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13 ‘old-school’ parenting ideas people say just what today's kids need

A lot of "bad" ideas are turning out to be quite good.

via Jim Forest/Flickr

A dad has had it with his crying son.

There are as many different parenting styles as there are children. But in 2025, there is a conflict between newer, softer parenting styles and older, tough-love approaches. Softer parenting styles that have come into favor in recent years tend to encourage emotional intelligence, gentle discipline, and open communication.

On the other hand, older, tough-love parenting encourages risk-taking, natural consequences and discipline. One of the most controversial parenting styles that has emerged over the last generation or two is helicopter parenting. In this style, parents closely monitor and control most aspects of the child’s life. While it’s done out of an abundance of concern, it can also limit the child's independence.

A Redditor named NumanLover asked parents to share their parenting strategies that may be considered” bad” by today’s helicopter parents. They received over 1,300 responses. Many resisted the idea that parents should control their children's lives and shared strategies that encouraged independence and perseverance. The “bad” parenting ideas urged parents to let their children grow in confidence by spending time alone and unsupervised.

family, family values, parenting, old-school parenting, discipline, 1950s, good parentingA man lifts a couch with his wife on it while vacuumingImage via Canva

They also reminded parents that it’s OK to ignore a tantrum, even if it is in a packed restaurant.

Here are 13 of the best answers to: What is considered bad parenting but it's actually good parenting?

1. Giving your kids space

"Giving your kids enough space to fail and then try to figure it out on their own. I see a lot of parents solving their children’s problems without giving them a chance to find their own solution."

"Consequences are the best teachers for some lessons. Barring significant issues, if you don't do your schoolwork or hand it in late you get lower grades. If you show up late to work too many times you may get reamed out by your boss and fired. If you decide to say something careless and cruel you may lose a friendship and the respect of others. Support them through it so they can learn and improve, yes. Shelter them and try to get them out of it, no."


- YouTubewww.youtube.com

2. Let them be alone

"Leaving your kids alone for age-appropriate periods of time. At some point, kids have to learn to entertain themselves or to be responsible for their own meals, depending on how old they are. Which is why the key part of that statement was 'age-appropriate.' And I suppose it depends on how safe your neighbourhood is, too."

"A lot of parents are too helicopter-y today. I also went where I wanted as a kid as long as I came back when I was supposed to. I think it’s social media getting into parents head with anxieties about what could happen."


parenting, modern parenting, kids, chores, family, old-school parenting, family values, raising kidsA mom watches her two children doing choresImage via Canva

3. Give them chores

"Making your kids help with chores from an early age This is just teaching good habits and skills. When I grew up we had a rule in my house. The person who cooks don't have to do dishes. If you didn't set the table and didn't cook. You had to wash dishes. And ironically because of that I became a really good cook because I HATED doing dishes. So I learned how to cook everything."


parenting, modern parenting, old-school, raising kids, kids, children Two kids fight over a basketballImage via Canva

4. Allow them to experience conflict

"Allowing kids to experience discomfort and situations of conflict and confrontation so they can develop the necessary skills to process and navigate said conflict, and with your guidance before and correction after - learn to compromise when necessary and resolve conflicts effectively."

"Similarly: a lot of parents think it's bad to argue in front of your children. When you argue in front of your kids, you're teaching them that sometimes people disagree on things. When you resolve the argument, you're demonstrating conflict resolution."


kids, playing, parenting, free range parenting, modern families, old-school parenting, parenting adviceA young girl climbs on a playground ladderImage via Canva

5. Encourage risky play

"Letting kids engage in age-appropriate risky play. Trying to protect them from everything is bad parenting. Let them climb, run, jump, dig, throw, etc. They’ll become more specially aware, aware of their body, physically literate, and more active."


parenting, modern parenting, family, old-school parenting, tough love, kids, kids crying A young child cryingImage via Canva

6. Let them cry

"Letting them feel emotions helps them learn how to regulate them."

