What is Gentle Parenting?

What is Gentle Parenting? In my opinion it can be summed up with just four words: 1. Empathy 2. Respect 3. Understanding 4. Boundaries 1. Empathy Parenting with your child’s feelings in mind as much as possible. Using empathy (or what some psychologists call ‘mind-mindedness’) to gain insight into your child’s behaviour and using empathyContinue reading “What is Gentle Parenting?”

When Gentle Parenting Doesn’t Work

It seems like everyday I come across a comment from a parent proclaiming “gentle parenting doesn’t work”, that their baby “still cries all the time” or their toddler “tantrums constantly and still hits his brother” – this despite all of their effort to understand and practice gentle parenting, which can be so much more timeContinue reading “When Gentle Parenting Doesn’t Work”

The Great Sleep Obsession (The Problem of Modern Day Life versus the Primitive Infant)

Sleep  No other word can generate such an emotive response in so many parents of young children. The ‘baby sleep industry’ is worth millions of pounds, a myriad of products from pharmaceutical to musical, mechanical and material adorn the shelves of the high street luring in tired new parents with the promise of peaceful nights.Continue reading “The Great Sleep Obsession (The Problem of Modern Day Life versus the Primitive Infant)”

Help – My 4-5 Month Old Is Sleeping Like a Newborn Again (AKA ‘The 4-5 month old babies from hell’)

If you asked me what point of parenting I found the hardest (excluding tweenhood, because that’s a WHOLE other ball game, whoah have you got fun to come!) it would have to be 4 and 5 months. I’ve always found the newborn period pretty easy, I think in part to the hideous morning sickness, PGPContinue reading “Help – My 4-5 Month Old Is Sleeping Like a Newborn Again (AKA ‘The 4-5 month old babies from hell’)”

Bedsharing & SIDS – Why We Have it All Wrong

So today Carpenter et al published a horribly unreliable and flawed analysis of bedsharing. This scaremongering piece of ‘science’ (I use that term loosely) does not add to public understanding of the safety of bedsharing – far from it, it shrouds it in more myth and mystery and, in my opinion, is incredibly dangerous. WhyContinue reading “Bedsharing & SIDS – Why We Have it All Wrong”

How to Heal from a Traumatic Birth & Bond with Your Baby

Bonding issues are so common but so rarely discussed in our society, there is such a stigma attached to a new mother who isn’t head over heels in love with her newborn. Commonly these feelings appear after a traumatic birth experience and it is with this in mind that I am writing this post. TheContinue reading “How to Heal from a Traumatic Birth & Bond with Your Baby”

Top Ten Babymoon Tips – AKA How to Enjoy the Time after Your Baby is born.

I always thought the term babymoon sounded a little bit odd, the sort of thing only hippies would do, locking themselves away from the rest of the world with their babies for days after the birth. I wanted to show my baby off to the world, I wanted to get back to normal and mostContinue reading “Top Ten Babymoon Tips – AKA How to Enjoy the Time after Your Baby is born.”

The Fourth Trimester – AKA Why Your Newborn Baby is Only Happy in Your Arms

“My baby is only happy in my arms, the minute I put her down she cries” “He sleeps really well but only when he’s laying on my chest, he hates his moses basket” “She cries every time we lay her on her play mat” “He hates going in his pram, he cries the second weContinue reading “The Fourth Trimester – AKA Why Your Newborn Baby is Only Happy in Your Arms”