gentle parenting

I'm sorry that the time spent with your D and GC was tarnished by the children's bad behaviour Tigerlily.

As we are constantly constantly reminded here on GN when it comes to GC it's the parents' rules that matter, regardless of what GP's may think of them, or as it appears here, the parents' lack of rules.

This really isn't your problem, it's your D's and s.i.l.'s and if they can't see that it is now, I'm sure they'll realise in the not too distant future and maybe the next time you visit, things will have improved. I certainly hope so.

It’s lazy/non parenting. I feel sorry for the children, it must be a terrifying world to live in when there is endless choice and no boundaries in place to keep you safe.

Well ... if this is how your daughter deals with this so be it. However, you do not have to, if it is directed towards you then say something, how else will they learn right from wrong and what is acceptable behaviour and what isn't. There is a big difference between kids being naughty and kids being downright rude.

LOUISA1523

That is lazy parenting...or non parenting .....gentle parenting has boundaries and consequences

Absolutely agree! It's hard to understand why any parent would want to raise an unruly, rude child.

That is lazy parenting...or non parenting .....gentle parenting has boundaries and consequences

Sounds like you are in the USA?

6 year old going to ‘pre school’?

I know someone in the extended family who did this.
By the time the children were more than toddlers, three boys, no one in the family would babysit for them or have them to their house alone.
The marriage broke up eventually,don’t know why and the boys went to live with their Father so I lost contact and never asked about them.

Gentle parenting can be interpreted in many different ways and clearly the extremes (as with the extremes of anything at all) are undesirable.

It need not mean failing to set boundaries, which are the necessary structures within which a child can feel safe to learn and grow - and become a sociable human being.

Sane gentle parenting can be summed up as trying to put oneself in the mind of a child with all their lack of experience and puzzlement about the world, and their developing emotional regulation abilities.

So - you have a rule, say - you are not rude to people. A gentle parent will model this behaviour by not being rude themselves and when a child fails at this they will ask themselves why the child has failed - what made them do this? They can then address that whilst at the same time holding fast to the principle that the action was wrong.

Say a child has a temper tantrum at being asked to do something they do not want to do. You can get annoyed at them and punish them for it, or you can ask yourself why it is hard for them ... "I know it feels annoying that you have to do this as you really wanted to watch TV and are fed up about it, but you must do it because ......."

Children need those boundaries - gentle parenting supports those whilst also recognizing that they might be hard for the child.

Tbh I would call that lazy parenting,not gentle

I so agree, gentle parenting I’m all for, allowing children to be unruly, rude and badly behaved, isn’t, imo, gentle parenting.

Well , there is gentle parenting and no parenting at all. I guess you know which this is.