"Teaching them self-soothing skills, a little bit at a time, is also essential. but they do need to learn emotional regulation!"

7. Ignore the tantrum

"As long as they aren’t hurting themselves, someone else, or destroying things, the best thing is to let them tire themselves out. Parents cave in way too often, and it teaches the kid, 'Oh, Mom and Dad will give me this thing I want; I just need to do this long enough,' leading to more and more tantrums. Operant conditioning done inadvertently is difficult to undo."

"The trick is to do the opposite of rewarding the kid throwing the tantrum. Growing up, I behaved well because I quickly learned that if I was acting up in a restaurant, we would leave the restaurant immediately, and we did. It only took a few times of doing that to make it clear there was no upside to throwing a fit, only downsides. That tasty treat you wanted, the chicken nuggets and chocolate milkshake? Nope. You threw a fit; everyone's going home. No nuggs and milkshake for you."


parenting, modern parenting, discipline, family, old-school parenting, family values A mother explains the situation to her childImage via Canva

8. Logical consequences

"Refuse to put on your coat to go to the playground? Then either we don’t go to the playground or we go and you get to be cold enough to be miserable while your warm siblings are running around playing."

"Dr. Becky just had a really good episode on her podcast about this. We need to let kids experience the arc of their decisions when it’s safe to do so."


teachers, parenting, kids, school, family, modern families, old-school parenting, family valuesa mom talks with her son's teacherImage via Canva

9. Side with the teacher

"Your child is being a little sh*t. Yes, they are 6 years old, and yes, 6 year olds are talkative. But there are 30 other 6-year-olds in the classroom, and if the teacher needs to come to and tell you your child is talkative and being disruptive, do something about it."


parenting, family, modern parenting, parenting advice, modern families, old-school parentingA couple walks along the oceanImage via Canva

10. Prioritize yourself

"For parents, it's actually good to NOT make your kids the highest priority ALL THE TIME - to consciously plan and take the effort and time to prioritize your partner and yourself regularly. A happy, healthy relationship between parents is worth so much more than the occasional bouts of inconvenience/missing the parents/whatever opportunity cost these times have to kids."

"If you're feeling overwhelmed as a parent, it's GOOD to leave the kids to their own devices for an appropriate length of time, maybe even in front of the TV or whatever distracts them, while you take time out to recharge."

11. You aren't your child's friend

"So many people think you need to be friends with your kid, but you're not a friend, you're a parent. Even if your kid hates you, even if you get screamed at, you NEED to teach them the right lessons in life. Cos, guess what, kids won't always love what you say. And what they love is sometimes not what they should love. Being a parent isn't a matter of your child loving you, it's a matter of making sure they're ready for life and praying to any and all gods and demons that may or may not exist that they turn out a decent human being."


parenting, family, modern parenting, old-school family, kids and smart phones, internet, social media, protecting kidsA mom takes away her daughter's phoneImage via Canva

12. Keep them offline

"Not letting a small child have an iPad / phone / any access to the internet. This is somehow seen as something really strict / no fun parenting. The parents who don't allow internet are actually great, the internet isn't a nice place for a child to explore."

"I always want to ask 'why' or 'what do you think that’s doing for them?' I’m pretty sure most of these parents just didn’t want children and they just want to offload that time to the tablet and call it a day. There are definitely times when I feel that way too, but it’s just no way to raise a child every day."

13. Spanking your child is wrong

"A bunch of people justifying physically abusing children under the guise of 'discipline'"

"It’s funny because they are objectively wrong. The only thing it does is show you child (by example) that violence is the way to deal with problems."


This article originally appeared last year.

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Millennials are bonding over their Boomer parents' 'gramnesia.' Here's what the viral term means.

People can't get over how "accurate" it is.

@millennialmomtherapist/Instagram, Photo credit: Canva

Millennials—are you victims of "gramnesia"?

