Buy This Book!

You would not learn to drive by reading a manual written by someone who has never driven and yet, remarkably, you can buy parenting books written by the childfree/childless. I have written before about my general disregard and distrust of parenting by the book/s but that was because the right book had not yet been written. Calling your book 'The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read' certainly suggests no lack of confidence on the author's part but the truth is we all long for advice from those quietly confident in its soundness.

That is not to suggest for one second that Philippa Perry, its author, claims absolute knowledge about the best way to parent. She does however take real pains to set out why some of the conclusions she draws are well founded by her researches and, most particularly, by her own experiences of parenting. She is quick to illustrate reflections upon her own childhood experiences in consciously shaping her own intentions for parenthood.

A remarkable number of people seem not to question their own childhood experiences or weigh up what was successful or less successful about their parents' parenting. True it is that there are a lucky few whose early years were characterised by clear boundaries within which needs both basic and complex were attended to and there was the fullest possible realisation of physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual development but was that genuinely your experience? Even if it was it's impossible that came about by pure chance.

A lot of parenting books insist upon a clear right way/wrong way duality with wholly implausible case histories where the author's edicts are followed to a T and overnight a howling banshee becomes a model of docility. There is often a distinct absence of kindness and gentleness in the imparting of advice and that is where Perry excels. In her words it's never too late to repair the ruptures. And ruptures there will always be despite and sometimes because of our best intentions.

Another thing that Perry gives a lot of thought to is the vocabulary of parenting. She decries the description of children as naughty or bad but instead, rightly, suggests a focus on the causes of the behaviour being exhibited. Characterising, as she does, 'bad' behaviour as inconvenient may seem euphemistic or mealy-mouthed but the reality is that the worst toddler meltdowns are the worst because they happen in the most inconvenient ways at the most inconvenient times.

The hardest truth of parenting to absorb and process is its inconvenience but resistance to this truth does perhaps more harm to children than anything else. At the start of parenting it comes as a shock that you have to sublimate your desires (convenience) to meet your child's needs every single time. A baby's cries are a very effective way of ensuring that the immediacy of that requirement should not be overlooked. Although a baby can be 'trained' to an emotional awareness that decibels don't work. That uncomfortably is what 'sleep training' depends upon. Deliberately rendering impotent your child's only means of communication might be convenient but it's also very uncomfortable.

Children have needs. They are never needy. If children's needs are neglected that neglect often manifests in adulthood as neediness. When a parent prioritises their convenience over their child's needs they simply defer a debt that will have to be paid at a most inconvenient time in a most inconvenient way. The good news is that it is never too late to settle the account.