How much of an effect will my mum have on the way I parent?

[dimples82]

Hello,

I'm in my last stages of pregnancy so think I've been spending too much time in the house on my own, but....

I've read tons of parenting books etc (and quite frankly confused!) but how much do you think the kind of parent I will be is down to how my mum brought me up?

My mum was a great mum although she used to reward me or try and cheer me up with food and sometimes I think that maybe that is why I've always had food issues. This has made me determined not to do the same.

However on the flip side she only gave my brother and I home cooked meals which fully expect to continue.

Has anyone else got any things like this or is my pregnancy getting to me!

x

To some extent you will be channelling your mother in your own parenting (I can hear my mother's voice sometimes when I talk to my children and almost look round for her), but you do have a choice which bits of her style you wish to follow, and which you should reject. If you are determined not to behave in the same way with food, then you won't.

My mum and I had huge power struggles over my 'faddiness' (not much more than an aversion to sprouts) until I was well into secondary school, and I did vow never to get into that, and I haven't (my mum said a few years ago, 'Your children are such good eaters, not like you were, you used to make me cry'. I bit my lip, because she's great in most ways and we are close).

Yes to home-cooked food, no to force and comfort feeding!

I have become my Mum!!! I even use the word 'tumbly bump' when dd falls over!!

Because your own mother is the main role model most people have, they are influenced by how she did things - but that can be all positive, all "I vow never to do anything how she did it", or a mix of the two.

I think as long as you have an idea of what she did well and what you feel she didn't do so well at, then you can decide which parts to follow and which to avoid.

Phew feels like I'm not alone on this one.

Thanks everyone really helpful.

I think you can choose, and actually I think reflecting on how you have been parented is a good thing as you can take the good and leave the bad.

Personally I hope I've taken my mothers sense of fun and madness and left all the other (very considerable) rubbish parenting behind.

One thing it will do though I can guarantee is make you see your parents in a different light once you become a parent yourself !

I have wanted to do things quite differently to my mum, but am finding it bloody hard not to praise/punish like she does. And it doesn't help that she's round here a couple times a week undermining me