Tips to help my mother understand gentle parenting

[Nothermothersdaughter]

I grew up in a household with lots of shouting, punishment, and yes the occasional spank with a wooden spoon or hairbrush. My mum was very unpredictable and would just fly off the handle at any tiny thing.

I've obviously since realised that this was not 'normal'

I have a beautiful 11mo daughter of my own now and am really trying to be conscious about how I raise her, and not repeating the behaviour of my mother.

Does anybody have any tips, websites, resources on how to help her understand without her getting defensive about the way she raised me?

I'm already starting to see hints of her parenting style coming out when she's with my daughter. (Telling her no for a small thing and getting cross if she doesn't stop, but not giving her an alternative thing to do. Getting frustrated if she makes a mess or drops food, or doesn't want to give her a kiss.... basically if she doesn't comply because she's 11months old for goodness sake!)

Do you spend a lot of time with your mother?
I think if you're planning on her having sole care you're facing an uphill struggle.
If you’re just going to be “parenting in her presence” intervene and model the parenting you want to do.

You probably won't convince your mum and perhaps your gentle and kind parenting will trigger her into remembering that perhaps she wasn't the best parent. She might feel defensive which is why she probably criticises your parenting. Keep doing what you do and with confidence- well done for breaking that cycle

I’d read “The whole brain child” by Daniel Siegal and “Why love matters” by Sue Gerdhart and see if she wanted to too - if not, you could at least say “this is how we’ve chosen to be with DD, I’ve read a lot about brain development and this is important to us to use this way of speaking to her. We know so much neuroscience now compared with even ten years ago so we’ve decided to follow some of the thoughts here.”

What about getting her to read the Philippa Perry book- the book you wish your parents had read and your children will thank you you did

Just don’t get your mum to do childcare when you are not there.

Good luck with pointing the older generation to websites that explain why kids these days can’t hear the word ‘no’, and how there is no such thing as a spoilt brat and ‘spirited’ and ‘knowing their own minds’ are to applauded by anyone they choose to terrorise. They may or may not keep a straight face but their eyeballs will be rolling around their heads internally.

Thanks everyone. No she won't have sole charge and we live far enough away that we dont see her too regularly but when we do it's for at least a week in one go.

@PandaOrLion that's a really good idea thank you

@HoppingPavlova I'm not sure if you intended for your comment to sound judgey but it did, to me. Of course I know about setting boundaries and not just making excuses for terrible behaviour. I'm talking more about parenting without shouting, name calling and punishment for what is normal developmental behaviour.

I’d suggest get yourself some parenting books and read them through thoroughly.

Then you can present to your mum the new kinder way to parent, based on studies and scientific research.

My DM was like yours and I parented like you.

It was their norm. They had no Google, no parenting books. In many cases they were actively encouraged to be rather cold and harsh - spare the rod and spoil the child etc. In many cases they may actually have been kinder parents than their own parents before them. So you parent the way you want to, and enjoy it, and don’t stress too much about your DM.

@HoppingPavlova I'm not sure if you intended for your comment to sound judgey but it did, to me. Of course I know about setting boundaries and not just making excuses for terrible behaviour. I'm talking more about parenting without shouting, name calling and punishment for what is normal developmental behaviour.
But you say she parented you this way, and is displaying the same behaviour towards your daughter.
Why are you contemplating allowing her to have sole care of your child? You can't really imagine directing her to a website will change anything?

I think with everything related to gentle parenting it is important to remember it is gentle parenting, not gentle grand-parenting or teaching etc

What an unhelpful response. I'm in my 70s and wish I'd known about some of the more modern parenting approaches when my DC were small. As it is I've learned so much from my DD and DGC.

One thing I found useful with my MIL (who was an easygoing person but could obviously see we did things differently) was to ask her if child-rearing advice had changed when she was a new mum so she was doing things differently to her mum/ grandma, and was that hard to deal with, did they criticise her, that kind of thing.

It was interesting to hear how things had changed, and it (gently) reminded her that advice for parents changed over the decades, so she shouldn’t be offended by us doing things differently.

Sorry @HoppingPavlova I now realize I wasn't clear. I meant resources for me, to help me in explaining it to her better. She won't have sole charge of my daughter and doesn't live close, but she already is looking to me to discipline my daughter for doing normal 11mo things. (Dropping food from the high chair for example) and at 30 years old I find i do still find it difficult to challenge her, and she finds it difficult when I behave differently to how she expects. PP have already suggested some books so I shall start there.

@user1474315215 that's lovely to hear and so encouraging!

