye are both kind of right some of the time. The OP is right to point out that really ineffectual wet lettuce , overly gentle parenting is a cop out really. I've seen it over the years, in restaurants, playgrounds, shops when kids are simply not held to account asap and instead frankly indulged at other's people's time & patience expense while their maybe well meaning GP parent tries to "gently" guide them to better behaviour!! (Jeez even writing about it does my head in, tbh). So wet lettuce parenting is no parenting really., it's a cop out.

Nonetheless OP, observing someone else trying to parent their kid in a playground and coming online to comment about it does reek of a smug superiority complex wrt that parent or parenting style.

As for me, I've thankfully been guided by my daughter's mother in offering choices, incentives for good behaviour & disciplining for bad behaviour when I see it. Am I any good at this? I'd say that's highly debatable tbh, but one thing that parenting just one 4yo child has taught me thus far, is not to be anyway too judgemental about anyone's parenting style, or their kid's bad behaviours, unless they really impact on me or my family. Otherwise I tend to just smile to myself & quietly reluctant, yup there's another parent struggling a bit, I know the feeling (as most parents do i think) only too bloody well!!

I already said this: In my opinion, asking an open question where a child is obviously going to say “no” (as any 3-year-old would), then begging, and then blaming the child for acting their age; that’s not guidance, that’s avoidance.

Discipline alone isn’t parenting either. If you do discipline, there are different styles within that, and those are individual to each parent and child.

Let’s not pretend people don’t have opinions. This is a discussion forum. It’s not about who is a good or bad mother (there’s no such thing, by the way). It’s about the question: why some people stopped discipline their children? You can agree or not, but it is happening. If you don't want to talk about it, it is your choice. But I don't see why discussing this is an issue.

I found giving them a countdown helped. Ten more minutes, five more etc. DD2 was good with that. DD1 would probably try and still negotiate longer.

I didn't beg but we definitely did negotiations over how many biscuits, how many forkfuls, and some parents laughed at that and would say they were more my way or the highway. DD1 had very firm views about choosing clothes and dressing herself, DD2 was more laid back but needed more help for longer with dressing. So you soon realise that one size does not fit all for parenting. One you need to let them have their head a bit, and go with it even if they have their top on inside out, with the other one you might play a game of who can get dressed first and make it fun.

But they have grown up to be fantastic girls at age 20 and 16, and we have a lovely relationship, in spite of my being, apparently a "soft touch".

You see tbh, the attitude you're again exhibiting in this post is part of your issue imho.

E.g. You write above, "...It’s about the question: why some people stopped discipline their children? You can agree or not, but it is happening...."

Now you're stating this as a fact, but it's actually not a fact it's an opinion. It's an opinion I'm inclined to agree with, btw, but that doesn't change it to a fact either, it's just your opinion. And no matter how much you try & ram it down people's throats on here doesn't charge that, it's still just an opinion.

Then you finish with
" If you don't want to talk about it, it is your choice. But I don't see why discussing this is an issue...."

Well I'm discussing it on here so that's quite obviously not an issue for me. However, I qualify this by pointing out that since being a parent myself for just a few years now, I'm very slow to judge other people's parenting style ,&/or children's behaviour tbh, unless that directly impacts mine, but I can see that is something that doesn't hold you back in the slightest!! Each to their own, I guess, just maybe try not to be so bloody self righteous about it perhaps!? Yes, that may help!?

Thank goodness there's a man on this thread to tell us girlies where we've been going wrong all this time, eh?!

As if there haven't been quite a lot of women telling the OP she's all wrong. Presumably women, at least.

That particular type of exchange is indeed characteristic of gentle parenting, whilst also being something that many other parents would do instinctively. It’s not that that type of interaction is confined solely to gentle parenting. However, gentle parenting has its own philosophy that does advocate for some specific elements that are distinct from what many other parents might do e.g. it doesn’t endorse unrelated punishments such as removing screen time for refusing the leave the park. It is big on natural and logical consequences. It also doesn’t advocate time outs, or naughty step, or ignoring tantrums. These are just a few examples where it differs from commonly used parenting strategies, although many parents may also use these techniques.

Usually, when people are giving examples such as these, it’s not that they are trying to say that people who don’t subscribe to gentle parenting wouldn’t do those things, but rather that gentle parents would. Normally, because the assumption is that gentle parents would just sit idly by, or come out with some ridiculous, developmentally inappropriate script without taking any action to help the child follow through with the instruction.

To be clear, I’m not trying to say that I’m a superior parent because I use gentle parenting. I have good and bad days like anyone else and I don’t agree 100% with all aspects of gentle parenting that I have researched. I think there are multiple ways to be a good parent and I’ve chosen what feels right for me and my children at this and it seems to be working fine so far.

Thank goodness there's a very silly, sexist eejit on this thread, who is so blatantly stupid at grasping at a completely irrelevant, red herring argument, that it's very obvious to all, eh!?

"Now you're stating this as a fact, but it's actually not a fact it's an opinion. It's an opinion I'm inclined to agree with, btw, but that doesn't change it to a fact either, it's just your opinion."

You said yourself (with examples!) that you keep seeing parents who lack discipline. There are plenty of examples from posters here too. Just think about how many teachers are leaving the profession. A lot of them cite undisciplined students and a lack of parental support as major reasons. That alone shows that weak boundaries at home are more than just an opinion: they’re having real, tangible consequences in our schools.

People who use this “begging” style don’t contribute anything useful here. They could easily say: “I do this, this is the reason, and this is how it works for us.” Instead, what I get is: “Who do you think you are?” … “You think you know better.” … “It’s none of your business.”

Or comments like yours. Just because you don’t take sides (at least that’s how you make it sound here. Who knows what you really think) doesn’t make you a nicer person. And just because we hold stronger opinions on the matter doesn’t make us bad people.

OK, you keep right on going with the mansplaining, you're doing a beautiful job of showing your true colours so far. 😂

I have always had to do the countdowns/set timers. My ds is ND, and needs pre warnings with a timer count down. The timer has to be precise. "In a minute" means nothing to him, because he will literally come back to me in 60 seconds and say It's been a minute, you said in a minute.

I also can't ask him, unless I can genuinely give him a choice. Can you put your shoes on please? Or Would you like to put your shoes on? is no good for him. I have to say You need to put your shoes on now.

I've had to adapt my parenting style, and parent him differently to my NT child.

I'm definitely not a perfect parent and I definitely don't have perfect DC, but I know that I can't stand there begging and pleading with them to do what they need to do. It's ineffective for us

Definitely.

I think the labels are helpful when it comes to parenting styles. We all know (or should) that the worst types of parenting are ‘authoritarian’ (a label) and ‘permissive’ (another label). The best style of parenting is ‘authoritative’. I don’t know where gentle parenting (in its intended form) lies.

I would say I was a mix of authoritative and gentle. Easier for me as a single parent to keep to consistency with no one contradicting my parenting style (which was based very much on gut instinct). It wasn’t plain sailing (by any means) but I have two great adult boys who have never got into any kind of trouble (not even a single detention between them). I like to think of it as intelligent parenting (that’s not to say I didn’t sit on the stairs crying my eyes out more than once or a hundred times).