It’s funny how once something sort of abstract experience gets a name attached to it, it suddenly becomes much easier to relate to and talk about. The internet—and primarily TikTok—has been great for that. Sure, things get out of hand quite easily (like the overuse of “therapy speak”) but there has also been quite a lot of validation and meaningful conversations that have spawned from these overnight buzzwords.

Case and point, “gramnesia.”

“Gramneisa,” which combines the words “grandparent” and “amnesia,” has been popping up on Reddit discussions for a while now, though the coiner of the term seems unknown. But only recently has it been really gaining traction.

Back in June, Maryland-based therapist and mom Allie McQuaid, really brought “gramnesia” to the forefront of the conversation when she made an Instagram video all about it.

“I just heard this term called ‘gramnesia’ when grandparents forget what it’s really like having young kids and I can’t stop thinking about how accurate it is,” she said in the clip.

And then in her caption, McQuaid shared how so many of her clients would get “slammed” by their parents about how different (i.e. “easier”) raising kids was for them whenever they brought their own children around.

These hyperbolic memories are, as McQuaid put it, so “ridiculous” that they're clearly “forgot[ten] what it was really like in those early years of parenthood.”

Some example of “gramnesia” statements could be:

“You never had tantrums when you were a kid”

“I potty trained you before you were one”

“You were always happy to eat whatever we fed you.”

“You were spanked and turned out fine!”

Clearly, Mcquaid’s video struck a chord, because it wasn’t long before people begin chiming in with their own stories of gramneis.

“My MIL, over the years, loved to act like her children were perfect growing up. I love to tell the stories of her son (my hubby) getting into all kinds of trouble as a kid - oh the shock.”

“*Baby makes any kind of noise* Grandma: "Oh they must be teething!" Me : "Umm she's 4 months old, She isn't teething yet - just has feelings and is you know - A BABY" grandma: ‘well my kids had all their teeth by 4 months’ 😐🤨”

“5 months old and not sleeping through the night? Did you try rice cereal? Baby not walking ? Rice cereal. Baby not in college yet? Have you tried rice cereal?”

“Ugh my dad literally just said this to me last week… ‘I don’t remember you guys having this many tantrums’… 🙄 right after my boys were upset.”

Mcquaid posited some theories as to why gramnesia exists in the first place.

One could simply be the natural tendency to have a cognitive bias which puts past experiences in a more positive light than they actually were, aka having “euphoric recall.”. As she told Huffpost, we tend to have a “foggier memory of how things truly were” as we get older, “especially if the experience we had was particularly difficult or even traumatic.”

Plus, the first few years of parenthood are often such a blur anyway. Mcquaid herself admitted that I” I even have a hard time remembering the first year of motherhood, and that was only four years ago.”

In addition, Mcquaid theorized that a gramnesia exists because previous generations “were not given space to express emotions or indicate that they were struggling to adjust to motherhood.” Honestly, a sound hypothesis.

And for the frustrated folks itching to confront their boomer parents about this, Mcquaid suggests picking your battles.

“Check your capacity if you have the space or energy to even consider bringing up your frustration with your parents,” she told Huffpost. “You are likely in the throes of parenting right now, and maybe all you can do is smile and nod after hearing for the 100th time how ‘you were never like this.’”

However, if you are determined to bring it up, Mcquaid suggests to keep it centered around you the situation makes you feel, rather than combating their memories. So instead of “that’s NOT how it happened!” try something like “When you said that I never did X when I was Y’s age, it makes me question how well I’m doing as a parent.” Probably easier said than done, to be sure.

And while this sore spot might never come to a full resolution for a lot of millennial parents, at least take some solace in knowing that you’re not crazy, nor are you alone. Clearly.


This article originally appeared last year.

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Adult children who had 'good parents' share what their parents did right

There's a lot we can learn from these parenting success stories.

Photo credit: Canva

Good parenting is often most recognized in hindsight.

