to think that we're more "precious" about the way we bring up our kids than our parents/grandparents were

[MmeBovary]

Bored this afternoon and been thinking about a couple of posts yesterday - the relative dangers of eating chips and childcare vs SAH decisions and I thought - just we don't worry about all this stuff too much? I'm sure our parents never angsted so much about little things.

For example, I was brought up on a council estate, by FT/PT working parents. Both myself and sister were put in p/t childcare at least some of the time, but I don't really remember much about it. We weren't played with much, just left to entertain ourselves. No Cbeebies, no videos and DVDs... Our clothes and toys were often 2nd hand or handmade, though Xmas was always magical. I'd have loved ballet lessons or a pony but no money for such things- also few trips out and even fewer holidays. Pack lunches considered of sandwich spread sarnies with a club biscuit and a packet of crisps. We were routinely fed pot noodles and sausages & spaghetti hoops and it was a treat to be sent to the chip shop for chips and "scraps". DM wouldn't recognise hummus and pitta bread if it hit her in the face [simle]....Pocket money was spent on pick and mix and kiora, and we wandered for miles around from an early age with no one worrying. Noone checked to see you'd brushed your teeth for 2 minutes and bathnight was Sunday. We were brought up quite strictly with the odd slap on the back of the legs but were impressed upon as to the value of education and were always read to every night. And we were loved....I think my (pretty average 70s)childhood was great and hope dd has the same - though oh the difference between then and now, though she is fortunate to get mostly new stuff and a healthier diet and probably more attention than me - and we are lucky that we can manage an afterschool activity and a holiday most years.

So, sorry - I've gone on a long time - if I haven't bored everyone to death with my nostalgia... AIBU to think we worry too much about kids these days, and everything they see, do, eat etc - when we grew up perfectly OK (well mostly anyway

twelvelegs i think that's true. However (and maybe this is for a different thread) IME those extended families and villages where 'everyone knows everyone' can give a false sense of security and hide some pretty murky stuff.

I wonder if women's altered place in society has some bearing on this? I feel that society's expectations of us are not as clear-cut as they would have been a generation ago - women are having children later now and are confused about how to balance motherhood and all the other things we now feel entitled to. It feels to me as though the result is that we have to reinvent the whole set-up for ourselves on an individual basis, which means we may tend to examine details more closely than our parents might have done.

lol raxo yeah I heard that one too!

A friend of mine has been interviewing grads recently for juniorish project management type roles and he says they are a bloody nightmare. No initiative and a serious sense of entitlement.

Interestingly, it is statistically no more dangerous in this country for our children now than it was when we were growing up. The figures for child murders are almost identical now as for 50 years ago. It is our perception that has changed, fueled by the media.

Also, about 90% of child murders are comitted by someone known to the child, so statistically your child is in more danger inside your home than outside..... Slightly facetious, but still.

Also completely agree about the blame culture. It used to be a horrible tradgedy if your child was killed - now it's your fault for taking your eyes off them.

Could society in this country be any more precious?

Most accidents happen inside the home

probably because dc are never allowed out.

Actually I think it has more to do with both world wars - if their was a war happening in this country or if war had just finished I don't think anyone would have the time or ability to think about all these small insignifigant things.

I think the over-professionalisation of parenting has a large role to play. People (journalists, experts, TV producers) make money out of commenting on parenting and as a result we are all over-anxious about things that we probably wouldn't have bothered about 20 years ago.

We're more conscious of all sorts of things that would never have occurred to our parents - when to buy a first pair of shoes for a new walker, what age to start giving finger food, choosing a school, organic versus non-organic, breast vs formula. These things all just happened - I was breastfed, my brother was formula fed, my mother didn't analyse it, she just did it because it was the right decision at the time. Not that thinking about some of these things is a bad thing per se, but it does make us more neurotic overall.

I think internet forums play a part in this as well - I've had huge amounts of support from MN, but it's also given me a whole load of things to worry about that would never otherwise have occurred to me!

