“The Harsh Reality of Gentle Parenting”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

I'm not PP but there is one reason why your statement is a bit nutz. Honestly I stopped reading after that one glaring logical leap.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about everything being "child-led": I don't think that's a problem at all.

I think that when you make things all about what the child needs, it can relieve this huge burden. You can just focus on getting your kid what your kid actually *needs*, rather than trying to make your kid behave a certain way. Like, my child does not *need* to get good grades. What she needs is to learn to work and to figure this out for herself. So I offer help but her grades are her responsibility. I rarely spend any time helping her with school, and I think I have much more time to do fun things instead of checking parentvue every day.

Also it doesn't mean you have to be a doormat. In fact, kids need to be taught to not treat others like doormats. They need an example of somebody standing up for themselves, setting boundaries, and getting their own needs met. And I think the principles in gentle parenting that I have learned help parents do this in a really effective way. Parents need to deal with their own issues instead of just trying to make kids act a certain way.

+1 and I think one reason I like "child-led" parenting is that it's a reminder that my job as a parent is to guide and facilitate my kid becoming a functioning adult. I think parents who are very authoritarian also view it as the child's job to adapt to their (the parent's) adult life, including their moods, schedule, etc. I think this is wrong. My kid's job is not to make sure I'm in the right headspace for work, or that I meet my social obligations or whatever. It's not her job to be quiet and unobtrusive and compliant so that I can take care of all my grown up obligations. None of that is her job.

If my kid doesn't understand how to calm down after getting frustrated, my job as a parent is to stop and figure out how to help her learn. I might have to do it a bunch of times. The end goal is that she learns to handle frustration. If my response to her getting frustrated and yelling is "I don't have time for this, just be quiet" then maybe I get to go back to my work or TV show or adult conversation or whatever, but all she's learned is that as long as she is quiet I don't really care if she understands how to manage frustration. That's not "authoritative" it's neglectful.

Absolutely and I don't think you even need to be an authoritarian parent to view kids that way! I think that even really good parents can sort of have this idea in the back of their minds that kids need to accommodate the parent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

Your approach sounds very enmeshed. Sure a parent's emotions matter, but you're making it sound like if the child doesn't validate the parents' emotions, then the parent's emotions aren't going to be validated. Hello, parents need to go sort out their feelings with somebody who isn't their kid. Maybe you are pushing back against the idea that parents should pretend they don't have feelings, or that they need to hide their feelings from kids. That's wrong, but what gentle parenting expert says "parents, if you're frustrated about something, never tell your kids in a calm voice that you're frustrated, and don't let them see you manage that frustration in a healthy way?"

Another way a child can know that parents have emotions and they need to be validated is that a child can see a parent talk to a spouse or friend about a negative emotion, and can see the other adult validate. That is super healthy for kids to see, and nothing about gentle parenting prohibits it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about everything being "child-led": I don't think that's a problem at all.

I think that when you make things all about what the child needs, it can relieve this huge burden. You can just focus on getting your kid what your kid actually *needs*, rather than trying to make your kid behave a certain way. Like, my child does not *need* to get good grades. What she needs is to learn to work and to figure this out for herself. So I offer help but her grades are her responsibility. I rarely spend any time helping her with school, and I think I have much more time to do fun things instead of checking parentvue every day.

Also it doesn't mean you have to be a doormat. In fact, kids need to be taught to not treat others like doormats. They need an example of somebody standing up for themselves, setting boundaries, and getting their own needs met. And I think the principles in gentle parenting that I have learned help parents do this in a really effective way. Parents need to deal with their own issues instead of just trying to make kids act a certain way.

+1 and I think one reason I like "child-led" parenting is that it's a reminder that my job as a parent is to guide and facilitate my kid becoming a functioning adult. I think parents who are very authoritarian also view it as the child's job to adapt to their (the parent's) adult life, including their moods, schedule, etc. I think this is wrong. My kid's job is not to make sure I'm in the right headspace for work, or that I meet my social obligations or whatever. It's not her job to be quiet and unobtrusive and compliant so that I can take care of all my grown up obligations. None of that is her job.

