As I’ve said before, parenting is a highly volatile issue. It’s so easy to be judgmental of other parents and the way they choose to raise their children. Everything from discipline to baby care to sleep habits is subject to criticism. Most of us think the way we do things is the best and when we see others making different decisions with their kids, it can be extremely tempting to fall into the judgment trap.
This judgmental attitude among parents is the main reason I decided to start my blog. There is no one right way to raise kids. Period. Each child is different and has individual needs that his or her parents usually know best. There are, of course, some clearly wrong ways to raise a child, i.e., hurting, mistreating or abusing kids in any way, but in general, I think we need to learn to be a lot more tolerant of each other’s parenting styles.
I am certainly not immune to thinking my methods are the gold standard, much as I hate to admit it. It’s not hard to settle into the comfortable feeling of wisdom that naturally comes with raising a larger-than-average family. It’s not that I think I know it all, by any means, but the fact is that I have had many parenting experiences, thanks to the size of my brood. These said experiences can sometimes lull me into complacency, and even a misguided feeling of superiority.
Here’s my challenge to you, as well as to myself: The next time you feel tempted to deride another parent’s way of dealing with her child, bite your tongue and think about how you would feel if someone criticized your inability to get your baby to sleep through the night, your toddler’s tendency to get into everything in sight or your teen’s insistence on wearing all black. And if you’ve raised your kids already, before you dole out any criticism and scorn, don’t forget that you were not perfect either. Most of us are simply doing our best, and really, isn’t that all our kids can ask for?
Which parenting areas inspire judgment and criticism in you?
I think we all like to think of ourselves as in the middle of two extremes, and we use criticism of other parents to identify these extremes that we feel we’ve moderated in our own parenting. For example, I feel I’ve been critical of parents for two reasons in the past, first for being overly disciplinary (yelling all the time, expending your one’s disciplinary capital uselessly), and second for being negligent with the idea that the kids will learn their lessons by themselves and won’t do something that caused them harm. I guess the point is, though, each of these parents who have been subjected to my whispers in the next room are also imagining a different set of extremes, perhaps one that I fall into (I’m sure my insistence on raising S vegetarian is there somewhere
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Very true, Josh. We’d all like to think we’re paragons of moderate parenting, but there will always be others who see us as extremes in some way or another.
Excellent topic.
Other parents have made my role as parenting such a source of judgement.
I have 3 children with severe peanut allergy and asthma to pets: yes, I am overprotective, I have to be.
BUt parents cannot understand when I have to up and leave b/c they’ve brought PB sandwiches to the park, when I’ve asked them not to.
They say, “oh,you’re overprotective.” Yes. I am. B/c my children can die if they even smell the airborne allergens.
So, thank you for this. Don’t judge till you know what the other parent has at stake.