Snickersnack - I think you have summed up really well was I getting at - and I think you're right that media has a big part to play in why things have changed. I agree with Raxa that parents do fight their kid's battles for them - if I got into trouble at school I would have been grounded - or had one of those smacks - no way would parents have been down there complaining. We went to the nearest school - well primary at least and walked there.

I guess I didn't really mean about protecting children from the more obvious dangers - if there aren't any more paedophiles out there, there are certainly more cars and more crime in general so I would certainly not let my dd have the same level of freedom as I had. Twelvelegs point about extended family is spot on too - I was close to all my cousins but my dd barely knows here. And I knew all the families in my street whereas people hardly know their own next door neighbours now.

It's more these anxieties over the RIGHT food, RIGHT way to make bottles, RIGHT school, etc etc that bothers me. I worry that the next generation will grow up to be a right load of wusses. I was told by HV not to nibble baby's finger nails as there are germs in my mouth FFS - yet our parents often gave us sugar water in a bottle to wean us of night time feeds - can you imagine suggesting such a thing now?

I resorted to sugar water to wean off night time feeds & in between feeds
worked a treat ! I think my DD had been very ill tho.

it was warm water i recall, and i gradually reduced the amount of sugar (which was probably about 10 grains) and got her to accept plain water instead of milk, and then eventually nothing at all. Sorry, a bit off message. Am just reminiscing out loud!

According to research the world was a much more dangerous place decades ago than it is now. Its just that our media network is so huge evrybody hears about everythink. Statistics say there were more child abductions 30 years ago than now. Believe it or not?
Still agree tho yes we do worry too much and some people who pussyfoot around their children annoy me!

SugarSkyHigh - see you're embarrassed about doing it - and yet obviously it worked for you. I'm no socialist really but sometimes I think if we just used common sense and put half the amount of energy (that we spend on worrying about these little things) into getting to know our neighbours and sorting out the local school if it's not up to scratch and other such etc....things might change for the better. People on MN go a long way to support other people on here so if we translated that effort to the RW and supported neighbourhood/teachers etc etc etc Hey - a MUMSNET REVOLUTION!!!!

Sorry - had a glass of wine and it's nearly the weekend so I'm probably getting carried away....

Oh no - killed thread with my revolutionary talk!

How would you know if you were more precious than GPs or previous generations? I bet there were loads of parents who were as anxious and worried as there are today.

I know when I was a kid there were loads of kids in my street (big, circular street) that weren't allowed outside of their gardens. I was though and was often looking for a friend to ride my bike with. Poor poor me .

I don't think making sure your kids have a balanced diet is "precious" at all. I'm really at the food given to the OP. My mum would have had a fit if we'd asked for pot noodle.

There were stories then about Myra Hindley and Ian Brady, the Yorkshire Ripper (although I know he wasn't into children but as a madman, I think he'd worry parents), that paperboy that got killed by a group of men etc etc. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that the same sorts of stories were circulating then.

I don't think that much has changed personally. You get crap parents, you get good ones, you get neurotic parents, you get neglectful ones, you get good cooks in the house, you get those who haven't a clue.. . . .

An interesting topic! I went to a 'parenting' class and the first thing the psychologist said was 'teach them to be happy'. that was it. his gist was that then you wouldn't have to deal with spotting depression/other psychological problems.

my point with this is that I think its not so much what our parents did or didn't do/give/watch. I think its about whether they set a happy mindset with whatever they had.

these days we do spend more time worrying; there are definitely more threats, but we are used to living with them and will pass that on I hope, together with an open and positive attitude to life and what it brings, something my parents did for me.

I most certainly did not ask for Pot Noodles (boak!) - we were given them! Actually cooked in a saucepan for ages rather than just the boiling water then stir thing - which I think was kind of missing the point

I agree with you WW that it is a good thing to give your kids a balanced diet - but my point is that people get TOO hung up on it. There's nothing wrong with chips or crips occasionally or sweets or fruitshoots or any other "devil's food" item you can think of as long as they get some fruit and veg and calcium etc. It never killed me, or made me fat, or gave me fillings...

