I can do resonate with this! It’s that feeling of failure that we impose on ourselves when we feel we can’t get it right no matter what label we choose. And I agree that gentle parenting techniques are inevitably trickier as they get older… it’s a constant evolution! Thank you for reading 🙏
Mmmmm yes! I have found myself feeling the sting of self disappointment as I ‘fail’ to stay 100% gentle after reading the books and of course wanting to do the best for my girls. I try and focus on respect and kindness… but also often find myself in the repair stage because my capacity to hold it all reaches its limits. I also have found that a lot of the ‘gentle parenting’ techniques worked well for the first few years but not so great now she is 4.5! It’s a different phase when they can articulate things more I’ve found. I think any label is harmful as it gives us a standard we have to try and perfect and can simply lead to us feeling like crappy Mothers when of course we never intentionally want to do wrong by our children. Thank you for talking about this. Xxx
Is there any other area of our life where we’re so likely to get unsolicited advice even though we’re grown ups with a pretty great handle on our own unique situation?? Or where we’re super-sensitive to what we might be doing “wrong”… If I could do one thing over, it would be raising my boy with ear-plugs in, just leaning into my own instincts and reaching out to select supporters when I knew I needed a hand. Children definitely need boundaries, heck we all do, it’s reassuring that the entire world isn’t actually our oyster all at once… as ever I could go on! Thank you for your words today Ashley xx
Dolphin 🐬 parent!! One of the only parenting books I bought was The Dolphin Parent: A guide to raising healthy, happy, self-motivated kids. It straddles the different parenting styles, upholds boundaries, and makes the most intuitive sense to me 🙂
Thank you for talking about this. Motherhood is a big enough struggle without having to label what kind of parent we are. I do think teaching boundaries is important for kids, they need to learn to respect them and to learn to have their own set of boundaries as they grow older. I parent my kids...not sure if I would say it’s gentle or not. I do know that my mum guilt would be far less if I stayed off the internet.
Oh I’m so with you on the no tolerance for violence. It’s been so frustrating for me when friends kids have hurt mine and they absolutely no consequences and the parent doesn’t even step in to stop the hitting. And I can’t stand the idea that it’s more Important to validate the feeling of the child that is doing the hurting than it is to validate the experience of the one being hurt!
I really like the phrase my mum and her friend (who had 13 kids between them) use: common sense parenting!
Thank you 🙏 it’s so true… it’s like we are deaf and blind to our own instincts sometimes, which is mad! But very hard to quiet the external noise when it’s screaming in our face everywhere we turn x
I can do resonate with this! It’s that feeling of failure that we impose on ourselves when we feel we can’t get it right no matter what label we choose. And I agree that gentle parenting techniques are inevitably trickier as they get older… it’s a constant evolution! Thank you for reading 🙏
Mmmmm yes! I have found myself feeling the sting of self disappointment as I ‘fail’ to stay 100% gentle after reading the books and of course wanting to do the best for my girls. I try and focus on respect and kindness… but also often find myself in the repair stage because my capacity to hold it all reaches its limits. I also have found that a lot of the ‘gentle parenting’ techniques worked well for the first few years but not so great now she is 4.5! It’s a different phase when they can articulate things more I’ve found. I think any label is harmful as it gives us a standard we have to try and perfect and can simply lead to us feeling like crappy Mothers when of course we never intentionally want to do wrong by our children. Thank you for talking about this. Xxx
Is there any other area of our life where we’re so likely to get unsolicited advice even though we’re grown ups with a pretty great handle on our own unique situation?? Or where we’re super-sensitive to what we might be doing “wrong”… If I could do one thing over, it would be raising my boy with ear-plugs in, just leaning into my own instincts and reaching out to select supporters when I knew I needed a hand. Children definitely need boundaries, heck we all do, it’s reassuring that the entire world isn’t actually our oyster all at once… as ever I could go on! Thank you for your words today Ashley xx
Dolphin 🐬 parent!! One of the only parenting books I bought was The Dolphin Parent: A guide to raising healthy, happy, self-motivated kids. It straddles the different parenting styles, upholds boundaries, and makes the most intuitive sense to me 🙂
Ooh I love this! Haven’t heard of the dolphin… will do some investigating. Sounds very common sense!
Thank you for talking about this. Motherhood is a big enough struggle without having to label what kind of parent we are. I do think teaching boundaries is important for kids, they need to learn to respect them and to learn to have their own set of boundaries as they grow older. I parent my kids...not sure if I would say it’s gentle or not. I do know that my mum guilt would be far less if I stayed off the internet.
Oh I’m so with you on the no tolerance for violence. It’s been so frustrating for me when friends kids have hurt mine and they absolutely no consequences and the parent doesn’t even step in to stop the hitting. And I can’t stand the idea that it’s more Important to validate the feeling of the child that is doing the hurting than it is to validate the experience of the one being hurt!
I really like the phrase my mum and her friend (who had 13 kids between them) use: common sense parenting!
Ha love that: common sense parenting :) so simple!
Thank you 🙏 it’s so true… it’s like we are deaf and blind to our own instincts sometimes, which is mad! But very hard to quiet the external noise when it’s screaming in our face everywhere we turn x
Ditto. The doom scrolling is real… 🫠