Jane Scott - The Confident Parent: A Pediatricians Guide to Caring for Your Little One—Without Losing Your Joy, Your Mind, or Yourself

N OT LONG AGO I had to buy a new mattress. While getting ready to pay for my purchase, I noticed a young mother wandering up and down one of the aisles studying the price tags, carrying a small baby while her tiny son followed a few steps behind her. The toddler stopped and quickly scrambled up the side of one of the model beds. He bounced gently up and down for a few seconds, and then started to wriggle toward the edge. It was clear he wasnt sure the best way to get down. As he sat with his bottom on the edge of the bed and looked warily down at what to him must have seemed a long distance to the floor, the mother surprised me. Instead of rushing over to help her child, she casually called over from the other side of the room, You might do better turning around and dropping off the side. And he did. He proceeded to quietly wander up and down the rest of the floor, climbing on and off mattresses, exploring his environment, while his mother spoke with a salesman. It might sound crazy, but I left the store thrilled by what I had just witnessed. This mother didnt try to intervene. She didnt hover. She didnt warn her little boy that he was going to fall or to stay close to her. She just offered a suggestion, then let him play while she got on with her life.

If I hadnt known better, Id have thought this mom was an Aussie. She had a shell be right attitude if Id ever seen one. Shell be right is the Australian way of saying dont worry, an attitude that implies that whatever isnt okay now will certainly be fine soon. It connotes a relaxed, optimistic, confident approach to life, one that, in the decade I spent living there, I found often translated to a relaxed, optimistic, confident approach to parenting as well. We dont see this kind of parenting very often here in the States, but I wish we did. As a pediatrician, I often wished I could prescribe a hefty dose of shell be right to the parents in my clinic. They would have been happier for it, and their children probably would have been safer, too.

Why? Because in the twenty-five years since I started my pediatric practice before retiring from my clinic at the end of 2015, I encountered many well-meaning parents so determined to protect their children they wound up putting them in real danger. I met many babies whose heads were flattened and deformed because they spent too much time on their backs or strapped into strollers, carriers, and infant seats by parents too busy or too worried about their safety to give them unfettered time on the floor. I treated toddlers for vitamin D deficiency because their parents were so concerned about sun exposure the children didnt spend a minute outdoors unless covered head to toe in clothes and sunscreen. And I met an awful lot of kids with behavioral issues that I have reason to believe were triggered by the stress of living in schedule-driven, hypervigilant homes.

I saw parents put themselves at risk, too. The mother who called me at three in the morning frantic with worry that the pimple on her babys backside was the first sign of staph infection, the father who confessed to staying up all night watching his infant sleep, the parents tearfully expressing fear that their child may have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) because he wouldnt sit still in preschoolat a time when these parents should be enjoying their new roles as caretakers and protectors, they were instead being crushed by it.

New parenthood is not supposed to be this way. And in other countries that havent allowed their cultural traditions and common sense to be hijacked by personalities and media outlets that profit off our fear, it isnt. I wrote this book because I want parents to see there are many more ways to raise a happy, successful child than our culture would have us believe. If we could break down our assumptions about what entails good parenting, we could benefit from a world of best practice that will release parents from the culturally imposed pressure and stress that has become a de facto parenting badge of honor, still turning out equally successful children, while inspiring far more family joy.

Some people say we should parent more like the French; others say Asians do it best. But after living in and raising my kids on four continents, I know that every country has its own tried-and-true traditions and methods that work, and work beautifully. By exploring all the ways in which children succeed and thrive around the world, I hope to give parents some new back-to-basic tools that will allow them to follow their instincts and parent with confidence and calm. Its an approach I taught families for twenty- five years, gleaned from my own experience living and raising children abroad. In fact, you could say Ive been preparing for this book my whole life.