You've absorbed the experts' advice
and weighed their sometimes conflicting views.
Now you may need to . . .

Trust Yourself

by Liza N. Burby

At a lecture at Tilles Center in Long Island. NY, a few months ago, parenting guru T. Berry Brazelton was greeted by the mothers and fathers in the audience with adulation infused with the conviction that he would hold the answers to their parenting problems. This became particularly apparent in the question-and-answer session during which parent after parent spoke of concerns that were clearly driving them wild: One child, for example, wouldn't wear shirts with tags in the collar. Another refused to wear shoes. Still another had started ignoring her parents' wishes.

Brazelton serenely listened to each difficulty and then asked questions: Have you tried cutting out the tags? Is it really an issue if he doesn't wear shoes? Has something happened in the family to change your daughter's behavior, such as a new sibling? (The answers, in order, were: no, no and yes.)

In almost every case, the parents already seemed to realize the right answer for their child but didn't quite trust themselves, believing instead that the expert would know best. But that's the way parenting has become. We gather in all the advice, we memorize the scripts as if communicating with our kids is truly programmable and, if our children don't respond as expected, we worry about our parenting skills — even if our kids are normal. We routinely second-guess ourselves. And we feel a vague sense of guilt most of the time. We're overwhelmed by all the available information, which is often conflicting, so we're left with what's been called "analysis paralysis."

Chances are, though, if we took a moment to listen to our inner voice, we'd know how to handle the many riddles that delineate parenting. But, in an interview, Brazelton said it's not necessarily knowledge we're looking for.

"Parents are seeking confirmation and they need it," he said. "They're not getting it from their own child-rearing experience and not from the extended family of old. When they don't get it, they seek confirmation from someone like me or books or TV. It's more that they are getting backup because they already have a sense of what is right for their own child."

What is it about parenting in the '90s that makes us tend to buy into the idea that we need to rely on strangers to help us figure out our own kids? Ray Guarendi, author of "You're a Better Parent Than You Think" (Simon & Schuster, $10) and a clinical psychologist in North Canton, Ohio, hypothesizes:

"It's a result of this psychological correctness that is pervading our society. Parents are nervous wrecks. We've taken something people have been doing for thousands of years and made it into a psychological process. You have to talk right, walk right in order for your kids to turn out okay. This is a phenomenon that will be in the history books as a time when the big people were frustrated by all the little people," he quips.

Joking aside, this father of seven adopted children, ages 6 months to 10 years, reminds us that we are our children's mom or dad and the experts aren't, and forgetting that simple fact can have a detrimental effect on our parenting skills.

"If you're worried you're wrong all the time, you will actually be in more trouble than if you make a mistake once in a while," he warns. "Parents need to start trusting their own common sense, their own intuition more often. Parents need to stop scrutinizing. You cannot walk on eggs through parenting."

The idea that we each possess the passkey to our own children through intuition is tantalizing but seems as hard to get a handle on as are many parenting issues.

Vicki Carr, associate director of the Arlitt Child and Family Research and Education Center in Cincinnati, who finds that parents seek advice about discipline more than any other topic, asserts: "Intuitive parenting means you know how to communicate with your child. It's a combination of being sensitive, nurturing and being very understanding. A lot of programs adhere to a very regimented way of working with a child. Intuitive parenting means meeting the needs of the child when their needs need to be met."

The good news, she says, is that all parents are capable of being intuitive, but it's only when you nurture it that you can develop it.

As a new mother, Leslie Kincaid of Manhattan often felt unsure. Now, says Kincaid, whose son, Henry, just celebrated his first birthday, "Some of the 'intuition' I've developed is really just common sense if you set aside some of the notions we have been trained to assume are mandatory. I remember waking my son to change his diaper before I went to bed because I didn't want him to lie in a wet diaper all night. It took me an hour to calm him and I never did that again.

"Although this sort of learning does fall under the realm of common sense, it also feels right," she says. "I'm sure that in the long run children turn out fine under most conditions, but I certainly feel happier as a parent now that I've started to trust my own choices. It's really much easier to listen to my child's needs and improvise on the spot than to try to bend him to my will."

Carmel Foley, chief of adolescent psychiatry at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, NY, points out that we come to parenting with a lot of ready intuition.

"We bring our own experiences of being parented," she says. "If it was good, we have a lot of good things to pass on. We've absorbed skills without knowing it. If we experienced a not-so-great childhood, it gives us a psychological advantage in stepping back and not repeating mistakes and making deliberate choices. Parents should trust themselves more fundamentally. I've rarely met a parent who doesn't sincerely want to do right by their child. So intuition is powerful."

There may be times when that sense is on the mark more than others.

"Probably the time intuition is strongest is with school-aged children," she says. "It tends to be the easiest phase. The child is verbal, articulate, lives are programmed and predictable. It's the least tumultuous time of life, assuming there are not life stressors like divorce."

Parents are most insecure when their children are teenagers, Guarendi believes, "because the stakes are so high." As a result, says Foley, adolescence is the time that parents are more likely to rely more on intuition and also more likely to speak with other parents to set the standards for their child's behavior, such as making a curfew similar to other kids' in the neighborhood, because the societal standard for adolescents is not clear-cut.

But no matter what stage your children are in, Guarendi thinks the best approach is the most straightforward. "If your child kicks you, you stop him, no discussion. Most of the time as parents you define what is right to do. Too many parents are not allowing themselves to make decisions in their own homes," he contends.

"Keep in mind that you can decide what you want to do, no matter what the experts suggest. If you want to use banishment to a kid's room as punishment, even though experts say you shouldn't do that because their room is a special place; or your kid calls his sister a name and you make him write an essay about why he shouldn't, even though the experts say that will teach him to hate writing — if that works in your household, do it," he says. "It's not so much figuring out what is right, but what matters to you."

Here's where the experts come in, says Michael Quinland, a clinical psychologist at Nassau County Medical Center in East Meadow, NY. He believes parents often have unrealistic expectations of what their child can handle developmentally.

"Parents get frustrated with a child who doesn't do what's way beyond what is developmentally appropriate," he says. "For instance, you're not going to be able to keep a six-month-old quiet on a ten-hour car trip. Reading information about child development can help you determine the right course of action for your child."

That sort of information also is important in helping you ascertain if you need to get an expert's opinion. For instance, if you were to see a sudden increase in such behaviors as anxiety or aggressiveness, it might be a good idea to call your pediatrician or a mental health professional.

As Brazelton says, there are times when you just need confirmation from others — be it a well-known expert or your parents or friends. They can give you an extra boost, even if you're fairly certain you're right. After all, we don't get a review of our performance in this parenting business and it's reassuring to have someone say, "Good choice — you're doing a good job." Joining parenting groups and reaching out to parents whose kids are close in age to yours also can be beneficial.

As Larry Chorowski of Northport, NY, the father of Daniel, 5, and David, 2, says: "Parenting is a learning process for the parent and child, and more experience is gained through the process every day. You have to trust yourself and you have to trust your kids, too. Kids are intuitive in a lot more ways than people give them credit for. You have to get down on the floor with your child and be with them. If parents are aware of their kids and don't take things too seriously, kids respond."

You can't buy intuition like that.

Liza N. Burby is an award-winning author and an accomplished public speaker. She is the mother of two daughters, Danielle, age 7 and Laura, age 4, and is married to Stephen, a high school teacher. They live in Huntington Station, NY. She is a frequent contributor to Working Moms' Internet Refuge.

This article first appeared in Newsday.

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