If my kid doesn't understand how to calm down after getting frustrated, my job as a parent is to stop and figure out how to help her learn. I might have to do it a bunch of times. The end goal is that she learns to handle frustration. If my response to her getting frustrated and yelling is "I don't have time for this, just be quiet" then maybe I get to go back to my work or TV show or adult conversation or whatever, but all she's learned is that as long as she is quiet I don't really care if she understands how to manage frustration. That's not "authoritative" it's neglectful.

Absolutely and I don't think you even need to be an authoritarian parent to view kids that way! I think that even really good parents can sort of have this idea in the back of their minds that kids need to accommodate the parent.

Raises hand. Yes, I have that idea. The children enter into the family and fit in. The parents don't fit into the child's family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just about everything being "child-led": I don't think that's a problem at all.

I think that when you make things all about what the child needs, it can relieve this huge burden. You can just focus on getting your kid what your kid actually *needs*, rather than trying to make your kid behave a certain way. Like, my child does not *need* to get good grades. What she needs is to learn to work and to figure this out for herself. So I offer help but her grades are her responsibility. I rarely spend any time helping her with school, and I think I have much more time to do fun things instead of checking parentvue every day.

Also it doesn't mean you have to be a doormat. In fact, kids need to be taught to not treat others like doormats. They need an example of somebody standing up for themselves, setting boundaries, and getting their own needs met. And I think the principles in gentle parenting that I have learned help parents do this in a really effective way. Parents need to deal with their own issues instead of just trying to make kids act a certain way.

+1 and I think one reason I like "child-led" parenting is that it's a reminder that my job as a parent is to guide and facilitate my kid becoming a functioning adult. I think parents who are very authoritarian also view it as the child's job to adapt to their (the parent's) adult life, including their moods, schedule, etc. I think this is wrong. My kid's job is not to make sure I'm in the right headspace for work, or that I meet my social obligations or whatever. It's not her job to be quiet and unobtrusive and compliant so that I can take care of all my grown up obligations. None of that is her job.

If my kid doesn't understand how to calm down after getting frustrated, my job as a parent is to stop and figure out how to help her learn. I might have to do it a bunch of times. The end goal is that she learns to handle frustration. If my response to her getting frustrated and yelling is "I don't have time for this, just be quiet" then maybe I get to go back to my work or TV show or adult conversation or whatever, but all she's learned is that as long as she is quiet I don't really care if she understands how to manage frustration. That's not "authoritative" it's neglectful.

Absolutely and I don't think you even need to be an authoritarian parent to view kids that way! I think that even really good parents can sort of have this idea in the back of their minds that kids need to accommodate the parent.

Raises hand. Yes, I have that idea. The children enter into the family and fit in. The parents don't fit into the child's family.

So if the parents like to go to restaurants and bars and stay up late and watch movies and travel extensively, then a 2yo or 3yo is supposed to just do all those things with them and never complain or get tired or bored? The child can't need consistency, or earlier bed times, or more time with same-age kids? They just need to be mini adults who share all the same interests as their parents and never be unhappy or uncomfortable with that?

I know a lot of parents who really do think this. And some of their kids actually do become tiny adults who love sushi and are seasoned travelers and will sit quietly while adults discuss politics or whatever. And they also have meltdowns, get depressed, and have can have very disrespectful or dysfunctional relationships with their parents.

Kids change families. Even if you already have kids, a new kid will change the family. And yes, you do have to adjust the family to accommodate the needs (not wants, needs) of the youngest and most vulnerable family members. Within reason, of course, but still -- you have to adjust.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting read--thanks for sharing, OP.

I wish the author had included consideration of Attachment Parenting, which was the big thing when my oldest was born, and which I think places outrageous pressure on mothers specifically. And I say that as a psychologist who wrote a dissertation (literally) on attachment theory!

