It’s Not Too Late to Change Your Parenting Style, and Maybe You Should
If you overestimated your parenting skills in the past year, you are hardly alone. What seemed to be effective in the pre-pandemic period does not necessarily mean that you are suddenly at home with your children and partner every minute of every day for over a year. But as we emerge, vaccinated, from the depths of COVID hell, it may be a good time to take stock of how we raised children before, how we raised children over the past year, and how we want to raise children in the future.
What are the four main parenting styles?
Parenting styles are often divided into four main categories: authoritarian, authoritarian, condescending, and innocent. A couple of them have obvious negative connotations, even if we have not yet penetrated , but let’s talk a little bit about each, which are described in detail in Verywell the Family .
What is authoritarian parenting?
The authoritarian parent sets the law. Children need to be seen, not heard. They should do what you tell them “because you said so.” They are not particularly worried about their child’s opinion or feelings – the authoritarian parent does not take this into account. These are strict parents who tend to “punish” rather than “discipline”.
What is authoritative parenting?
Authoritative parents set the rules and adhere to them (and the consequences of breaking them), but they also take into account the feelings of their children. Authoritative parents want positive relationships with their children and tend to focus on perpetuating good behavior in order to curb bad behavior before it even begins.
What is lenient parenting?
Indulgent parents can make rules, but adhering to them is not a priority. “Children will be children” is the mantra of the indulgent parent, who tends to be quite reserved and condescending to unwanted behavior. They are parents who act more like a friend.
What is non-participation in parenting?
An uninvolved parent is exactly what they are like – these parents don’t really know what their kids are up to. They may be overwhelmed with other problems, or maybe they just lack basic knowledge of what children need, but they often neglect, even if the neglect is unintentional. Uninvolved parents don’t spend a lot of time with their children, and ultimately children mostly grow up on their own.
Post-pandemic parenting
I bet most of us consider ourselves reflected in the “authoritative” category (although I know there are a few authoritarian supporters as well). But I’ll be the first to admit that the words “because I said so” flew out of my mouth at a particularly embarrassing moment or two, and I was not always perfect at enforcing the consequences that I said I was going to strengthen.
But I also don’t think we should identify ourselves as a particular style. As long as you’re generally quite consistent, there may be times that require the law and times when looking the other way will not kill anyone. If the past year has taught us anything, it’s that our parenting style can and should be flexible. The fact that we have always been parents in a certain way does not mean that we should always raise a child in this way. We can learn and adapt as we go.
Right now, we have a unique opportunity to return to our “normal” life from a point of view that we never thought of. You can see how our priorities could be mixed until 2020 – maybe we didn’t have a good quality time with our kids, or we were too strict on some things and too lenient on others. Before, we could be too “authoritarian”, and then the pandemic turned us into the embodiment of a “condescending” parent, or vice versa.
This is fine! Your parent’s type is never set in stone. We can hit reset as often as we like, using the lessons we’ve learned to better educate our children – and now is the perfect time to do that.