How ‘hyper-parenting’ can do more harm than good

Guilty of intensive parenting? An advocate for ‘childcare as self-care’, Sarah Hesz on why it can be damaging to both you and your child
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It takes most babies seven months to realise that they are a separate entity to their mother. Let that settle in - babies take over half a year to realise they are an individual, that their feet and limbs belong to them and, even better, they are able to control them. Put a baby in front of a mirror and they will not recognise themselves.

So I guess it’s not that surprising that it takes them a further decade to realise that their parent is an individual too.

Our kids see us primarily in relation to their needs, the person who provides food, shelter and comfort. But just occasionally you catch a glimpse of what else they think we do. Whether it’s watching them role play, hearing them chat to their friends or seeing their artwork, we occasionally get a sense of what fantastical ideas are in their heads.

As someone who champions the importance of using childcare for self-care I think about this a lot. The age-old reality is that for many parents: once we become one, our other, original self can quickly become forgotten. Certainly by our children, who struggle to comprehend that mum and dad have ambitions, passions and commitments that don’t involve them, and a life that existed long before they came along.

The truth is that it’s only by remembering we are more than a parent that we are able to really thrive as a parent.

While most of us are racked with guilt about the lack of time we dedicate to our kids, the fact is that parents across the western world are spending more time than ever with their children. In the last 50 years the amount of time that mothers and fathers devote to childcare each day has quadrupled, research suggests.

According to a recent study by sociologists in which parents were asked how they spend their time; in the 1960s mothers reported that they spent 30 minutes a day on childcare-related activities and fathers half that. In 201, UK mothers said they spent almost two and a half hours a day on childcare and fathers up to 2 hours. Meanwhile, a separate study by the Centre for Progressive Policy this year found that half of working-age women in the UK do up to 45 hours a week of care - that’s more than the average working week.

Parenting only started to be used as a verb in the 1980s. The US sociologist Paul Amato has found that couples in the 1960s “had 51 per cent more friends, were 39 per cent more likely to share friends with their spouse, had 168 per cent more organisational memberships, and were 133 per cent more likely to share those affiliations with their spouse” than those born in 1960 and after, as reported in The Atlantic.

The pursuit of ‘intensive parenting’ as an aspiration  - think sacrificing hobbies and friendships to be at home more than ever - was a phenomenon first recognised in the 1990s. However, the facts suggest that this is neither sustainable nor good for us.

Intensive parenting is actually damaging for families. The more connected we as parents are to our friends the longer we live, in fact loneliness has been shown to increase ageing more than smoking, and psychologists have repeatedly proven that having hobbies makes us happier and more confident and can add years to your life.

It’s damaging to kids too. In 2019 Dutch sociologist Mara Yerkes wrote a research paper in which she states: “intensive parenting may lead children to feel less competent, feel more anxious and more depressed. Adolescents of highly-involved parents show higher levels of internalizing problems such as anxiety and depression, and lower autonomy.”

So what’s the takeaway? While being a parent will always be the most important thing in our lives, we need time to give to the other roles that we perform.

Our children will be surprised to learn that we are more than ‘mummy’ or ‘daddy,’ but our lives - and the lives of our children - will be happier and healthier for it.

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