That she ignores Whole Brain Child is interesting, too, since that book is arguably the most prominent within the genre. But maybe the examples she chose are more extreme versions of gentle parenting.

I try to be aware of my kids' developmental limitations and to be empathic, but we also have clear boundaries and limits for our kids. Making everything "child-led" isn't particularly beneficial for kids, IMO.

I know this thread isn’t about attachment parenting, but I’m on my third child, and my conclusion after 3 is that attachment parent is actually the easy way to take care of young children. It’s easier to sleep with them and wear/hold them for naps instead of trying to get them to sleep somewhere else. It’s easier to wear them than lugging around a car seat and stroller. It’s easier to just breastfeed them from your boob than pumping, washing bottles, etc. To me, the “pressure” isn’t from attachment parenting. The pressure comes from having to make your child independent asap so you can get back to work, get back in shape, basically pretend you didn’t have a baby. To do that, you need to get the right bassinet, swaddles, pacifier, white noise, get the sleep training books, do sleep training and hope it works, carefully monitor your baby for “drowsy but awake,” buy the bottles, nipples, pumps, wash them all, hope your supply doesn’t drop, get your baby to take a bottle, make sure they’re getting a bottle regularly, etc etc. Oh and do it on no sleep bc you can’t take a real nap unless someone is there to hold your newborn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

These are possible scenarios but not causation from more gentle/authoritative/child-led parenting. Specifically the bolded. You also seem to have some assumptions that only mothers are raising their children AND that if both parents are involved, only Mom is choosing gentle parenting.

You are all over the place with assumptions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting read--thanks for sharing, OP.

I wish the author had included consideration of Attachment Parenting, which was the big thing when my oldest was born, and which I think places outrageous pressure on mothers specifically. And I say that as a psychologist who wrote a dissertation (literally) on attachment theory!

That she ignores Whole Brain Child is interesting, too, since that book is arguably the most prominent within the genre. But maybe the examples she chose are more extreme versions of gentle parenting.

I try to be aware of my kids' developmental limitations and to be empathic, but we also have clear boundaries and limits for our kids. Making everything "child-led" isn't particularly beneficial for kids, IMO.

I know this thread isn’t about attachment parenting, but I’m on my third child, and my conclusion after 3 is that attachment parent is actually the easy way to take care of young children. It’s easier to sleep with them and wear/hold them for naps instead of trying to get them to sleep somewhere else. It’s easier to wear them than lugging around a car seat and stroller. It’s easier to just breastfeed them from your boob than pumping, washing bottles, etc. To me, the “pressure” isn’t from attachment parenting. The pressure comes from having to make your child independent asap so you can get back to work, get back in shape, basically pretend you didn’t have a baby. To do that, you need to get the right bassinet, swaddles, pacifier, white noise, get the sleep training books, do sleep training and hope it works, carefully monitor your baby for “drowsy but awake,” buy the bottles, nipples, pumps, wash them all, hope your supply doesn’t drop, get your baby to take a bottle, make sure they’re getting a bottle regularly, etc etc. Oh and do it on no sleep bc you can’t take a real nap unless someone is there to hold your newborn.

This was also my experience with just one kid, but one thing I've learned is that experiences can vary a lot from one family to the next, and the problem is in being prescriptive with any of these methods.

I just fell into attachment parenting because I tried different things and it turns out the stuff that worked best for me and my baby and our family wound up being consistent with attachment methods (except co-sleeping, that wasn't for me). My kid slept well in the carrier and it allowed me to be handsfree and feel more less encumbered. It also made me feel good -- the oxytocin release of having my baby physically close was really enjoyable for me. Breastfeeding happened easily for me and I hated pumping, so EBF felt easier. My DH was the master of rocking the baby to sleep during the early months and then led the way on introducing solid foods, so it's not like doing EBF locked him out of childcare. It just meant I did most of the feeding in the early months.