When you're in the thick of parenting, it can feel like you're just flying by the seat of your pants. You can read every parenting book under the sun and still feel like you're doing it wrong, and the conflicting advice about what to do and what not to do with your kids is enough to make your head spin. To make it even more complicated, each kid who comes into your life brings their own unique personalities, leading to specific joys and challenges and making definitive rules about parenting seem silly at best.

However, there's no doubt that some parents manage to raise kids into solid, healthy, contributing adult humans while maintaining good relationships with them. Some of those adult children are sharing what their parents did that made them good parents—what they did right in raising them—and it's a treasure trove of excellent parenting examples.

from AskReddit

Here are some of the most popular responses:

They supported their kids' interests without judgment

"My parents are imperfect, but they did a lot of things right. The biggest one that sticks out to me is that they're supportive of things my brother and I like even when they don't understand or like it. They didn't really care for skateboarding, but they spent hundreds of dollars over the years for my brother to enjoy his hobby. They not only helped me get a drum set, but allowed the band to hold practice in our basement and drove us to all our shows. They wanted me to be a lawyer, but they were willing to settle for line cook. It made a difference in the long run, because eventually it helped me realize that I get to make my own choices in life - nothing is laid out for me. I can do whatever I enjoy, and my parents will be there for me, cheering me on."

"My parents are the same. My brother always showed huge passion over a short period of time for things like skateboarding, drums, BMXing etc and our parents happily bought him what was required for him to pursue his interests. He never did well academically so they were supportive when he chose to go into construction; our dad actually helped him get a job. When my brother showed restlessness with that job, our dad helped him start a business and kept it afloat during periods of financial difficulty.

I on the other hand, had my limited interests in reading and drawing nurtured. I was given books whenever requested and was supported when pursuing an art degree. Now I’m pursuing an entirely different degree and I’m supported by our parents once again in their own way.

They’ve never encouraged us in ways other parents might. We don’t get told we’ve done a good job or to keep going when we’re about to give up, we just know exactly what is expected of us and know if we fail, our parents won’t hold it against us. They’re there, quietly cheering us on in the background."

They explained themselves to their kids

"Taught respect, never played favorites. But the biggest thing was they always explained their actions and we're willing to discuss why, and occasionally even change their mind. It was never 'no because I said so.' I think I didn't really have a rebellious phase because they never really forbid anything, it was always 'well you can do that when you don't live here.'"

parents talking to young kidsExplaining things to your kids is key. Photo credit: Canva

"This is honestly one of the biggest things a parent can do right. Mine always tried their best to explain everything to me. There was rarely ever any 'Because I said so' moments. Knowing the reasons why I could or couldn't do something made me listen 99% of the time. 'No, do your homework first - you'll have more time to play later.' 'No, you can't have that toy - we only have $200 to last us the rest of the week,' 'No, you can't be out past dusk - something bad's more likely to happen to you when it's dark.' It made me respect my parents instead of resent them, and it also helped me develop good habits and reasoning early on."

They were fair-minded and taught fair-mindedness

"My dad was exceptionally fair. Any conflict would be solved by sitting down and having me evaluate multiple perspectives. If we could reason through an issue and it appeared someone had indeed treated me poorly/done the wrong thing and I was 'in the right,' he would give me credit for that but then still work with me to find a way to resolve the issue with the other person. Vice versa, if I was wrong he had a way of conversing with me that made me realise it on my own.

I think this really helped in building some character traits I’m very grateful for, but it also built a child/parent relationship with mutual trust. I felt comfortable approaching my dad about anything. I knew he’d tell me about it if I was wrong, but I also knew he would back me if I was in the right. That was powerful, to feel respected as a teenager. It’s only now I’m an adult I realise how that empowerment drove me to be responsible for my own actions rather than blaming the world for not understanding me."

"Ah, my mother does this. One of the biggest things she taught me is to put myself in the other person's shoes and see the situation from their perspective rather than just my own. It's really shaped me into a kinder person, I think, and I'm really grateful for her."

