Essay Sample on Parenting Styles

In my childhood, I lived under a variety of parenting styles. For the most part, I had a very good upbringing with some things here and there. I was spoiled, not spoiled with love, but spoiled with money. I always wondered why they bought me so much even though I never felt any love, then I came to realize they bought my love. They believed if they could get me what I asked for I would forget about all the time they didn't spend with me. Little did they know growing up, I watched most of my friends get loved on unconditionally. This issue started when I was 7 years old. I remember every time our family came over they would give me a toy I'd been asking for and tell me to stay in my room, when one night I overheard them talking about how annoying my ADHD was and sometimes they just want to kick me out. I was 7.Im not going to lie I was a hyper kid but there were always  ways to prevent it if they would have shown more attention.

When I was getting older, I became depressed and had major anxiety. I was scared to go out alone, I was scared to talk to people, I was faced with a bunch of challenges I didn't know how to face. They began to realize that and started to become better. I think they understood buying my love wouldn't work anymore. And that's when their parenting style changed to either authoritative one day and indulgent the next. "Diana  Baumrind  (1971)  stresses  that  parents  should  be  neither  punitive  nor  aloof. Rather, they should develop rules for their children and be affectionate with them (Santrock182)."  One day my mom would be so supportive of what i'm doing, and the other she would be doubting and telling me i could never do anything too hard. She would always say “we are never gonna get along” and i don't think she will ever understand how much that affected me. "Third, many parents use a combination of techniques rather than a single technique, although one technique may be dominant. Consistent parenting is usually recommended, yet  a  wise  parent  may  sense  the  importance  of  being  more  permissive  in  certain  situa-tions,  more  authoritarian  in  others,  and  more  authoritative  in  yet  other  circumstances (Santrock 184).” Consistency means purposely choosing how you are going to engage or respond to your child. If I grew up with consistent parenting I think I wouldn't be as controlling or insecure as I am today. Growing up not having that stable relationship with my parents makes it hard for me to have self confidence because I'm afraid I'm not being good enough or too annoying. Their parenting style showed me how I don't want my kids to raise my kids.

I truly believe I will raise my kids with authoritative parenting. Raising a child to become independent but still set rules I feel is the number one way for a child to grow up. "If  a child  behaves  inappropriately,  for  example,  an  authoritative  parent might  put  his  arm  around  the  child  in  a  comforting  way  and  say,  “You know  you  shouldn’t  have  done  that.  Let’s  talk  about  how  you  could handle  this  type  of  situation  better  next  time.”(Santrock 183)”. Teaching a child it's okay to make mistakes is so impactful. If instead I were to yell at the child they would just be in fear to experience things. Authoritative parenting will teach your child respect, accountability, leadership, and resiliency. Although athouritive is the best option for parenting it can become more difficult and lengthy to implement because it requires a delicate balance of discipline and freedom. Parents can undergo a few periods of trial and error before they find the strategies that work best for them and their children. It's important to recognize that rebellion is a natural part of childhood. Another example of authoritative parenting would be  “Screen time:Authoritative parents are likely to place limits on screen time, but consider their children's ages and individual situations when doing so. They're also most likely to work with their child to establish a rule that works for everyone (Perry 2019)”. Nowadays screen time is a major issue when it comes to parenting. Parents tend to use ipads to distract their kidor occupy them. Technology is ruining their generation, being exposed to  social media at a young age is going to cause an uproar in self esteem and depression. I will make sure I use the screen time technique and raise my kids as best as I can.

Being raised always wondering what real love feels like has affected me tremendously. I am always asking for reassurance from  my boyfriend, questions like “do you still like me?” or “ am i good enough?”. I would never want my child to grow up having to wonder what love feels like because of the way I raised them. I believe authoritative parenting is by far the most beneficial style. Teaching kids to be independent while still setting boundaries is very healthy. We need to stop shoving ipads in children's faces to have some alone time. We need to teach them to be more active and do things outside of a screens.