But not everyone who makes different choices is just trying to get their baby to be "independent". Like the reason we didn't cosleep is that it stressed me out too much. I roll over a lot in my sleep, naturally (side sleeper and I will instinctively change sides for comfort). I can see how being really close so you could nurse more easily during the first few months would be easier, and I can see how sleeping with another person could be comforting for the baby. But it was stressful for me and I just slept much better if the baby was safely in a bassinet or crib.

And another mom might make similar decisions about stuff like baby-wearing or breastfeeding. Some stuff works great for one person and not at all for the next. Instead of saying "this is how you have to do it or you will screw up your kid" we should encourage parents to find solutions that work well for both the baby AND the parents, that meet everyone's needs. There's no right way. There's just a right way for a particular family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting read--thanks for sharing, OP.

I wish the author had included consideration of Attachment Parenting, which was the big thing when my oldest was born, and which I think places outrageous pressure on mothers specifically. And I say that as a psychologist who wrote a dissertation (literally) on attachment theory!

That she ignores Whole Brain Child is interesting, too, since that book is arguably the most prominent within the genre. But maybe the examples she chose are more extreme versions of gentle parenting.

I try to be aware of my kids' developmental limitations and to be empathic, but we also have clear boundaries and limits for our kids. Making everything "child-led" isn't particularly beneficial for kids, IMO.

I know this thread isn’t about attachment parenting, but I’m on my third child, and my conclusion after 3 is that attachment parent is actually the easy way to take care of young children. It’s easier to sleep with them and wear/hold them for naps instead of trying to get them to sleep somewhere else. It’s easier to wear them than lugging around a car seat and stroller. It’s easier to just breastfeed them from your boob than pumping, washing bottles, etc. To me, the “pressure” isn’t from attachment parenting. The pressure comes from having to make your child independent asap so you can get back to work, get back in shape, basically pretend you didn’t have a baby. To do that, you need to get the right bassinet, swaddles, pacifier, white noise, get the sleep training books, do sleep training and hope it works, carefully monitor your baby for “drowsy but awake,” buy the bottles, nipples, pumps, wash them all, hope your supply doesn’t drop, get your baby to take a bottle, make sure they’re getting a bottle regularly, etc etc. Oh and do it on no sleep bc you can’t take a real nap unless someone is there to hold your newborn.

This was also my experience with just one kid, but one thing I've learned is that experiences can vary a lot from one family to the next, and the problem is in being prescriptive with any of these methods.

I just fell into attachment parenting because I tried different things and it turns out the stuff that worked best for me and my baby and our family wound up being consistent with attachment methods (except co-sleeping, that wasn't for me). My kid slept well in the carrier and it allowed me to be handsfree and feel more less encumbered. It also made me feel good -- the oxytocin release of having my baby physically close was really enjoyable for me. Breastfeeding happened easily for me and I hated pumping, so EBF felt easier. My DH was the master of rocking the baby to sleep during the early months and then led the way on introducing solid foods, so it's not like doing EBF locked him out of childcare. It just meant I did most of the feeding in the early months.

But not everyone who makes different choices is just trying to get their baby to be "independent". Like the reason we didn't cosleep is that it stressed me out too much. I roll over a lot in my sleep, naturally (side sleeper and I will instinctively change sides for comfort). I can see how being really close so you could nurse more easily during the first few months would be easier, and I can see how sleeping with another person could be comforting for the baby. But it was stressful for me and I just slept much better if the baby was safely in a bassinet or crib.

And another mom might make similar decisions about stuff like baby-wearing or breastfeeding. Some stuff works great for one person and not at all for the next. Instead of saying "this is how you have to do it or you will screw up your kid" we should encourage parents to find solutions that work well for both the baby AND the parents, that meet everyone's needs. There's no right way. There's just a right way for a particular family.

“The problem is being overly prescriptive…”
YEAASS that exactly. My parenting sounds a lot like PP’s, some of the attachment parenting stuff worked for us, some of it didn’t. I read a lot of parenting theories, but I certainly didn’t follow any of them for the sake of being a disciple. I just picked the stuff that worked. Remember Dr. Spock? There is always going to be some hot trend that every insecure, desperate to please Mom is going to latch on to, and then that same theory will be proven to be horrible by the next trend. Don’t fall for the marketing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting read--thanks for sharing, OP.

