Is Gentle Parenting Working? What the Critics Get Right and What They're Missing
I’ve noticed a lot of criticism of gentle parenting recently. A nursery owner writing in The Telegraph in March 2026 argued that gentle parenting is "wreaking havoc" in early years settings and a Psychology Today piece has asked what is actually wrong with ‘gentle parenting’, while an article in World, republished by the Institute for Family Studies, described some of its effects as "harsh".
Considering I work with overwhelmed parents every day, and have spent years studying and teaching Aware Parenting alongside other attachment and trauma-informed approaches, I think some of these criticisms raise important questions, but I also think they are missing something fundamental.
The problem isn't that parents are too gentle.
And I certainly don't believe the answer is to become harsher. Parents I meet are trying incredibly hard to parent differently from how they themselves were parented. They want to understand their children. They don't want to shout, punish, threaten or control. They've read books and listened to podcasts. They know how they want to respond. And yet, in the hardest moments, they can still find themselves reacting in ways they wish they hadn't.
Why?
On a workshop of Aletha Solter’s that I recently attended, what stood out more than anything else is the reasons WHY WE find it hard. Even though I knew them already, they really landed more fully in me.
There are 2 main reasons
our own unmet needs
and our unhealed childhood wounds.
Knowing how we want to parent and being able to access that response when we're exhausted, overwhelmed or triggered are two very different things. And then we may swing between being too permissive to being too authoritarian.
We Still Need Gentleness
Aware Parenting is certainly a paradigm of its own, but I don't want to lose the word gentle. When we consider the history of how children have been treated, gentleness towards children and towards ourselves still matters enormously. For anyone interested in exploring this history more deeply, I recommend Robin Grille's Parenting for a Peaceful World, which offers a detailed, extensively researched history of childhood and the ways children have been treated across generations. By questioning aspects of what has come to be known as gentle parenting, I am not suggesting less compassion, less empathy or less understanding, in fact I think we need to go deeper.
What the Critics Are Actually Saying
The Telegraph piece, written from the perspective of someone working in a nursery setting, described children arriving who struggle to hear "no" from anyone other than their parents, find it difficult to wait or share, and struggle with boundaries set by another adult. The argument is that what may feel gentle and connected at home can translate into difficulty navigating the inevitable frustrations of communal life. Dr Emily Edlynn, writing in Psychology Today in 2024, raised a different concern: that gentle parenting, as it is commonly practised, can create unrealistic expectations for parents.
Always be calm.
Always validate.
Always respond with perfect attunement.
When we inevitably fall short, we are left not only exhausted but often guilty about behaving in ways we wished we hadn't. The World article ‘The Harsh Truth About Gentle Parenting’, republished by the Institute for Family Studies, offered a more polemical critique: parents exhausted by endless negotiation and children who have become demanding or difficult to manage. There are things here worth taking seriously. But I think we need to look much more carefully at WHY parents and children might be struggling before concluding that gentleness itself is the problem.
Knowing How We Want to Parent Doesn't Mean We Can Always Access It
Many parents I work with already know exactly how they want to respond. They genuinely want to parent with empathy, connection and understanding. But then their child hits their sibling for the fifth time. They refuse to put their shoes on when everyone is already late. They scream because you've said no. Or you're woken again after another night of broken sleep. And suddenly all that knowledge seems to disappear.
You shout. You threaten. You say something you immediately regret.
I don't believe the answer is that you need to try harder or find a way to be more gentler. Sometimes the reason we can't respond in the calm, connected way we hoped to isn't complicated at all.
We're exhausted.
We're hungry.
We're overstimulated.
We've been touched all day.
We haven't had five minutes alone.
We're carrying the mental load of an entire family.
We're trying to meet everybody else's needs while our own have quietly disappeared from the list. That isn't a failure of gentle parenting. It's a human being reaching their capacity! We live in a society where we need to do it mainly on our own which is never how it was meant too be.
And Sometimes the Feeling Is Older Than This Moment
There is another piece that I think is often missing from conversations about gentle parenting. Sometimes our reaction feels much bigger than the situation in front of us.
Our child's anger makes us furious.
Their crying feels unbearable.
Their refusal feels deeply personal.
Their need for us feels overwhelming.
This is where becoming curious about our own childhood can be so powerful. What happened when you cried? What happened when you said no? Were you allowed to be angry? Were your feelings welcomed? Did you have to be good, helpful, quiet or easy? Were you responsible for other people's feelings?
Our children have an extraordinary ability to touch places in us that we didn't even know were still tender. And this isn't about blaming our parents and it’s definitely not about blaming ourselves. It's about understanding what Robin Grille calls the ‘ah no wonder’ realisations. Despite maybe knowing exactly how we want to parent, we sometimes find ourselves responding in ways we promised ourselves we wouldn't. This is deeply wrapped up in our own childhood which is why I am so passionate about using Robin Grille’s Inner Child Journey work in my parenting support. As chair of the International Attachment Network understanding our earliest experiences can transform our relationships not only with our children but also ourselves.
We Don't Need to Be Perfectly Calm
Donald Winnicott, the influential paediatrician and psychoanalyst, gave us the concept of the "good enough" mother. His work challenged the idea that children need perfectly attuned parenting. In the earliest period of a baby's life, a high level of adaptation to the baby's needs is important and sensitive attunement. But as the baby develops, the caregiver naturally becomes less perfectly adapted. The child gradually encounters manageable frustration and the reality that another person cannot meet every need immediately. There is something reassuring in this for modern parents. Our children don't need us to respond perfectly every time.
