Times change. When mum had me, she sought
advice from her book on pregnancy and childcare, from family, friends,
neighbors and colleagues, and from healthcare practitioners. Her parenting style was very similar to the
way she’d been raised herself. In the
thirty years since then, parenting is virtually unrecognizable. I seek advice from the same sources as mum
did years ago, but I choose from thousands of books, medical research and
practice have developed, and due to changes in our society my friends,
neighbors and colleagues don’t all share my upbringing and culture – they come
from all over the world.
And then there’s the Internet – a community
to whom you can ask any question, confess any fear, be completely honest, safe
in your anonymity. The people who are
just as pregnant as you, or have a baby of the exact same age, and are awake in
the dead of night when everyone in your real world is fast asleep.
This new world of parenting has benefits
and downsides – we are more invested in our children, which can be both good
and bad. And for mum, and women I know
of a similar age, I think it can be disconcerting when we don’t follow their
suggestions. Since being pregnant, “We
never did that when we had you…” has been a phrase I’ve heard at least a few
times a week.
And a tried and tested methods have their
place – plenty of mum’s common sense suggestions makes so much sense. But in our society, there’s no real reason to
use one set of advice. What works for my
baby could be something recommended by my family, or it could be a suggestion
from the health visitor, or via the internet from a woman in her forties living
in Ecuador…or a teenage mother from Thailand.
Yes, you did things differently in your
day, but until someone can present me with a perfect baby, there’s no reason to
take one set of rules and advice. With
an open mind, if I mix and match and take a few risks, I can muddle through and
create a new set of tips that work for my child.
