Parenting Styles

Blonde1817

What parenting style do support?  Why have you chosen this/why does it work for best you?

The reason I ask is... I've planned to kind of just wing it as far as parenting styles go.  I've read "Happiest Baby on the Block" and I think it's a great resource for the first three months or so.  We had an interview with a daycare provider who follows the Babywise philosophy and all I really know about it is that it gets a very polarizing response from people! What do you all know about it?

So now I'm curious to know if any other FTMs have any clue how they plan to parent, and if and BTDT mamas can share what has worked best for them, especially during the first year. 

Thoughts???

MRSCORKER

I plan to read "Happiest Baby on the block" as well but I'm not going to commit myself to a certain parenting style or philosophy until we get to know our LO. What I think might work for me pre-baby may not work for him at all. I would research the various philosophies that different day cares use and chose the one which best aligns with your thoughts, keeping in mind that you might have to switch gears down the line. That being said, I'm a FTM and total newb so I could be going about this all wrong!

TurtleMomma

I generally align myself with attachment parenting/gentle parenting/evolutionary parenting (all are basically the same). Just feels natural to me. 

Far as I'm concerned, stay as far away from Babywise as you can. Run, don't walk. Of all the parenting methods out there, it is the only one the American Academy of Pediatrics has specifically come out against because of the prevalence of cases of failure to thrive in babes. 

ball4768

Happiest Baby on the Block worked really well for us, and Babywise felt completely wrong to me. But you will do whatever works for you and your baby! I also couldn't do Cry It Out, so I did a No-Cry Sleep Method with great success. 

queen_frostine

Is "lazy parenting" a style? Because that sounds like me.

(Obviously I'm not going to let harm come to my child or fail to meet her needs - but I am never going to be organized enough to really get it together or have a "system.")

von1976

Um, I have no idea. We're first time parents, so we're pretty much just going to wing it. I don't even know what parenting styles there are other than authoritative, permissive, etc. 

Both our parents were pretty strict. We will probably try to achieve a happy medium. 

cbamama641

This is baby number four and I still don't really know what my parenting style is except "keep the kids happy and alive". I feel like it's really impossible to adopt a parenting style before they even arri'e, but it is good to know what things are important to you as a parent..

amye102485

I remember reading happiest baby on the block, but I don't know how much I implemented it with my first. I just did what I thought she needed, I still do. I nursed when she was hungry, I slept with her until she didn't need me to, I set boundaries for her as a toddler, etc. You just have to do what feels right for you and your baby once they get here. You'll figure it out!

mrskratt

I have a very laid back, go with the flow parenting style. Before DD, I wanted to do the complete attachment parenting, with co-sleeping and extended BFing, but neither was in the cards for us. She was too independent.
So, I learned to just go with it and it has been so much smoother. 

booksandicecream

Oh man, this is my jam! Most people have gathered at this point that I'm a developmental psychologist, although to be fair not a parenting specialist, however the basic principle is easy. You want to be authoritative without being authoritarian. Basically, raise baby to know you will always be there when they need you but also set rules that don't bend. Lay out the rules and the consequences ahead of time. You're the parent, not the friend and sometimes your kids will hate you for a few minutes but if you have bonded well it will pass quickly.
 Most important, IMO,is age-appropriate parenting. Your 2-month-old does not possess the cognitive capability to understand that they are not allowed to cry in public whereas your 6-year-old definitely does.
Also, prior to 6 months, your baby doesn't have object permanence, meaning when something is out of their sight it's literally out of existence. This is also true for caregivers - when you're not there it can be somewhat traumatic for the baby. All babies are different, but this is the primary reason why cry-it-out is so frowned upon. Yes, they will eventually learn to "self-soothe", aka they learn they can't depend on their caregivers to provide what they need. But coming to that point is traumatic for them and impairs bonding and trust. 
There is no "right" way to parent, but I will be there for my baby whenever they need me for at least the first 6months. Baby will sleep right next to me and receive comfort when he cries. Once he understands that he will always be taken care of, we will start distancing ourselves, letting him cry for a few minutes before coming, letting him be a bit uncomfortable, etc. 
That was REALLY long so I'll stop there.

KarenBM13

I'm a FTM so take this FWIW, but several guys I work with have unbelievably well behaved children and they all swear by Babywise for the first few months. The thinking is that it sets up a very basic level of authoritative parenting @books&icecream discussed. The approach in Bringing Up Bebe (almost a gentler version of Babywise) made a lot of sense to me so I'm going to try to implement the approaches in those two books.