I wish the author had included consideration of Attachment Parenting, which was the big thing when my oldest was born, and which I think places outrageous pressure on mothers specifically. And I say that as a psychologist who wrote a dissertation (literally) on attachment theory!

That she ignores Whole Brain Child is interesting, too, since that book is arguably the most prominent within the genre. But maybe the examples she chose are more extreme versions of gentle parenting.

I try to be aware of my kids' developmental limitations and to be empathic, but we also have clear boundaries and limits for our kids. Making everything "child-led" isn't particularly beneficial for kids, IMO.

I know this thread isn’t about attachment parenting, but I’m on my third child, and my conclusion after 3 is that attachment parent is actually the easy way to take care of young children. It’s easier to sleep with them and wear/hold them for naps instead of trying to get them to sleep somewhere else. It’s easier to wear them than lugging around a car seat and stroller. It’s easier to just breastfeed them from your boob than pumping, washing bottles, etc. To me, the “pressure” isn’t from attachment parenting. The pressure comes from having to make your child independent asap so you can get back to work, get back in shape, basically pretend you didn’t have a baby. To do that, you need to get the right bassinet, swaddles, pacifier, white noise, get the sleep training books, do sleep training and hope it works, carefully monitor your baby for “drowsy but awake,” buy the bottles, nipples, pumps, wash them all, hope your supply doesn’t drop, get your baby to take a bottle, make sure they’re getting a bottle regularly, etc etc. Oh and do it on no sleep bc you can’t take a real nap unless someone is there to hold your newborn.

I also have three kids, and have the entirely opposite opinion of you. It is easier for me to sleep when they are in their own bed, easier for me to exist sharing feeding duties with my husband, easier to push in a stroller then strain my shoulder carrying them around all day.

The reality is that people are different, and people achieve goals differently, and a path that might be very easy for you would be very hard for me and vice versa. The real problem is trying to make any of these parenting styles the gold standard for for every kid, who, like moms, are all different people who will struggle with different things, and find easy success with others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

These are possible scenarios but not causation from more gentle/authoritative/child-led parenting. Specifically the bolded. You also seem to have some assumptions that only mothers are raising their children AND that if both parents are involved, only Mom is choosing gentle parenting.

You are all over the place with assumptions.

I think the PP has leapt to some conclusions that could be totally off base to who she is responding to. But I think there is a lot of truth in the patterns they describe. The idea that a mom should so to the garage to scream to shield her children from her pain is, to me, insane. I try not to yell but when my kids do things that hurt me, I let them see it. I don't freak out, but when they are too rough and hurt me, I am sad/mad and stop the play. When my daughter was chatting away with me for an hour in the middle of the night after a nightmare and in frustration I finally was like, 'omg! I need you to go to sleep! I am so exhausted! It is 3am!' not yelling but clearly distressed, that was ok. I was tired, and it is not nice to keep people up for hours in the night. And yes I want my feelings to matter to my kid. So that when they are 12, and they make a giant mess or break something, they understand that their actions actually have an impact on the person who loves them. I think shielding your kids entirely from your mental labor allows them to take you for granted.

The flip side, is making them feel 100% responsible for your emotions, to the point where they have to be your parent, which is just as bad if not worse. It isn't easy to walk the line, but moms take on a LOT. And that is what makes them good moms. But you want your kids to see you as a person too. And you REALLY want your kids to see your husband treating you like a person. These are REALLY important things IMO. You want your kids to see you as a person, who has feelings, but who also has control over herself. Who they don't need to worry about, but who they should not treat badly or take for granted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting read--thanks for sharing, OP.

I wish the author had included consideration of Attachment Parenting, which was the big thing when my oldest was born, and which I think places outrageous pressure on mothers specifically. And I say that as a psychologist who wrote a dissertation (literally) on attachment theory!

