Many millennials are pushing back against traditional parenting styles used by their boomer parents. We explore the confusion and chaos in today's parenting with a mom and her mom. This episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlin, edited by Miranda Kennedy, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Andrea Kristinsdottir and Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Noel King. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast Support Today, Explained by becoming a Vox Member today: http://www.vox.com/members James Austin Johnson as a gentle parenting father during an "Airport Parade" sketch on SNL. Photo by Will Heath/NBC via Getty Images. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is gentle parenting?
Gentle parenting is hard, even for the super practitioners like influencer Olivia Owen.
And when you're all done, then we can get you down and you can go play with the toys.
It's hard to hear a toddler out. So we definitely will get in the face of our toddler and ask him how he's feeling and help him have feelings.
Chapter 2: Why is gentle parenting difficult to explain to older generations?
It's hard to explain this mess to your boomer parents. I think that they are super skeptical of what we're doing. And it is very, very hard for your parents to understand what you even think you're doing.
It's just exhausting. They just go round and round and round talking.
So why are we doing it? Ahead, Today Explained is for the children.
Hopefully we don't raise a serial killer.
Today Explained
Megan Rapinoe here. This week on A Touch More, we are live from New York for the Liberty's home opener with an extra special guest, Brianna Stewart. We talk about the Liberty's newest additions, the best lessons Stewie ever got from Sue, and what it was like to be at the Met Gala this year. And of course, we couldn't let her go without asking her about that 2024 foul call.
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Today. Today. X-ray. So cute. Growing up, we had a wooden paddle that was just always sitting out. And if we misbehaved or acted out or talked back, we would get the paddle. And even though I think this is effective because we were well-behaved kids, When I first had to try to spank my son, I could not bring myself to do it. It just broke my heart.
We asked you to call the Today Explained hotline if you are gentle parenting, and many of you wanted to talk about the way that you were parented. And we get it. The paddle, the wooden spoon, the slipper, the switch. Were our boomer parents just kind of mean parents? Alison Schaefer is a longtime family counselor and parenting teacher, and she says, no, they were not.
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Chapter 3: What are common challenges faced by gentle parents?
And we do need family, and we do need strong relationships within the family for healthy development, and especially in the teen years. Because in the teen years, your biggest parenting tool is the power of the relationship and your child not wanting to disappoint you when they're out and about in the world, because you can't follow them everywhere. You can't go to every party.
You can't sit in every classroom to make sure they're not on their phone and that they're listening to the teacher. So you have to really rely on influence rather than control. Being a good disciplinarian does not mean that you are going to lose the relationship. You can be a very good disciplinarian. Kids need leadership. Security comes with boundaries and predictability and stability.
And they want to know there's somebody big in the house who's looking after them. Because if you're six years old and you think that there's like nobody running this place because you're so permissive and can't set a boundary. And when I cry, I get my way. Then I'm the most powerful person in this house. And I'm just a kid. That's not safe.
Allison Schaefer, family counselor, longtime parenting teacher. Coming up, a gentle parent speaks. Support for Today Explained comes from Koala. There are lots of awesome things, says Koala, that have come out of Australia. On the beach, the book, not the movie, Joel Edgerton, Wake in Fright. Who wrote this? And now, says Koala, you should also consider Koala.
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You're listening to Today's Wave.
I'm Noelle King. We're back with Lauren Nicholson, one of the parents who called in to tell us about gentle parenting her two kids. She's a 39-year-old sales rep for a publishing company in Atlanta, Georgia. She has girls, five and two and a half, and she describes her own upbringing as old school and somewhat fondly remembers the Boomer Smackdown.
Now, Lauren identifies as a gentle-ish parent, which looks like this.
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Chapter 4: How have parenting styles evolved over time?
So how do you, how do you kind of coach her through it, but also like acknowledge, like, you need to get out of your head here. You need to get out of your own way child. And so, like, not overreacting. And how does that present, like, how does that make your mourning harder? Oh, my word. She's on the floor crying, going, my socks don't fit right.
And then, you know, her other, her younger sister is running around, pulling out her hair bow, not putting on her socks, taking off her diaper, flinging it around while you're trying to get out the door on time. Because if you are late to her school, they will literally lock the door and make you go in and fill out a form and shame you into writing why you're late. And why are you late?
Oh, because my daughter's socks didn't fit right. You know, it's like you can't put that on a Google form. That turns into five minutes late, which turns into 10 minutes late, which means I'm not getting to work on time. which means my day is disrupted all because my five-year-old is frustrated over this one little thing.
And so you're taking deep breaths because internally you're going down the rabbit hole of all of this is ruining my morning.
Okay, so the reason that we're talking to you, Lauren, is that I presume you identify as a gentle parent.
I would say all millennials are. can relate to being gentle-ish parents because we were raised, most of us were raised by boomers. I can see my mother's face right now. And boomers maybe are more of an authoritarian kind of style of parenting. And I think millennials can relate more as a, we'll call it we're relating to our kids' feelings more
And I think gentle parenting is a very hot button topic because if you go out in the world and you say, I'm a gentle parent, you will be judged. Like parents will come for you and look at you like, what? So I think it's more about acknowledging your kid and I think that we parent our kid for exactly who they are.
I think that's maybe what gentle parenting is trying to accomplish is parent the child you have as opposed to parenting in broad strokes the same way for all your kids. But I don't know. I'm not a parenting expert.
So how do you handle, let's say, a little tantrum on the floor about the socks in a way specifically that you think is differently than the way your mom might have done?
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