They taught by their own example

"A lot of it was the little things they taught me by example. Stuff like being patient and kind to customer service or waitstaff. I’ve seen my parents get unbelievably mad with cable companies, but never to their face; they keep their cool and stay as polite as they can be on the phone, then blow a gasket after the call where it won’t get dumped on a call center worker who doesn’t deserve it. Just because you’re having a shitty day doesn’t mean they need to get cussed out too.

They also taught me to be accepting of others’ beliefs by example. We grew up going to church and when I came back from college I had done some thinking and decided I didn’t believe in God at all, and told my parents as much. My dad, who was the sitting president of the church council, said “alright, we won’t wake you up early on Sundays, and if you ever do want a ride to church you know where to find us”, and that was the end of the discussion.

Honestly a lot of principles I hold today are because I try to follow in their footsteps, since it’s because of them that I try to be a decent and honest person every day."

"They led by example. My parents never expected things out of me that they didn't live by themselves. Whether it was something as simple as being open and honest to our entire family or something more complicated like living within your means, budgeting, and treating all people with total kindness. It's a lot easier as a kid to look-up to your parents when they live their daily lives by the same values they taught me."


dad talking to a sonCycle breaking parents are superheroes.Photo credit: Canva

They broke cycles of dysfunction

"My parent's weren't perfect and they weren't wealthy. My dad was abandoned as a child, in a state thousands of miles away from home, raised with a bunch of people he wasn't related to. My mom was a child of divorced parents, abused and hated by her step parents. They found each other and worked their ass's off so me, my sister, and my brother never had to go through those same troubles. Both of my parents have trauma from their youth, my dad can be paranoid, my mom struggles with depression, but they never abandoned us. When my cousin was starving because my auntue was out drinking, they took him in, and he became my brother. Sometimes they argue, sometimes they yell, but they never laid hands on each other. They've been there for me countless times, even when it cost everything. Now that I'm older I'm trying my hardest to be there for them, because i know now what they've done for us. They broke the cycle."

"My mom came from a huge, poor family. Her father was a physically abusive alcoholic and her mom was mentally ill. Her siblings are almost all into drugs and crime.

My dad's parents were immigrants, and were pretty locked into their culture. They all worked hard, but no one took care of their mental health and honoring your elders was more important than happiness. He married a tall white lady anyway.

They always encouraged me to do whatever I wanted, and be whoever I wanted. They broke cycles too, and they're amazing. They were financially smart and sacrificed so much for us, and I'm glad they're close to reaping the rewards in their retirement."

Some practices that popped up repeatedly in the discussion were:

- they spent time with me

- they read to me

- they loved me through mistakes

- they didn't shelter me

- they trusted me

- they respected me

One thing that a lot of people pointed out was that their "good" parents certainly weren't perfect. It might be a relief for current parents to know that you don't have to parent perfectly to have kids who are grateful for how you raised them.

May we all be the kinds of parents who are spoken of this highly by our adult kids when we're not around to hear it.

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This innocent question we ask boys is putting more pressure on them than we realize

When it's always the first question asked, the implication is clear.


Studies show that having daughters makes men more sympathetic to women's issues.

And while it would be nice if men did not need a genetic investment in a female person in order to gain this perspective, lately I've had sympathy for those newly woke dads. My two sons have caused something similar to happen to me. I've begun to glimpse the world through the eyes of a young male. And among the things I'm finding here in boyland are the same obnoxious gender norms that rankled when I was a girl.

Of course, one notices norms the most when they don't fit. If my tween sons were happily boy-ing away at boy things, neither they nor I would notice that they were hemmed in.

But oh boy, are they not doing that.

In fact, if I showed you a list of my sons' collective interests and you had to guess their gender, you'd waver a bit, but then choose girl.

Baking, reading, drawing, holidays, films, volleyball, cute mammals, video games, babies and toddlers, reading, travel, writing letters.

I imagine many of you are thinking at this point: That's awesome that your boys are interested in those things!

