OPINION: 'You're not gentle parenting, you're Instagram parenting.'

Maybe it's just my Instagram algorithm, but the online parenting space is full of videos and posts pushing advice about how to be a 'gentle', 'conscious', and 'aware' parent.

Thousands of videos provide scripts to use in response to common parenting dilemmas, and alternatives to frequently heard parenting phrases.

Many of these ideas feel inspiring and helpful. Many of them are also directly contradicting each other.

From "never pressure a child to eat" to "support your child to finish their meal".

From "hold your baby to sleep" to "gently sleep train to create independence".

Even "light a candle at every meal" to "never light candles in your home EVER".

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Parents are swimming in a swamp of steaming, frustrating, bite-sized pieces of advice, all from beautifully gentle, picture-perfect parenting influencers who claim to help you achieve the elusive 'gentleness', the flawless 'awareness', the tranquil 'consciousness' that all trend-savvy parents must obtain.

Who are these people whose advice gets onto my feed and burrows into my brain? Paediatricians, psychologists, parenting experts, parents, random people who overheard something at a park, grandparents, child-free millennials annoyed at their friends, young zoomers with opinions about screen time… absolutely anyone can weigh in, presenting their opinions and advice as undeniable facts.

Parents everywhere in their sleep-deprived, overworked states are now stuttering over inane scripts like "I know you want the toy — and that is okay, you're allowed to want things honey — but we can't snatch from others". By this point, the three-year-old has run off and mum is kicking herself that she used the wrong conjunction.

Don't get me wrong. These scripts are trying to teach parents a useful skill. By validating a child's emotions ("I know you want the toy"), a parent is attempting to help build emotional literacy for the child. Some of the advice handed out on Instagram and TikTok is actually based on research, and much of it derives from genuinely thought-provoking and helpful books and articles which detail up-to-date psychological research.

But there's still a major issue with all kinds of parenting advice that we must acknowledge.

Instagram doesn't know your child.

The author of a parenting book has never met you. Another of the thousands of mums who shares ways to deal with tantrums on TikTok has no understanding whatsoever of the unique relationship between you and your child. No understanding of who your child is: their likes and dislikes, their developmental abilities, their idiosyncrasies, their fears, their dreams.

Psychologist Gordon Neufeld has identified a major crisis of confidence in today's parents and teachers "overwhelmed by the plethora of information available for them" and instead stresses the importance of "being your child's answer".

You need to have confidence in yourself, your knowledge of your child, and the strength of your relationship, in order to have any leverage over them at all.

Sure, it can be helpful to read and learn about effective ways to parent. But there is only so much information one's brain can take.

If every five-minute break I have away from my child is spent scrolling and cramming my brain full of conflicting advice lacking in nuance, where is the room in my mind for my child?

Where is my time to reflect upon their signals, and mull over how I want to approach whatever today's challenge might be?

How can I trust my instincts if I can never hear them?

If you had to choose between knowing every piece of parenting psychology and research in the world, and simply being present with your child, which would you choose?

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Let's take "good job" as an example. This is a phrase that the internet has declared 'out'.

"Instead of 'good job' try one of these," suggested an Instagram post I saw last week.

These included "you figured it out", "you are learning!" and "I love to hear your ideas!". Perhaps these suggestions are made for good reason.

As a trained high school teacher, I was taught at university about the importance of feedback, and more specifically the importance of quality feedback: it is true that saying merely "good job" to a child and patting them on the head is not generally doing them any favours.

But of course, in order to be accurate and specific in our feedback and interactions with our children, we need to notice them. We need to be present with them. We need to really observe what they are doing. We need to be attuned to their current skills, have realistic expectations based on their current behaviour, mood, circumstances and abilities.

Very often, when your child is minding their business and working at a task, a good approach is to say nothing and not interrupt them. And if a child makes a bid for your attention, like "Mama, look at this" we can remember to engage genuinely with what the child is showing us, through making specific statements like "Wow, I can see how carefully you coloured in those edges!" or "That is possibly the tallest tower you have ever made!".

But really, you should ignore the suggested phrases above. I am, after all, just another person on the internet with opinions about how you should talk to your child. The last thing you want to do is overthink and stutter over your words while your toddler is poking their baby sibling's eye, or feel guilty for happily proclaiming "good job!" when your six-month-old sits unsupported for the first time.

The worst thing that parenting advice does is make parents self-censor their language and second-guess their instincts, and ultimately, distrust their relationship with their child.

What parenting advice can't tell us, and what Instagram videos and posts can never replicate, is a genuine relationship with your child.

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