Why I Ditched the Parenting Books for the First Year
By: Louise Hudson
Tags: Montessori, Books, Childhood, Parenting Advice, Parenting

Yes, you read that right. For a self-confessed bookworm, I didn’t read a single parenting book for the first year of my daughter’s life.

Sounds crazy, right? I read a lot of books while pregnant on how to deal with growing a baby and pushing it out, but my line of thinking sort of stopped at cutting the cord. I’d deal with the ensuing chaos later, and would accumulate a long reading list along the way. I envisioned myself flicking through book after book with helpful tips on bottle vs. breast, sleep training, sleep deprivation, how not to throttle your husband when all he did was breathe a little too loudly… you get the picture. I remember lying in a hospital bed, hardly able to move and with a sleeping baby snuggled on my chest, adding a few random books into my basket on Amazon but never getting around to pressing ‘Checkout’. Which, in hindsight, is the best thing I could have done and here’s why.

I didn’t want any outside influences clouding my natural instincts as a parent.

For me, parenting has been intuitive and when the newborn fog cleared, I realised I didn’t want any outside influences clouding my natural instincts as a parent. I will admit that I’ve had what most people consider an ‘easy’ baby. She fed well, she slept well, she rarely cried. So that was certainly a good baseline to start with, but I found I quickly fell into a rhythm with her, and that we had a strong connection from the moment our eyes met in the brightly-lit and, quite frankly, terrifying theatre at our local hospital. It was like we both told each other ‘we got this’ and, it turns out, we did.

I found my parenting tribe.

I knew next to nothing about parenting styles while pregnant, and even less before the idea of children came to mind. When my daughter was a few months old, I curiously looked it up and found myself down a rabbit hole of information. Emerging, I had the Attachment Parent banner clasped firmly in my hand and a new network of parents to connect with. Parents who responded instantly to their baby rather than leaving them to cry, parents who didn’t feel sleep training was for them, parents who contact-napped and co-slept, parents who devoted 100% of themselves to their baby and spent 99% of their time joined at the hip. I’d found my parenting tribe.

Many of the big names in childcare have written guides and manuals of what to do in various situations, and for many parents these books are gospels — and that works for them. The last thing I want to be is a Judgy Mum (although we all fall to that trap from time-to-time, I’m sure). But the only thing I ever really sought guidance on was healthcare (I swear I had my health visitor on speed-dial at one point) and weaning, because it turns out feeding a baby isn’t quite as easy as feeding the bottomless pit I call my husband, or the four-legged Hoover who loves nothing more than to sit by the high chair in hope. And usually, that help was sought from wise friends who have been there, done that. So yes, three weaning books are sitting snugly on my shelf. But aside from that, we’ve been winging it.

Now, she’s thirteen months old and a toddler in every way possible. She moves faster than I thought any small human could and has the appetite of a hungry wolf. Suddenly, even though our connection is stronger than ever, there are potholes and pitfalls that I need some outside help with, and some large hurdles on the horizon (potty training — where do I even start?) so I’ve turned to my trusty books to help me out.

I know by now how I want to parent, I know of authors who will resonate with me, so the books I seek out are in-line with how I parent my daughter and how we connect, rather than trying to shape that connection and that parenting style to fit with the way we ‘should’ be doing it as instructed in numerous mummy manuals.

This approach certainly won’t work for everyone — nor should it. We all parent differently, and some mums and dads prefer to do everything by the book from the word go.

But for anyone wanting to trust their instincts, I definitely recommend trusting yours. Don’t be afraid to seek help when you need it, but finding our own ways as parents and learning how to nurture our little ones without being given a list of ‘shoulds’ and ‘shouldn’ts’ is definitely something I’d encourage any mum to try. It certainly worked for us.

Now, onto the toddler years…