That she ignores Whole Brain Child is interesting, too, since that book is arguably the most prominent within the genre. But maybe the examples she chose are more extreme versions of gentle parenting.

I try to be aware of my kids' developmental limitations and to be empathic, but we also have clear boundaries and limits for our kids. Making everything "child-led" isn't particularly beneficial for kids, IMO.

I know this thread isn’t about attachment parenting, but I’m on my third child, and my conclusion after 3 is that attachment parent is actually the easy way to take care of young children. It’s easier to sleep with them and wear/hold them for naps instead of trying to get them to sleep somewhere else. It’s easier to wear them than lugging around a car seat and stroller. It’s easier to just breastfeed them from your boob than pumping, washing bottles, etc. To me, the “pressure” isn’t from attachment parenting. The pressure comes from having to make your child independent asap so you can get back to work, get back in shape, basically pretend you didn’t have a baby. To do that, you need to get the right bassinet, swaddles, pacifier, white noise, get the sleep training books, do sleep training and hope it works, carefully monitor your baby for “drowsy but awake,” buy the bottles, nipples, pumps, wash them all, hope your supply doesn’t drop, get your baby to take a bottle, make sure they’re getting a bottle regularly, etc etc. Oh and do it on no sleep bc you can’t take a real nap unless someone is there to hold your newborn.

I also have three kids, and have the entirely opposite opinion of you. It is easier for me to sleep when they are in their own bed, easier for me to exist sharing feeding duties with my husband, easier to push in a stroller then strain my shoulder carrying them around all day.

The reality is that people are different, and people achieve goals differently, and a path that might be very easy for you would be very hard for me and vice versa. The real problem is trying to make any of these parenting styles the gold standard for for every kid, who, like moms, are all different people who will struggle with different things, and find easy success with others.

That last paragraph is the truest thing. It’s not just personality either — I fully expected to wear my second even more than my first but I also most never do because he’s so long his head bonks my chin. I think the parenting philosophies can be useful taken as “hear us what worked for me and why I think it worked” as opposed to “here is the only way to raise healthy kids.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

Your approach sounds very enmeshed. Sure a parent's emotions matter, but you're making it sound like if the child doesn't validate the parents' emotions, then the parent's emotions aren't going to be validated. Hello, parents need to go sort out their feelings with somebody who isn't their kid. Maybe you are pushing back against the idea that parents should pretend they don't have feelings, or that they need to hide their feelings from kids. That's wrong, but what gentle parenting expert says "parents, if you're frustrated about something, never tell your kids in a calm voice that you're frustrated, and don't let them see you manage that frustration in a healthy way?"

Another way a child can know that parents have emotions and they need to be validated is that a child can see a parent talk to a spouse or friend about a negative emotion, and can see the other adult validate. That is super healthy for kids to see, and nothing about gentle parenting prohibits it.

All I am saying is that whether or not this is a good method depends on the parent and it depends on the kid.
There is no one size fits all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a mental health professional and loved this article. There is a lot to like in gentle parenting but the ideas that parents should constantly disguise their emotional state is a big problem. There’s a world of difference between “you make mommy sad!” and a gauzy, cooing “it seems like you’re having such a good time hitting mommy in the face with your train’” type response. Also, the part about hitting the little sister was perfect example of the excesses/absurdity of the gentle parenting ethos.

I’m also a mental health professional, and I have to say that there are probably a certain number of kids who really do need this kind of parenting. I do a lot of DBT for borderline personality disorder, and my patients talk a lot about how they can’t trust their feelings. Most of them had abusive parents, but there is a certain subset that had normal parents, but were born with heightened emotional response to situations.