Blonde1817

Thanks ladies!  I certainly know that authoritative parenting is the way to go overall, but as far as sleep schedules and whatnot I had planned to just kind of be flexible and see what works, but it has kind of thrown me for a loop that this daycare provider is very specific about being on a schedule. I do think that's a good thing, but baby will start there at around 3 months and I'm just not sure if it's developmentally appropriate at that age?  Especially the self-soothing part.  I think I also need to ask more specific questions on how closely they follow this structure and how flexible they are. 

@books&icecream I definitely appreciate your response, I'm a therapist with a background in child and adolescent psych so I'm really looking for the most evidence-based practices here ... it seems like most parenting theories and books just provide a lot of "research" that supports their theory and sounds convincing but I'm not sure it's legit and don't have time to look into all of it.  Any ideas for helpful books/resources on infant development?

blaf322

I've been not posting on this bc I wasn't sure how to formulate everything into a cohesive response that also made sense. Words are hard Anyway, literally EVERYTHING @books&icecream said is exactly how I feel re: longer term parenting style. I was a nanny through college and spent more time with the kids than their parents. What was described was exactly my relationship with the kids and they loved me for it but were also well behaved (when I first arrived, they were not so well behaved).

Anyway, regarding sleep... I'm going to try the Moms On Call method. Who knows if it'll work for us, but I've armed myself with the info and am prepared to give it a shot. The book was written by 2 nurses with 8 kids between them and I've read a lot of success stories about it so I want to try. I recommend hopping on the MOC website and at least purchasing the first book (it's only like $15). It's a super quick read (read it with DH in the car on the way to the lake house that's an hour away... Took a couple of trips bc we talked through things we read but again, super short read) and has some other informative things about general care in other sections that you will find helpful, at a minimum.

mrskratt

Regarding the sleeping, DD was an absolute terrible sleeper. She was up every 45 minutes, all night long until 7 months. And the only way we could get her to fall back asleep was bounce on a yoga ball, vigorously. We tried everything, all the noisemakers, sleep sacks, magic sleep suits, co-sleeping, etc. We finally resorted to sleep training using The Sleep Easy Solution. It was one of the best decisions we ever made. We finally had a happy baby because she was finally getting solid sleep. And she is still an amazing sleeper to this day. 
Everyone that we recommend it to says the same thing. 

TheBeeCharmer

Baby number four here and no set parenting style. I'm not a bed sharing type of person or authoritarian. I try to be somewhere in between. So far, my parenting style has been keep them alive and happy and make sure they're not total dicks to people. It's working out ok. 

amye102485

@TheBeeCharmer I'm with you in this parenting style. Alive and happy is where I try to keep mine too!

Mrsrundell

*lurking from Aug 16* 

My SIL used a schedule, parent-led Babywise type of routine and it worked verrrry well for her son.  My co-worker suggested I read Secrets from the Baby Whisperer and it really resonated with me.  It emphasized the order in which things are done but not strict by the clock. 

serenaxo84

I am a kind of do what feels right parent. We don't do cry it out but I will do time outs. I try not to yell but sometimes I do. I try and explain and sometimes that doesn't work. I try and distract when we have a temper tantrum but sometimes I have to ignore. I feel like every child is so different and there isn't one mode that works all the time.

vcabbyw

I'm not trying to be snarky here, but I find this post kind of silly. While I definitely think it's smart to read as much as you can, educate yourself, follow your instincts and hopefully make decisions respectfully together as parents.....

My thought is that every child is different, has different personalities and experiences. After watching a few of my friends have multiple children, this becomes obvious. Some are great sleepers. Some are more active.  Some listen to direction and authority beautifully. I never decided which way I was going to go before my first, but ended up leaning towards more attachment style for the first year. 

I also started to observe other friends with children around me, even families with adult children. I don't have a great family relationship with my own. When I had hard questions about parenting, I went to the friends I knew had the same ideals, values and morals that I saw as important.

Anyway, this is getting too long. If parenting has taught me ANYTHING, is that we have to learn how to adapt quickly and plans never go the way we intend. This is where reading, listening to others and educating ourselves comes into play. 

 This includes birth too (the first lesson lol), so just keep an open mind  

Blonde1817

@vcabbyw  I definitely agree and plan on just seeing what works, I guess I was just kind of fishing for some knowledge because this particular daycare provider is great in every other way but has made it fairly clear that this is the childcare theory she follows and is not flexible about it.  I think I need to just ask her some more specific questions to determine how closely she will insist on following the schedule and structure if it doesn't work for our son.  But I've kind of decided that we'll just see how it goes in our first 12 weeks with baby, and if he is really not responding to a schedule at all then I'll find another provider.  

