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.

Yes! That’s exactly what she should have done!

I didn't read pp as saying it was a cause and effect thing. I read it (rightly or wrongly) that they were saying most kids who are diagnosed as being on the spectrum genuinely are, but that some aren't.

@Hollerationinthedancerieeee l meant in general but I’m glad to see that you are having success.

And then they need to, yes, be physically moved.

How do you have time to stand and watch other families interactions for 15 minutes or longer everyday? How bizarre

Why is it insulting? I’m not saying bad parenting causes autism, just that some parents use Autism as an excuse for their child’s bad behaviour when there are not autistic, just badly parented.

If they are diagnosed as autistic then they are autistic.

And actually neurodivergent children are often much harder to parent and can require a completely different approach to typical children.

OMG, THIS IS NOT GENTLE PARENTING!!!!!!

Ffs can people learn what things are if they want to slag it off?! Then you might find your opinion changes!

The thing is kids aren’t stupid. They know that’s no choice at all and you’re gas lighting them. Firm but fair is the way. Honesty and a sense of humour go a long way too. No one’s perfect, let them understand that and build a real relationship with your kids. Kids who don’t have guidance and leadership from their parents are at a loss.

A lot of the time it's not necessary to specifically stand and watch. There's so much ineffectual parenting out there that you don't need to stop to see it.

Yes but that’s what it turns out to be in practice

No it isn't!!! It's called permissive parenting!

What works for one doesn't work for all: I don't feel I have enough information here to judge.

I was once in the park with my then 3 year old and she didn’t want to leave. We really had to leave as we had somewhere to be so I told her “I understand you don’t want to leave but we have to leave now”, repeated a few more times before I ended up having to pick her up and carry her out of the park. I was approached by a complete stranger who told me to go on TikTok and research gentle parenting. I wish I’d told her to fuck off. That relatively minor incident made me self conscious about my parenting for a long time after. I thought I was being firm but fair, yet a random stranger still decided my parenting required intervention and took it upon herself to give me lecture

So in my view you are not being remotely unreasonable about these “please darling do use kind hands and listen to mummy and do as I say but only if you really want to precious darling” types, but a bad experience may be clouding my judgement in this matter

I would never claim that gentle parenting is the only way to success or has all the answers. However, I think it’s very much misunderstood as ineffectually calling “gentle hands darling” after your kids while they run wild or launching into overlong explanations that they aren’t capable of understanding without implementing boundaries. My experience of it has been that it has helped me implement very firm boundaries and clear expectations and consequences in a way where my children are learning the underlying reasons for desired behaviour rather than just complying out of a fear of punishment or getting into trouble. My children wouldn’t get away with refusing to get out of the sand pit, or move from the top of the slide and I never give in to tantrums. I’ve found it a useful tool and get fed up of blanket statements that it never works or leads to brats who can’t behave. It’s distinct from permissive parenting.

Sometimes I think though that a lot of the parents who are "overly" passive or are maybe misusing gentle parenting strategies are the grown up version of kids who were parented too harshly though and they're maybe trying to do things differently with the best of intentions but in a misguided way because their benchmark is skewed from how they were brought up? I absolutely want my son to grow up to respect me and I expect to have a certain degree of authority over him because its my job to manage him and keep him safe but I definitely wouldn't want him to feel remotely scared of me.

🤣

Before even leaving the house tell the child we are going to the park today, we will have x amount of time there and then afterwards we are going to go to...and so on and so forth. Give aome expectations of behaviour: I expect you to behave well and play nicely with other children. No shouting and no being rough
I agree completely with this. My DD was keen on pleasing and to hear what a good girl she was so was quite compliant. She was also laid back and trusting.

My DS has always been an anxious child and defiant. He had the biggest tantrums when he was 2-3 yo. In the end, I chose the tantrums rather than bagging him and going by his wishes. He quickly learn that he wouldn't get his ways and tantrums would only make things worse but I also learnt that knowing what to expect in advance really helped him. I would tell him in the morning what would happen in the day and when going out, go into more details. When he didn't want to leave, I would divert his attention reminding him what happened next. I think a lot of his behaviour came from his anxious tendencies and knowing what to expect helped a lot.

I agree too many choices are overwhelming. I took my two when they were toddlers into a toy shop and said they could pick something each. There was too much choice and they had a meltdown as they couldn’t decide. When I picked 3 things they could choose 1 from it was so much easier.
it’s like going out for dinner and not being able to decide what you want from the menu 😂😂

This is really ironic because I would say I gentle parent and my exact strategy in that situation is what you did. Acknowledge feelings, state expectations, give a very brief and simple context and if they continue my response is "I can see you're having a hard time leaving the park so mummy is now going to help you" and I would carry him out and name his emotions while he cries.

Same if he's going to hit etc. The person who said that to you clearly didn't understand what gentle parenting is.

And on an aside every single one of us has just had A DAY at some point and deserves to survive that day in peace without unhelpful and unsolicited advice unless of course its bordering into abuse.

Yanbu

Some people don't seem to ever expect their child to obey or comply with instructions.

I'm not asking my child to do X, i am telling them to. And they need to do as they are told/follow the instructions. They aren't in charge, I am.

See, I have so many different feelings about this. You're right in that it helps nobody, not being the 'one in charge'. However, nobody teaches you how to parent - you either follow what your parents did, or do the complete opposite, or try and pick it up as you go along. And what works brilliantly with one child will be a disaster with another, so you can't even just copy what your mum friends do. Which means you have a load of people trying to parent and not always getting it right. And it can be hard to get out of - once you've got a child that will throw a massive tantrum every time they're told no, it becomes easier to find ways to avoid the 'no' because the alternative is too exhausting...

Add to that the constant feeling of being judged by the person next to you at the sandpit. So if I'm not strict enough they'll be rolling their eyes. If I'm too strict there's a chance I'll be walking out of the park with a screaming thrashing toddler and the other mums will be muttering about how little Jimmy never does that and why on earth didn't I just let him play for another 5 minutes...

I'm so glad the toddler years are well behind us now - though I still have moments where I realise that I'm still winging it and have no idea if I'm doing the right thing or not as a paretn!

This! It fucks me off no end.

My parents were ahead of their time with this. In 1990 they were saying, for example "Do you want to do the washing up?" as if I could choose to say no. Of course I didn't want to! But if I did say no they would get angry. It's not gentle, it's cowardly and manipulative. When people behave like that towards me in adult life it makes my blood boil. I think they do it because they don't want to seem like they are being bossy or demanding. So they try and get the other person to collude with their self-image. Deal with your own self-image, it's not my job to pretend you aren't bossy. Grrr.

I don't actually think it is helpful to acknowledge or validate excessive emotions about these things. Children need to learn to get used to accepting disappointment without making a fuss/getting a lot of attention. The whole point is you are socialising them to this end.

Carrying a child away isn’t abusive!