@EllieQ I love this idea, thank you

My strategy for dealing with grandparents and their differing parenting strategies is mainly to make sure I'm around to step in and advocate for/rescue my child when needed.

Personally I've found that they are not willing to listen to me explaining authoritative parenting (another word for gentle parenting) so I don't try to educate them. When I have previously tried they have not been able to get past their feelings that I am criticising their methods by choosing different ones.

Over time they have seen that our parenting methods are working and are starting to respect that we have different ideas, even if they disagree with them and they are developing a nice grandparent/grandchild relationship.

I didn’t let my dad have any time alone with my two while they were small. None. The risk was too great.

So with the food from the high chair example do you know why you don’t want to discipline her? Just say that to your mum.
So, something like
‘it’s ok, I’d rather focus on her learning to get some in her mouth <smile>’

I'm wondering if this is more about you defining some boundaries with your mum rather than trying to get her to understand that you will parent differently from her. So if she critices you, you can say (and repeat) this is way we have chosen to do this. No need to explain or justify. I think it's unlikely that she will change, so you're wasting energy trying to get her to - will probably lead to disappointment for you. But you can change how you respond to her and how you feel about her criticism.

My parents naturally left us to parent our own children. They would occasionally make comments/give advise to me but would never dream of directly parenting the kids if my DH or I were there. If we weren’t there & they had responsibility for the kids, then they would keep them safe but not admonish them. If something happened like the kids fell out with each other, they would let me know when I got back and I would sort it all out. So differences in parenting (which there was definitely some!) didn’t matter and we used to enjoy long holidays away with them.

My In-laws… well we still have an agreement in place that one of us is always within arms reach of the kids when we see them - so they can develop a relationship with their grandparents but we protect them from their grandparents behaviour. I would adopt this second approach with your Mum if she’s treating your child in a way you’re not comfortable with.

I applaud you for wanting to try, but in my experience you're on a hiding to nothing. Many older people who parented with threats and violence respond exactly like @HoppingPavlova when different methods are suggested - lots of hyperbole and supercilious jeering, and a total lack of ability to consider that their way might not be the only one. My mother once said "the trouble with your DC, Greensleeves, is that they're too comfortable. You need to traumatise them a bit, haha". There's no reasoning with that.

I would advise that you do not allow your mother to be alone with your daughter at all. When you are with her, parent the way you feel appropriate and firmly shut down any criticisms, and intervene swiftly if she attempts to impose her own "discipline" - she's your daughter, and if you don't want her to be smacked, threatened or barked at, that is your prerogative. If your mother seems to be interested in learning about gentle parenting, great - but I doubt it.

A big phrase for me was

'I don't expect my child to behave better than the adults around them'.

Alternatively

'I expect the grown ups to behave better than the children'.

That clarifies that shouting and hitting are unacceptable, from everyone in the room.

Who's the grown up? Also got used occasionally.

If you're only seeing her that irregularly, I wouldn't try and re educate her personally. I'd just intervene from time to time as required, and then as DC get older, they'll see that different people have different approaches.

And as the mother of DC who are 10 and 7, I certainly try to parent in a less bad-tempered way to the way my DM parented me, but I do not succeed all of the time. So like you I'm am trying to break this cycle but am not always successful so am more sympathetic to my DM than I used to be.

I agree with @Greensleeves . Grandparents are either receptive to listening or not. Maybe make it clear to her that she doesn't have to agree with you on parenting approches, she just needs to accept that you are the parent and respect how you choose to parent your DD.

I also agree that unfortunately you can't leave her in sole charge ever - she sounds too liable to become stressed and resort to shouting and physical punishment. Despite differences in parenting approach, I do leave my DM in charge of my DC sometimes but that is because the differences between our approaches are acceptable to me - she is much stricter on sitting at table for long periods and various other things than me but she would never go beyond talking sternly to my DC. And my DM is much more relaxed as a grandparent than as a parent. When we were young, parents (most importantly, mothers) were absolutely judged by how well their children behaved. We were expected to behave impeccably in public as otherwise it reflected badly on our mother. We got an absolute earful or occasionally a smack if we stepped out of line at all, which we very seldom did as we were timid children. Having seen the difficulties that this has caused us in adolescence/adulthood, my DM has come round to the view that nurturing feelings of security and self-confidence in children (tempered of course by consideration for others) is more important than perfect behaviour at all times.

It's a great book, but just the title will say to her "You were a crap parent and here are all the ways you fucked me up"!

Given that OP wants to have the conversation in a way that prevents her mum getting defensive, I can't think of anything worse she could do!