My Modern Day Parenting Isn't In A Crisis, Not Necessarily

A couple days ago, I stumbled across an article titled 5 Reasons Modern-Day Parenting Is In Crisis, According To A British Nanny by author Emma Jenner. Jenner is the Author of Keep Calm and Parent On and the Star of TLC's "Take Home Nanny". I'm not going to lie, the title alone made me little defensive and quite skeptical. I know I'm not the perfect parent by any means but who doesn't think they're doing a PRETTY good job?!?!

 

Then I read the article. It confirmed for me that I am in fact doing a pretty good job, a little bit great even. But it also opened my eyes to a couple areas that I have committed myself to working on in the name of a healthy, happy, well adjusted child. That's what I get for poo-pooing the article. So here's what I learned from my read.

 

I do in fact suffer from a fear of my child. Not in the traditional sense that I think he'll do something awful to me but in the sense that I wouldn't pass Jenner's "sippy cup test". The sippy cup test is actually a regular fail for me. If I get Sam a water and he sees that it's in the "wrong" sippy cup, he begins to through a fit and rather than fight him, I've always just poured it into the "right" cup. So now I have given him the power, created a situation in which he knows he gets his way with mommy if he throws a fit (super bad lesson) AND created another dish for me to wash. Same goes for Cheese-Its instead of pretzels, or red jammies instead of motorcycle jammies.

 

I also get super wound up, stressed, and overly accommodating at restaurants. Luckily he's got pretty great manners in general. He says please and thank you. He says bless you when someone near him sneezes. And he says "sorry" without prompting when he gets overzealous and accidentally hits, headbutts, or scratches. Restaurants can be a different, exhausting story however. I think I fell victim to the "That's just the way it is with kids" mentality. Wrong. I will learn to expect more of both myself and my child. That's not to say that I think he will be able to sit through a two hour, formal, white table cloth dinner. Duh, he's three. But I will expect him to leave his shoes on, not lay on the floor under the table, scream like a banshee, or throw food. Madame Jenner, consider the bar raised.

 

Man this shrimp cocktail is good! Awesome behavior
at a fancy restaurant for my mom's birthday!

Luckily because

A) I had great parenting role-models growing up

B) I'm not the kind of person who believes that my child doesn't make mistakes or is never at fault

C) I can recognize and correct potential issues with my parenting

D) I'm not afraid to say no sometimes

E) I want to be his parent, not his friend,

I fully believe that I am not raising an entitled, impatient, rude, selfish, ass of a human.

 

I hope you'll use this as a chance for some honest evaluation and reflection as I did.

 

See the full article HERE.