Don't tell me what to do!
I hope your day is like being served that one dish you can never get enough of.
I never read parenting advice when my kids were small.
Why? Well, I’m kind of lazy. Also? I don’t like to be told what to do. And parenting advice smacks of self-help, and there’s only one self-help book I’ve read to the very end and actually liked.
But mainly, as soon as I stumbled upon something that didn’t feel right to me, some piece of advice I was clearly not going to take on board, I became suspicious of the whole endeavor and cut the expert out of my life for good. (Just me?)
A lot of parenting is instinctual. I mean, just living your life is mostly instinctual. You listen to your gut, hopefully, and to smart and experienced people, a little, and if you’re not a planner you just run full-tilt at the thing that interests you and see what happens.
This, at least, is how I’ve lived my life, with varied results. It’s not over yet, so ask me when I’m 80 or so and see if I’ve changed my mind about this as a strategy.
When it came to childrearing, I did sometimes ask for pointers from my friends. A lot of them were in the thick of it; some were just figuring it out, others were seasoned pros. So I asked a bunch of questions that were mostly related to the day to day details. Unsurprisingly, I had opinions. Which influenced my actions as much as any dollop of wisdom that found its way to me.
Are there things I would do differently? HELL YES. Am I mostly pleased with how it’s worked out? Again, a resounding yes. My kids like me and I like them and we’re kind of in this together.
When people want to give you advice, it’s smart to ask what’s in it for them. Trust me when I tell you that Momfluencers are not spending hours every day editing their hot take videos with the primary goal of making you feel empowered and invincible.
Nevertheless, parents are, apparently, dying to hear from the experts. Dr. Spock's Baby and Child Care sold over 50 million copies in the author's lifetime, which ended in 1998. The book has been translated into 39 languages; it’s not just Americans who are eager to be told how to manage the littles.
He had pretty legit credentials and was telling parents to chill, so his popularity makes sense. I don’t know what his book contract looked like, but it’s fair to say he died rich, which may have spawned the movement that’s currently ruining the lives of perfectly adequate parents.
Not to state the obvious, but not every piece of parenting advice is relevant or useful for every parent, or every child, or every situation. And then strategies come and go and new parenting ‘styles’ take precedence and eventually everyone just feels bad about their choices.
So maybe it’s not that there isn’t any good advice out there, it’s more that there’s no way to pluck the gems from the millions of objectively (or subjectively) terrible opinions swirling around us at all times.
My kids are adults now, so there’s no chance to course-correct; what’s done is done. So I’m not sure why I slipped into an internet torture-hole by Googling “parents of high achievers.” Suffice to say the answers were not reassuring. This one in particular seems to indicate that I’ve done everything wrong.
And truly, my kids aren’t super high achievers at this particular moment in time. But is that what I really want for them? They, like me, have their moments, but sustained achieving hasn’t really been our touchstone. Solid mental health seems to require a different set of maneuvers.
Which brings me to the question: What are we hoping to gain from all this advice?
Do we want the happiest, most successful, least likely to be taking psychoactive meds by high school children? Or do we just yearn to hear that we’re doing a good job, and that our kids won’t hate us and blame us for their future unhappiness?
Which we know they will encounter no matter how well we do, because, humanity.
I often thank the dumb luck that led to me having kids when I did, before screens had completely taken over our homes and our brains, and before the internet was yelling at us all the time. I perused one online parenting ‘community’ when my kids were tiny and quickly decided that it wasn’t for me.
Here’s where I long for a time that ended long before my birth, at least in my corner of the world. (Incidentally, there is now a word for that: Anemoia. Unfortunately this is not a particularly memorable or sparky word, so it may not prove to be all that useful.)
Once upon a time there were tons of other people around helping you raise your kids and teaching you all the practical things you needed to know and for heaven’s sake actually helping you with your new infant so you could get some damned sleep. But as Americans we don’t really like to be influenced by our elders and generally take their advice as condemnation, so maybe this setup would be less a return to grace than a prison of expectation and defensiveness.
So no, there is no cavalry itching to ride in and help us become perfect parents. Some of us will slog along alone in defiance of all the help knocking on our frontal cortices, and others of us will slip into the gyre of muddy ‘evidence’ and struggle to identify the right advice.
Which is fine. Do as you wish.
Just don’t fall into the trap of thinking that someone else has figured it all out merely because they tell you they have. Bring your best self to the endeavor and assume you have good instincts. Determine to model repair when you mess up; that may be more important than doing it right to begin with. (Oops - even I am not free of the desire to instruct!)
I don’t know if my refusal to take advice indicates an intrinsically rebellious nature or an instinct for self-preservation. Regardless, I refused to read all the books, and I have no regrets. At least my mistakes are my own.
Recommendation!
I'm a bit of a recluse, which leads me to spend a fair amount of time with my imaginary friends on screen. The person I currently wish was on my IRL friends list is Sean Evans, host of the incomparable Hot Ones.
If you've never had the pleasure of watching the show, which airs on YouTube, prepare to be entertained. Evans is hands down the best interviewer/host I've ever seen. His research includes the deepest cuts, prompting wonder from his guests, and most episodes seem more like two friends hanging out than an interview.
But I'm burying the lede: The premise of the show is that he and his guest eat 10 chicken wings (cauliflower for the veggies) doused with increasingly spicy hot sauce. Somehow their suffering really adds to the conversation...
There are over 400 episodes, so chances are good that he's interviewed a celebrity you like. A few of my favorites feature Jennifer Lawrence, Paul Rudd, and Dave Grohl.