Marsha Linehan gives a great example in her book (CBT for Borderline Personality Disorder). She talks about a parent taking a child to the ocean, and the child is afraid to get into the water. Normal parent makes the child get in the water. Instead of calming down, the child screams louder and louder until normal parent takes them out of the water. What happens next time they go to the ocean? Child decides to skip the middle part and just starts screaming.
When this same kind of thing happens over and over again in different situations, a child who already had heightened emotions learns to either go off the rails screaming or stamp down her emotions (which later leads to cutting or other self harm).

I can see how a gentle parenting approach might really work for these kids. I wonder if the authors of these books were highly sensitive children or abused as children and struggled to see their own emotions as valid. And if you can match up gentle parent and highly sensitive kid, it probably works out really well. (Of course, these women often marry narcissists, so I wonder how dad feels about all of this gentle parenting…).

But a normal kid doesn’t need a parent to sit on the beach and talk about his feelings. He just needs to stand in the waves for a minute and get used to it. And a kid who isn’t highly emotional might actually feel smothered by all of this, and later on might see her mother as weak and unable to stand up for herself.

All this to say that I don’t think that there is fundamentally a problem with this approach, but it is useful only in certain situations and with a certain type of kid. For example, this might be a really excellent approach for foster parents of abused children. But it isn’t a catch-all for every situation.

Also, if this really speaks to you, and you feel that you weren’t validated as a child, I think that there is a good chance that you married someone who doesn’t validate you (people do), and if you do this, you might just be training your whole family to see you as weak and like your feelings and opinions don’t matter.

How you get there from all that is nutz.

It really isn’t.
- you are used to having your feelings invalidated, so you don’t really trust them or ask for what you want.
- you don’t want to have that happen to your child, so you make sure their feelings are always validated
- this builds a relationship that is pretty one-sided where only the child’s feelings matter, and mom’s feelings don’t.
- as they get older they see that dad’s feelings matter, their feelings matter, their friends feelings matter. There is only one person whose feelings don’t matter.
- they see you as either too weak to express your feelings or so stoic that your feelings don’t matter.

Now, if you have an especially sensitive or perceptive child, they might pick up on your emotions anyway, and they will still make this a two way relationship. I will tell you that this is the only way therapy with my borderline patients works. If I try to be some traditional Freudian therapist and be a blank slate, they get pretty distressed. But normal people are happy to walk all over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

So, if you have a normal kid and not an especially sensitive kid, this might not be the greatest way to ease them.

I’m going to say something else that you will find insane here too. Your kid might see you as weak, but feel that they need to stand up for you, and all of this coddling might actually parentify them from a early age.

Your approach sounds very enmeshed. Sure a parent's emotions matter, but you're making it sound like if the child doesn't validate the parents' emotions, then the parent's emotions aren't going to be validated. Hello, parents need to go sort out their feelings with somebody who isn't their kid. Maybe you are pushing back against the idea that parents should pretend they don't have feelings, or that they need to hide their feelings from kids. That's wrong, but what gentle parenting expert says "parents, if you're frustrated about something, never tell your kids in a calm voice that you're frustrated, and don't let them see you manage that frustration in a healthy way?"

Another way a child can know that parents have emotions and they need to be validated is that a child can see a parent talk to a spouse or friend about a negative emotion, and can see the other adult validate. That is super healthy for kids to see, and nothing about gentle parenting prohibits it.

All I am saying is that whether or not this is a good method depends on the parent and it depends on the kid.
There is no one size fits all.

No you were saying that making sure a child’s feelings being validated builds a one-sided relationship and the mothers feelings are never validated.

[Anonymous]

People have pointed out that They have seen kids whose parents tried a gentle-parenting approach and who have no self-control, no boundaries, think they’re the center of the universe, etc.

Well I have seen parents who seemed delighted to tell their little kids that they needed to stop crying, who sent their kids to their rooms, who rolled their eyes at the conversations I had with my kids about feelings, etc. And now those little kids are teenagers who hate their parents and don’t want to talk to them.

Whereas my daughter tells me she is so glad I’m her mom, because I treat her like a human being who she can talk to because she knows I care about her.

So please stop with the dramatic anecdotes. They don’t mean a lot, especially when there is research out there.