Parenting Simplified: All You Need To Know If You're A Working Mom

Raising a child is an art which you learn every day. There is no one rulebook that you can follow to become a perfect parent. In fact, it is the challenges that you face every day that helps you in becoming a better parent. To add to it, if you are a working mom, then parenting can become an uphill task.

So today, we talk about all the things that you need to know if you are a working mom. These steps can help you tackle the parenting challenges better and create a huge impact on your child’s life.

Different Parenting Styles

Your parenting style can affect your child’s life heavily. Hence, it is of utmost importance that you choose the right parenting style that supports healthy growth and overall development of your child. Typically, there are four types of parenting styles.

What are the 4 types of parenting styles?

1. Authoritative: This is one of the best styles as it is the best of all worlds. Authoritative parents want their kids to follow rules but they also hold their children’s opinion important while making it clear that finally, only they will be in charge. Such parents adopt positive discipline strategies like reward etc., to motivate the child to behave properly. These parents put a lot of effort to create a positive relationship with the child.

2. Authoritarian: In this style of parenting, parents are often seen enforcing their decisions on the children. Such parents believe that kids should follow rules without any exception. They are strict parents who provide no emotional support to the child and do not try to understand the child’s point of view and feelings and even punish the child often for breaking the rules.

3. Neglectful: Neglectful parents (sometimes referred to as uninvolved) are usually not aware of their child’s needs. Needs here do not only mean food and clothes, but it covers emotional needs as well. These parents don’t spend time in guiding and motivating the child. However, parents may not be neglectful intentionally. Sometimes, some illness or other issues make them so.

4. Permissive: A parenting style where parents often give in to their child’s demand or don’t tell anything to the child when they are wrong, is a permissive parenting style. Such parents are lenient and this can pose a serious problem to them sometimes. Such parents love to take on the role of a friend rather than a parent and usually don’t put much effort into rectifying the child for their bad choice or behaviour. When you see a parent who buys an expensive toy for their child even if the child has a similar one, just because their child has demanded it and he/she cannot see tears in his/her eyes - such parent will be called a permissive parent. 

To identify your parenting style you can take this online test.

Parenting Skills

Wondering what are some good parenting skills? Well, we list some important skills that as a good parent you must have...

• Loving your child and becoming the emotional support for your child.

• Fulfilling the basic needs of your child.

• Communicating with your child.

• Providing the best education to your child.

• Respecting your child and helping your child become independent.

• Adopting measures that will help in reducing the stress in the life of your child.

• Creating an environment which helps in the normal and healthy development of the child.

• Taking all the necessary measures for the complete safety of your child.

 

What is good parenting?

This question is often asked by many working mothers. The answer to this question is parenting that helps foster empathy, honesty, self-control, kindness and cooperation and promote intellectual curiosity, motivation and desire to achieve among children is called good parenting.

Qualities of a good parent

• Good parents have patience. They listen to their child and do not lose their temper on petty matters.

• They are a child’s first teacher and teach them good values.  

• They encourage and motivate their kids to grow and become good human beings.

• They are loving and caring. They take care of all the needs of the child.

• They are supportive and support their child in all the good things that they want to do.

• They are understanding and try to understand their child’s difficulties and perspective.

• They always trust their child, however, they don’t trust blindly.

• They are willing to accept changes and their mistakes.

How do you become a good parent?

Well, the answer is...

1. By getting involved in your child’s life mentally as well as physically. Taking time out of your busy schedule and rearranging your priorities.

2. By adopting the parenting style that fits your child’s age, needs and development.

3. By focussing on complete physical and emotional development of the child.

4. By learning to strike a balance between fulfilling all the necessary demands of the child and saying no when required.

5. By knowing the limits of being a disciplinarian or permissive.

6. By giving appropriate time to your child.

How do working moms do it?

1. Since time is something that most working moms struggle with, they need to learn to plan ahead of time.

2. Working mothers also need to strike a balance between their professional and personal life. That does not mean sacrificing the career but working out other options. Like in case if they are nurturing a new-born, then they may take a break or look at the option of working from home. This can help them to remain involved in their professional life and at the same time, focus on their child’s all-round development.