But I do think it's essential to educate yourself and make a conscious decision on what parenting techniques you want to use.  Maybe not in the infant stage, but certainly later on.  Our default setting is to cycle around to parenting the way we were parented.  I love my parents and they were wonderful parents in a lot of ways, but there are also things I would like to do very differently.  Although I don't really think that any one book or theory is "correct."

queen_frostine

We can't parent exactly the way we were parented anyway -- when I was a kid we had 2-3 channels on television, no computers or video games or mobile phones!

booksandicecream

Blonde1817 said:

@vcabbyw  I definitely agree and plan on just seeing what works, I guess I was just kind of fishing for some knowledge because this particular daycare provider is great in every other way but has made it fairly clear that this is the childcare theory she follows and is not flexible about it.  I think I need to just ask her some more specific questions to determine how closely she will insist on following the schedule and structure if it doesn't work for our son.  But I've kind of decided that we'll just see how it goes in our first 12 weeks with baby, and if he is really not responding to a schedule at all then I'll find another provider.  

But I do think it's essential to educate yourself and make a conscious decision on what parenting techniques you want to use.  Maybe not in the infant stage, but certainly later on.  Our default setting is to cycle around to parenting the way we were parented.  I love my parents and they were wonderful parents in a lot of ways, but there are also things I would like to do very differently.  Although I don't really think that any one book or theory is "correct."

Yes to the bolded. Also, I really approve of this thread. The single most predictive variable for child outcome is maternal education. Technically this means academically, but I will put myself out there and bet that mothers-to-be who actively seek out evidence-based methods for parenting are way more likely to have children with high quality of life than those who just "wing it". Probably a UO, but still.

klv

My philosophy is to raise a kid who is well rounded and not an asshole. 

My daughter is 5. I did time out with her....I do not like to spank, but there were a few moments where time out would not have worked. She got a
swat on the butt maybe 10 times in her life. She is very respectful and has great manners. she understands rules and will let others know ( including my husband) when rules are broken.  She helps around the house and is very independent. 

I said I would NEVER co sleep. Ha! My girly would not sleep anywhere but on my chest for the first 6 weeks.  She eventually got into a crib around 3 months

I did CIO around 9 months after trying several other methods.  It was hard! It took about 3 days and it went from 5-6 night wakings to 1. She didn't STTN until she was 2 but 1 night waking was tolerable. 

I think you need to adjust your parenting based on the personality of your kid. Saying "I will do this and never do that!" Is the best way to set yourself up for disappoint. Raise your kid to not be an ass even if it means doing things you said you never would. 

vcabbyw

You know, totally my opinion too. But I would probably agree with saying that parents who don't question, think about how they were parented or educate themselves possibly have a lower chance of having happy well adjusted kiddos.

There's just so much shame and guilt that comes along with parenting, that I try to remind my friends that "bad mothers wouldn't question or research this...." and that in a month, everything will be different with your LO. 

Ive just seen so many of my friends say "I didn't expect this." "No one told me about this stage!" Or having some other type of guilt when plans for sleeping, breastfeeding, discipline (the list goes on and on) didn't go the way they anticipated. 

KarenBM13

vcabbyw said:

You know, totally my opinion too. But I would probably agree with saying that parents who don't question, think about how they were parented or educate themselves possibly have a lower chance of having happy well adjusted kiddos.

There's just so much shame and guilt that comes along with parenting, that I try to remind my friends that "bad mothers wouldn't question or research this...." and that in a month, everything will be different with your LO. 

Ive just seen so many of my friends say "I didn't expect this." "No one told me about this stage!" Or having some other type of guilt when plans for sleeping, breastfeeding, discipline (the list goes on and on) didn't go the way they anticipated. 

I love that concept! That is such a good reminder. 

Schell2013

I'm firm but fair. If I say no I enforce it. I do pick my battles carefully now that I have a 3.5 year old, I've been learning that over the last few years. I wouldn't say I have a set style. I'm kinda middle of the road. I co sleep until about 6 months and yes I do sleep train. I breastfeed but I'm fine if they need formula and if they start biting they get weaned. I Babywear but still own a stroller and do use it. 

serenaxo84

Oh the one thing I really read and took in was the wonder weeks app. It really helped me understand what was going on with DS1 developmentally and gave me a better understanding of how his little mind was growing and working.