NOTE FROM KERRY: Hi!! How are you?! How’s your week? Spring in banging down the door here in Wellington. We’re being buffeted by gale force winds and gangs of fluffy young tūī birds are weighing down kōwhai trees throughout the village. Every time I go outside, I discover some new bursting flower, a violet peaking from a sidewalk crack or a string of pink flowered vines hugging the drain pipe. Hope nature if similarly gorgeous where you are. Today I’m talking a bit about parenting:

The Parenting Advice I Listen To

Generally, I avoid parenting books. Why?

1. A little bit because I have a PhD in clinical psychology with a specialization in child development so I know something
2. Mostly because when I start reading those books I get prickly, defensive, and insecure. (Dude, I start questioning all my choices, all my sound judgements or supposed clarity.)

But I trust my best friend, an amazing Mama and a better psychologist than me, so when she recommended “Good Inside” by , I read it. This quote stopped me cold:

Eventually I enrolled in a training program for clinicians that proclaimed it offered an “evidence-based” and “gold-standard” approach to discipline and troubling behavior in children. The methods it taught felt logical and “clean,” and I walked away having learned about the same interventions that are regularly promoted by parenting experts today. I felt like I had learned a perfect system to extinguish undesirable behavior and encourage more prosocial behavior—basically, behavior that was more compliant and more convenient to parents.

Except, a few weeks later, something struck me: this felt awful. Every time I heard myself give this “evidence-based” guidance, I felt sick to my stomach. I couldn’t shake the nagging suspicion that these interventions—which certainly wouldn’t feel good if someone used them on me—couldn’t be the right approach to use with kids. Yes, these systems made logical sense, but they focused on eradicating “bad” behaviors and enforcing compliance at the expense of the parent-child relationship. Time-outs, for example, were encouraged to change behavior . . . but what about the fact that they sent kids away at the exact moments they needed their parents the most? Where was . . . well . . . the humanity?

(emphasis mine) from Kennedy, Becky. Good Inside (pp. x-xi). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

I don’t *literally* know the training program she is referring to, but I’ve been trained in a few evidence-based gold standard behavioral parent training programs myself. I don’t think I’d recognized or acknowledged that there are chunks of those programs I just plain ignored in my own parenting journey.

Once more for the people in the back. Yes I (and you!) should ignore parts of science-based parenting programs.

Of course there are nuggets from the science-based programs I love:

• Prioritization of child-led play and special parent-child time to “invest in the relationship piggy bank” (Ngā mihi Dr. Webster-Stratton.)

• Clear language to use with toddlers, aka choice within limits: Would you like to brush your teeth before bath time or after bath time? Would you like to use the red cup or the blue cup?

• Not part of the programs per se but most child specialists will nod to some science-based basics:

  • the importance of regular, predictable rituals and routines (ie during meals, in the morning, at bedtime).

  • Yes, sleep is very important. Sleep and sleep and sleep.

  • Wide open unscheduled bored time is good.

  • Screens are not great, keep kids in a 3D world as much as possible.

The Parenting Advice I DID NOT Listen To

So what traditional parenting advice did I ignore? I rarely used timeouts, punishment, sticker charts or other physical rewards.

My daughter got a lot of feedback about behavior within her relationships:

• praise,
• high fives,
• excitement as she modeled independence,
• or when she made safe choices,
• or when she did something brave.

Final thoughts on parenting

Parenting is both simple and complex. Your child is constantly changing (development?! all the time!) and that means that their needs are also evolving, changing. Yet, there are a few basics I keep coming back to:

1. When children act the least lovable, they are most in need of love.

2. Love them a lot, leave them alone, set a good example1.

3. The best investment we can make in our parenting is an investment in our own mental health. When we build our capacity to be a mature, emotionally regulated, resilient adult, we are becoming the best parent we can be, and the parent who is best-equipped to help our child thrive.

I offer these ideas humbly because I honed these ideas within the specific parent-child pairing that I have (my personality * my kid’s wiring).

You know who your kid is, you know who you are, you have a lot more info about what works in your home.

More reading: Parenting support I love

• ’s “Good Inside”
• How to Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis

QUESTION FOR NEXT TIME: Next week I’m going to be writing about sex, physical intimacy and partnering. Do you have favorite resources that I should include? Just comment or reply to this email, to send me your favorite books, podcasts, or other material that helped shape you own understanding of sex and intimacy.

Sending love, Kerry

*I am a one woman show so when you comment or respond, you are talking to me. All feedback is welcome, I want to hear from you so I can craft something that is useful to you.*