What Kind Of Parent Am I?

Standing outside my 12-year-old son’s room, I feel a shout rising in my throat. I’m about to yell something about practicing kindness, or saying sorry, or how we do not slam doors in this house. And then I take a breath. It’s not because I’m enlightened; I wish that were the case. It’s because I’m wondering what the parenting experts would say about me, and my approach to this problem. Am I an Authoritarian? A Helicopter Parent? A Tiger Mom?

It seems that there are as many parenting styles as there are parents. There’s Positive. Permissive. Unconditional. Uninvolved. There’s the Swedish approach, where kids are encouraged to say whatever is on their minds. There’s Japan’s “no-supervision-after-the-age-of-six” strategy. There’s the parenting technique where you don’t make eye contact with the infant, because doing so would tell him he’s in charge (?). And then there’s that parenting style where you smoke cigarettes, drink wine, eat slowly, and let your kid essentially fend for himself in France, or something like that.

Every parenting approach carries its own implications for a child—and for a parent’s sanity.

“Parental interaction with children has immense implications on every aspect of their upbringing,” explains Allison Mangini, DO, a pediatrician with Northwell Health. “Parenting trends come and go. There are always trends that become popular and integrate themselves into societal standards. And as our culture changes and evolves, these trends come and go.”

Many experts put parenting styles into the following six categories:

Authoritarian: One boss, one way. This isn't a democracy; this is a directed method of parenting where you say, ‘These are the rules,’” she says. “The child doesn't need to necessarily know why the rules are the way they are, but they are expected to follow them unquestioningly.

Authoritative: One boss, but with explanations, like, “I'm in charge, but this is why I am doing things the way I am, and here is the reason behind it.” Children can ask questions and expect communication.

Permissive: No expectations on the child, but it’s warm and responsive to the child’s needs.

Uninvolved: Basic needs are met, but there are no demands on the child, and the guardians are not warm and responsive.

Attachment parenting: An approach that promotes a close relationship between a baby and parent, often fostered by feeding on demand and letting a child sleep with their parents.

Free-range parenting: (another descriptor for permissive parenting)

“When it comes to ‘picking a parenting style,’ I'm not sure that the majority of parents actively seek out a way to go,” Mangini says. “Instead they work off of what they know from their own upbringing and culture, and from society around them. Friends tend to parent like friends, since they are around each other often, or family to family. Sometimes it's even the opposite, where someone might see a particular way of parenting or a parenting style they were raised in and feel adamant that they will never parent in that way.”

Personally, I would say that I was raised by an Authoritarian father and a mother who was Authoritative but also threw some Attachment Parenting techniques into the mix.

Here’s what Mangini has to say about that particular combination:

“Authoritarian parents tend to raise children to fear them. This can affect the child in their relationship with any authority, either being submissive to it, or developing an aversion to authority and rebelling against it,” she says. “Authoritative parents tend to have the best outcomes, in terms of well-balanced children who have structure but also learn to question and be respected as individuals. It's a good combination of authority and structure, as well as nurturing and caring.”

Permissive parents, meanwhile, “tend to raise children with little rules, so they may have poor diets, inadequate sleep, and may have low self-esteem,” she explains. “Uninvolved parents tend to raise children with few coping mechanisms for emotions.”

So here I am, standing in front of my 12-year-old son’s slammed door, and I’m finding myself largely overwhelmed by thoughts of what I “should” or “shouldn’t” do. Should I fight the instinct to go off on him for his disrespectful behavior? Should I ignore the behavior, because maybe it is attention-seeking and I don’t want to encourage it?

“I think parents are at risk of being overwhelmed if they worry too much about anything that holds them to a particular set of rules or expectations,” says Mangini. “If they fail to meet them, they may feel like they have failed as parents when in actuality parenting is really hard work and not one style works for every parent or every kid. Flexible parents meet the needs of their child. That's the best kind of parent.”

To an extent, she recommends that I follow my gut. So I swallow my frustration, lightly knock on the door, and ask my kid to take a moment to himself and come out when he’s ready to talk.

“Following a particular script isn't always the right thing to do,” Mangini says. “Being flexible and ‘following your gut’ allows you to be able to tailor the right style to the right kid and the right circumstance. That may be the best way to go.”

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