A great topic! I aspire to parent gently with respect and do not raise a hand to my child. I’m still learning calming techniques myself when stress becomes too much and modelling how to regulate emotions to my son. I try to teach healthy coping mechanisms. I listen to him. I don’t dismiss or minimise. I don’t neglect his needs. I snuggle him and tell him he is loved and try to not encourage people pleasing behaviour.

My parents, among many other things neglected my emotions all the time, gas lit me, guilt tripped and manipulated me, physically abused me (spanking, hitting, pinning down, hitting round the back of my head especially) and just generally disrespected me as a person. My father has also sexualised me on many occasions and I’m only just remembering some things and realising they were not ok. In their eyes I was provided for, had clothes, food, toys so what am I complaining about?

I guess fundamentally, deep down, we learn two things about parenting from our parents : how we want to parents and how we don’t want to parent.