There's more. One loves comics and graphic novels but gravitates to stories with strong female protagonists, like Ms. Marvel and The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl.

Cool! I love it.

And sports. They are thoroughly bored by team sports. They don't play them. They won't watch them. They will up- or down-arrow through any number of sporting events on TV to get to a dance contest or to watch competitive baking.

So? Nothing wrong with that.

Those are the kinds of things all my progressive friends say.

But it's often not the message my sons themselves hear from the other adults in their lives, their classmates, and the media.

For example, the first get-to-know-you question they are inevitably asked by well-meaning grown-ups is, "So, do you play sports?" When they say, "No, not really," the adult usually continues brightly, "Oh, so what do you like to do, then?"

No one explicitly says it's bad for a boy not to play sports. But when it's always the first question asked, the implication is clear: playing sports is normal; therefore, not playing them is not.

The truth is that one of them does play a sport. He figure skates, as does my daughter. When people find out that she skates, they beam at her, as if she suddenly has possession of a few rays of Olympic glory. In the days before my son stopped telling people that he ice skates, most of them hesitated and then said, "Oh, so you are planning to play hockey?"

But it's not just what people say. It's all those pesky, unwritten rules. When he was in second grade, my younger son liked the Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew series. But he refused to check any out of the school library. He explained: "Girls can read boy books, but boys can't read girl books. Girls can wear boy colors or girl colors, but boys can only wear boy colors. Why is that, Mom?"

I didn't have an answer.

An obvious starting point — and the one that we have the most control over — is to change the way we speak to the boys in our lives.

As Andrew Reiner suggests in a spot-on essay, we should engage boys in analytical, emotion-focused conversations, just like we do with girls. In "How to Talk to Little Girls," Lisa Bloom offers alternatives to the appearance-focused comments so often directed at young girls: asking a girl what she's reading or about current events or what she would like to see changed in the world. I could copy-paste Bloom's list and slap a different title on it: "How to Ask Boys About Something Besides Sports."

And with a few more built-in nudges, we might expand the narrow world of boyhood more quickly. Boy Scouts could offer badges for developing skills in child care, teamwork, and journaling. Girl-dominated activities like art, dance, gymnastics, and figure skating could be made more welcoming to boys, with increased outreach and retention efforts. My son could write his own essay about trying to fit in to the nearly all-girl world of figure skating, including the times he has had to change clothes in a toilet stall at skating events because there were no locker rooms available for boys.

I used to think that the concept of gender — of "girl things" and "boy things" — was what was holding us back.

Now I see it differently.

The interdependent yin and yang of gender is a fundamental part of who we are, individually and collectively. We need people who like to fix cars and people who like to fix dinner. We need people who are willing and able to fight if needed and people who are exquisitely tuned into a baby's needs. But for millennia, we have forced these traits to align with biological sex, causing countless individuals to be dissatisfied and diminished. For the most part, we've recognized this with girls. But we have a long way to go when it comes to boys. As Gloria Steinem observed, "We've begun to raise daughters more like sons … but few have the courage to raise our sons more like our daughters."

I acknowledge that young boys feeling pressured to be sports fans is not our country's biggest problem related to gender.

Transgender individuals still confront discrimination and violence. The #MeToo movement has revealed to anyone who didn't already know it that girls and women can't go about their everyday lives without bumping into male sexual aggression.

But if our culture shifts to wholeheartedly embrace the whole spectrum of unboyishness, it may play some small role in addressing these other issues, too. Male culture will be redefined, enriched, and expanded, diluting the toxic masculinity that is at the root of most of our gender-related problems.

Boys and girls alike will be able to decide if they would rather be made up of snips and snails, sugar and spice, or a customized mix. And my future grandsons, unlike my sons, won't think twice about wearing pink or reading about a girl detective at school.

This story originally appeared on Motherwell and is reprinted here with permission.


This article originally appeared six years ago.

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