I know that my grandparents had a cot that we all slept in when we stayed - me and a dozen cousins and no-one was worrying about new matresses and unleaded paint. Mash and gravy was acceptable food for small babies (personally speaking - yuk! - though probably more nutritious than pot noodles )

And I know kids younger than mine whose lives are filled with KinderMusic, babygym, swimming lessons, etc etc How will they ever learn to play and entertain themselves if they are constantly entertained....

Too much moddlecollying going on in general. I really liked earlier post re vomit and the breadknife lol

Or should that be mollycoddling???

My parents were definatly more "precious" with their parenting than I am with mine and I think I can probably be put in the "bloody precious" category. Playing with my children is a BIG one for me. I was played with a lot as a child. When I think back I don't think my parents who both worked FT and had 5 children ever had any spare time to themselves at all and I can never remember them shouting at me or even being very cross with me ever

YABU.

Things have changed and moved on since our parents and grandparents' time, why should parenting stay the same, too?

I find all this nostalgia about the past rather strange.

Ah, you lot never knew my grandmother! No such precious parenting has been known to the world since my Dad was being brought up by her in the 1930's. Fifty years later she was still regaling her grandchildren with the minutest details of her precious baby's development and childhood illnesses. Like I cared to hear about my Dad's food poisoning when he was 5! And her guilt because she'd let him eat an icecream.

Needless to say, he was an only child (apparently she was too traumatised by childbirth to consider another one); she was also widowed quite early, which no doubt didn't help.

She later thought her DIL a dreadfully neglectful mother because she let her firstborn crawl on the floor- why there might be dust and germs and all sorts! She had a definite thing about germs.

From dh's side of the family, I have been told that my MIL decided to move out from her in-laws' comfortable house into a rundown and unhealthy flat because she was worried about the effect her MIL's molly-coddling was having on her eldest son. In her words, "he was turning into quite a strange little boy".

well i was one of 4 and my mum was one of 9 so i suppose they didn't have time to get all het up.

I feel sorry for DD1 when she's watching the old Pippi Longstocking series filmed in the 1960's and Pippi and her friends just spend the whole time roaming the countryside with no adults telling them what to do. Maybe we all idealise our childhoods but we were freer then than children are now...

I try to give my children 'small freedoms' like letting them get dirty playing with earth. It's better for them than playing with plastic all day long.

Anyone else on this thread read the Toxic Childhood book?

i find this harking back to an idyllic time and berating today's "precious" parents baffling

information,research knowledge all influence society and decision making so why not parenting?

we have actually benefited from research about parenting eg Reduction in SIDS through back to sleep campaign

ye olde days so great heh....mmmm
early weaning recommended
BF discouraged
unregulated additives and colourants in food
sadistic teachers
dodgy tv programmes
i could go on.....

so i think it is easy to stereotype precious parents as a new phenomena but to be honest think the same ole pushy/precious parents have always existed.

FairyMum, It's not a question of nostalgia - my dd's childhood will be very much different from mine! In someways that will be good - we live in another country - she is bilingual, we go on holidays to other countries, we eat in restaurants from time to time, we do lots of child centric days out and she gets lots of attention from us. On the minus side, she will not be allowed to wander at will and unsupervised until well into her teens (or may be locked up entirely if she is anything like me at 15 , and she will not have such a close relationship with extended family.

It's more a case that we worry about everything so much! Another post tonight is asking about whether there is too much salt in weetabix/ readybrek or is there too much sugar in cheerios etc. I'm not dissing her concerns at all, just making the general point that people never had these concerns in the past and we yet we all survived...

my theory is that because alot of parents today are older and more educated, once they have children and find that they don't have the professional status that they once had, they channel it into child rearing.

MmeBovary, I didn't mention nostalgia. It was Expat.

My mother worried about too much salt and sugar etc in the 70s. I am not 150 years old.