Are we over parenting?

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Updated on Oct 25, 2013
I was watching a documentary on parents and toddlers. Therein, an observer said that very often parents do what is known as Over Parenting. What she meant by this is, for instance, when children are having their meal, we keep one eye on them and push them to eat faster or eat more. We can constantly be behind them to do little things to the extent that it may border on nagging! This behaviour can result in unnecessary stress and conflict between parents and children. I have realized that I do this very often and in almost every activity that my children do. I have consciously taken a step back and try not to interfere too much with my children during their activities. It does make a difference. Sometimes, my toddlers complete their task in no time and without anyone getting stressed. Are most parents guilty of over parenting or this is something we all should do to help balance family life? It would be nice to hear your thoughts fellow parents :)


| Oct 25, 2013
Coming to this talk, I completely agree with u when u say we r overparenting our kids. Call it time constraint, too much pressure on one person (mother) so she needs to do multitasking thereby frustration, lack of support, mad race to produce geniuses who just can't afford to go wrong and the onus would be on parents if they do so,pressure from school ( as they consider it their right to blame parents for every mistake done by a child), excessive socialization, etc. the moment a child is back from school we start our stopwatch n give a volley of instructions such as Change quickly, finish food fast, start studying, help ur parents, sleep on time, etc. without realizing we r not giving breathing space to r child. We r robbing them of their very childhood in this whole process of catching up fast. So it is time we should all introspect , take a step back as u rightly said n let them grow at their own pace.

| Oct 25, 2013
Shikha, I completely agree with you! We do it for our convenience, to maintain time in our busy schedules. We so often forget that children need to do things themselves to learn and develop and hence even little activities may take longer when they attempt to do it without out help.