 

Positive Parenting

With more and more parents understanding that a change must be made in the child-rearing practices, the trend of positive parenting is growing. Positive parenting involves providing gentle guidance to the child or lovingly explaining things to them in a positive way, so that they know the difference between right and wrong. It also involves treating your child with respect. It is a means of ensuring that your child is not scared of you but loves you and understands that all that you say and do is for his/her good. Positive parenting helps the kids to learn their responsibilities well and foster a positive relationship with their parents.

How to practice positive parenting?

Some of the ways through which positive parenting can be practised include:

1. Playing with the kids as this fosters the feeling of togetherness and cooperation among children.

2. Cooking with the kids.

3. Indulging in gardening with the kids as this way they can learn to value life.

4. Indulging in role plays.

5. Narrating stories which teach good lessons of life to children.

To know more about positive parenting and how you can be one, read this detailed blog post. 

 

Parenting Tips to Remember

No matter how busy you are with your professional life, it is important that you get involved in your child’s life as they crave for your time and attention.

You have to adapt to parenting ways depending on the age of your child. For tiny tots, you need to show extra love and care, but at the same time, you need to tell them the difference between right and wrong. As the child grows, you need to be more disciplined and strict in your approach. Given that at all times, you need to love them but not to the extent that it spoils them.

Here are some of the useful parenting tips for working mothers:

1. Make the most of your limited available time: Given that you cannot spend the whole day with your kids, you can make the most of your time that you spend with them. Doing simple and little things for or with your children can make a huge difference. Like while having dinner, you can ask them about their school and studies. You can take them along with you on morning and evening walks and have a good discussion at that time.

2. Don’t bring the office to home: Remember that your child has been waiting for you since the whole day. So, try not to bring your office work at home. Whenever you are at home, spend the maximum time with your child.

3. Say sorry and don’t make excuses if you are late: Just like adults, even children hate excuses and lies. So, when you are late from work, just say sorry. However, don’t make it a practice to be always late as then your sorry will also lose its value.

4. Make it a point to listen to your kids: Be patient and listen to your kids rather than giving them advice every time. Like adults, even children, especially teens, don’t like to be told what to do. So, listen to them and then guide them, similar to what a coach does.

 

Indian Parenting Blogs

One of the best ways to become a good parent is to know first-hand experience of people who have been through this phase at some point or the other and about various tips and trends and the likes which are covered by various parenting blogs. Here, you can also get a chance to understand some of the common mistakes that one makes as one grows as a parent. Some of these blogs also give you an insight into different aspects of parenting.

Here's a list of some prominent parenting blogs:

1. http://www.kidsstoppress.com

2. http://www.momjunction.com

3. http://www.wholesomemamma.in

4. http://www.artsycraftsymom.com/

5. http://www.beingmomma.com

6. http://www.babypregnancycare.com

7. http://www.bumpsnbaby.com

8. http://www.mylittlemoppet.com

9. http://www.shishuworld.com

The folks at Babygogo also publish a list of top mommy bloggers every year. You can check their 2016 and 2017 lists to find more of these awesome parenting blogs.

 

Top Parenting Apps

Technology has made life easy. These days, you have apps for almost everything, including parenting. These apps help the parents, especially working mothers in a big way. Here is a list of some of those apps:

1. Cry translator: One of the most difficult tasks for a new mom is to understand why her child is crying. Cry translator helps in translating the reason with more than 90 per cent accuracy. Whether it is hunger, boredom, stress or something else that is causing the problem, this app can come handy.

2. Remember the milk: As the name suggests, this app helps you remember to buy all the stuff like milk, diapers etc., for your child when you go to the store. It is a reminder app and is free.

3. Total baby: This is a logging and tracking application app. This app helps in tracking feeding, immunisations, nap length, allergies, overall growth etc., of your child.

4. Babygogo Parenting App: Through this app, you can find best paediatric doctors answering baby health related questions. Here, one can also find various articles on parenting, pregnancy etc.

 

Parenting is all about raising your child in such a way that he/she becomes a good human being. However, it is not that easy. One of the most common questions that most working moms ask is how to be a good parent. Well, it is a tough task (especially when you are managing office as well) but beautiful in its own way. You need to learn the art of having loads of patience, love, care and compassion for your child. You have to learn to respect your child and at the same time, be strict as per the need of the situation. Simply put, you need to grow with your child!