Before Rosie Whitfield became a mum, she imagined herself parenting very calm children.
asserted
herself → become → children
"Then I had two wild boys," she says with a laugh.
asserted
she → have → laugh
Following the birth of her kids, Rosie spent hours online looking for the best advice and was drawn to one particular approach to parenting: Gentle parenting, which focuses on empathy and mutual respect with little emphasis on punishment, albeit with boundaries.
But she constantly worried her choices, from sleep schedules to handling toddler tantrums, were "ruining their lives forever".
asserted
choices → follow → lives
Rosie does not blame the gentle parenting philosophy itself but instead says the overall amount of parenting advice online was "overwhelming" and "made mundane parenting choices feel like the absolute end of the world.
asserted
choices → blame → world
"
"I felt like if I was choosing to put the TV on for 20 minutes while I did the dishes or had a coffee, I was choosing to destroy my children's brains," says Rosie, who is originally from Birmingham and now lives in Dubai.
asserted
who → feel → Dubai
Rosie believes her confidence and intuition were stripped away as she questioned every parenting decision.
asserted
she → believe → decision
Government research suggests that around two-thirds of parents with young children feel overwhelmed by the amount of parenting information available and struggle with conflicting advice, with many turning to social media for support.
uncertain
many → suggest → support
Research from the charity Action for Children found that many parents of teenagers who initially contacted the charity for help with school avoidance, ADHD or mental health, often went on to describe their own anxiety, exhaustion and uncertainty of how to parent with empathy and patience when close to burnout.
asserted
who → find → burnout
Faced with an array of parenting philosophies, or "brands" to choose from, is all of this advice helping parents or making them more anxious?
asserted
them → face → parents
Or, as we strive to become the perfect parent, are we losing our intuition?
asserted
we → strive → intuition
The rise of parenting brands
Parents today are confronted by parenting styles including "helicopter parenting", which is focused on closely monitoring and protecting children from harm, and "tiger parenting", which involves strict parenting and high expectations for achievement.
asserted
which → confront → achievement
There are also "snowplough parents", who try to remove obstacles from their child's path, and "dolphin parents", who aim to be firm but flexible.
asserted
who → be → path
Author Matilda Gosling, who wrote Evidence‑Based Parenting, says many of the parenting fads or trends complicate what should be a straightforward relationship between a parent and child.
asserted
what → write → parent
"Some parents think 'I need to be a snowplough parent and plough all of these obstacles out of the way'.
asserted
I → think → way
"
"But it really complicates what is actually a fairly fundamental part of being human, which is that you are warm and you love your children and you put in place some boundaries around them."
asserted
you → complicate → them
Gosling believes parenting trends often represent a pendulum swing, with one generation trying to correct what it believes the previous one got wrong.
asserted
one → believe → swing
"Throughout history, you get these swings from one extreme to the other," she says.
asserted
she → get → other
Gentle parenting is seen by some as the latest swing away from a strict, detached parenting style popular in the 1990s, which often relied on controlled crying, the naughty step and time out.
asserted
which → see → crying
It is built around understanding, empathy and respect but also emphasises the importance of boundaries.
asserted
It → build → boundaries
One of the most widely studied models of parenting comes from developmental psychologist Diana Baumrind.
asserted
One → study → Baumrind
Baumrind identified three parenting styles, later expanded to four: authoritative (high warmth and high control), authoritarian (low warmth and high control), permissive (high warmth and low control), and neglectful (low warmth and low control).
asserted
Baumrind → identify → four
"Authoritative is the gold standard," says Gosling who has looked at more than 1,000 studies.
asserted
who → say → studies
Research has found that children raised with an authoritative approach, combining warmth with clear boundaries, tend to achieve better academic results, have higher self-esteem and stronger social skills.
asserted
children → find → esteem
But where gentle parenting fits within that framework is disputed.
asserted
fits → fit → framework
Gosling believes that it falls on the permissive side.
asserted
it → believe → side
"It's very much child-led.
asserted
It → lead → ?
The child ends up having so much control that there's no sense of safety coming from the outside."
However, Sarah Ockwell-Smith, who is widely credited with coining and popularising the term 'gentle parenting', strongly disagrees.
asserted
who → end → term
"It [gentle parenting] is not remotely permissive," she says, putting it firmly in Baumrind's authoritative category.
asserted
she → say → category
Social media, however, is flooded with memes of exhausted parents calmly negotiating with a child having a supermarket meltdown, something Ockwell-Smith finds deeply frustrating.
asserted
Smith → flood → meltdown
"I have to step away from the Instagram reels and the TikToks because I just want to comment, 'This is not gentle parenting'".
asserted
This → have → reels
"You have house rules, family limits, discipline and consequences.
asserted
You → have → rules
But the difference is we look at discipline as learning and teaching rather than punishing."
asserted
we → look → learning
Toddler tantrums and teenage behaviour, she argues, should be viewed through a lens of ongoing brain development, not 'they're being naughty' or 'they hate me'.
asserted
they → argue → me
But despite the term being popular, Ockwell-Smith believes that gentle parenting is still a fringe movement and that authoritarian parenting remains the dominant style.
asserted
parenting → believe → ?
The pressure to get parenting 'right'
asserted
parenting → get → ?
Around 80 years ago, American paediatrician Dr Benjamin Spock published a book called Baby and Child Care, which went on to sell millions of copies and became the main source of advice for mothers for generations.
asserted
which → publish → generations
The opening line was "Trust yourself.
asserted
line → trust → yourself
You know more than you think...
asserted
you → know → more
The book challenged strict parenting norms of the time and in the following decades parents were offered more advice from an increasing range of voices.
asserted
parents → challenge → voices
Research into parenting has increasingly focused on the early years - from pregnancy to the age of two when the building blocks for lifelong emotional and physical health are laid down.
asserted
blocks → focus → health
…and 45 more, not listed.
The Aporia