And yet some modern parenting advice can leave us believing that good parenting means maintaining almost the superhuman calm of a Buddhist monk. I have never met a parent who doesn't lose their temper sometimes. I definitely haven't managed it myself, especially when my own capacity is low. Sometimes we react because our needs haven't been met for far too long. Sometimes our child's behaviour touches an old wound. But offten it's both.
So when a parent tells me: "I know I shouldn't shout, but in the moment I just can't seem to stop myself." I’'m much less interested in giving them another parenting script than I am in becoming curious about what is happening for them.
What do they need?
What are they carrying?
What does this particular behaviour bring up for them?
Children don't need parents who never experience difficult feelings.
They need to learn that feelings are not dangerous. (Of course we need to have places to fully express our own and get support if we are really struggling with our own!)
That relationships can have difficult moments.
And that repair after rupture is possible.
Parenting Scripts Can't Reach the Parts of Us That Are Hurting
Gentle parenting phrases can be helpful and sometimes having different words available really does help us respond differently. You can download Aletha’s suggestions of what to say to a crying child here. But a script can't meet an unmet need and it can't heal an old childhood wound.
In the middle of a meltdown, when we're tired and triggered and have heard "I hate you" for the third time that afternoon, we don't necessarily have access to everything we've learnt. We may find ourselves responding from somewhere much older. Our instinct has been shaped by our own history. The deeper work isn't simply learning what to say. It's becoming curious about why particular behaviours are so difficult for us. It's noticing when our own capacity is low. It's finding ways for our needs to be supported. And it's gently tending to the experiences from our own childhood that parenting can bring to the surface. Sometimes the most important parenting with gentleness work isn't what we do with our child. It's how we learn to care for ourselves.
But What About Children Who Can't Hear "No"?
Early-years practitioners are describing children who genuinely struggle with limits, waiting, sharing, frustration and hearing no. I don't believe the conclusion should be that children have received too much empathy. A child can be deeply understood and still experience clear limits. In fact, children need both. Within Aware Parenting we talk about loving limits: clear limits held with connection rather than punishment or control. Understanding why a child is hitting doesn't mean allowing them to hit. We can say: "I won't let you hit." And still care deeply about the feelings underneath the hitting. Understanding why a child is devastated about leaving the playground doesn't mean we stay there indefinitely. We can hold the limit: "It's time to leave." And also remain present with the enormous disappointment that follows as all these feelings may be also wrapped up in an entire day of experiences that have been upsetting and may have been stored in their nervous system thus providing a beautiful opportunity to release these in your connected presence. We need to move away from this concept of self regulation to healthy expression in connection.
The problem isn't too much gentleness. What can be missing is gentleness alongside clear limits and a deeper understanding of feelings and how to be with them, especially the big ones!
Being With Feelings Is Often the Hard Part
There is an important difference between acknowledging feelings and actually being able to stay with them. You could t say: "I know you're disappointed." But then immediately try to make the disappointment disappear.vWe distract. Explain. Negotiate. Fix. Offer something else. Sometimes children need something different.
I love this beautiful book gifted to me many years all about listening.
Children need us to remain present while they're angry, disappointed, frightened or heartbroken. (Just like us) In Aware Parenting, crying, raging, laughter and play can all have an important place in children's emotional lives. As Pam Leo has expressed it: "The crying is the healing." But being with a child's strong feelings can be extraordinarily difficult when nobody was able to be with ours.
What Might Be Underneath the Behaviour?
One of the things I value most about Aware Parenting is that it encourages us to become curious about behaviour rather than simply trying to stop it.
We can ask:
Does my child have an unmet need?
Perhaps they're hungry, tired, overstimulated or needing connection.
Do they need information or a clear limit?
Children are learning how the world works. Sometimes they simply don't yet know what is expected or need an adult to provide a safe limit.
Or are there accumulated feelings or stress that need an opportunity for expression?
These questions completely change our starting point. Instead of asking: "How do I make this behaviour stop?" we begin with: "What might my child be communicating?" That doesn't mean behaviour doesn’t has limits. It means we're interested in understanding what is driving it rather than simply suppressing it. And sometimes we find we don’t even need a limits and a simple 5 minute game that can meets their need for attention is all that’s actually needed, and your child is ready to cooperate again!
Why I Don't Think the Answer Is More Rewards and Punishments
When critics point out limitations in gentle parenting, the temptation can be to swing back towards consequences, punishment, reward charts and stricter behavioural control. I don't think that's the answer either. Alfie Kohn has written extensively about rewards, punishment and the difference between securing short-term compliance and supporting intrinsic motivation. I've written more about why I don't use reward charts and punishments and what we can do instead. A reward may get a child to do something and a punishment may stop a behaviour in the moment. However compliance isn't the same as understanding. I am always curious about what sits underneath the behaviour.
What need isn't being met?
What does the child not yet understand?
What feeling is asking to be expressed?
What is happening within the relationship?
Is there any stress or past trauma in the child’s life?
And what does the parent need in order to respond!?
This takes us beyond both permissiveness and control.
I Don't Think We Need Less Gentleness - We Need More Understanding
This is where Aware Parenting has been transformative for me. Aware Parenting was developed by developmental psychologist Dr Aletha Solter, who studied with Jean Piaget. Her work brings together attachment, non-punitive discipline, children's crying and emotional expression, play and an understanding of what sits beneath behaviour. Dr Solter has written extensively about emotional release in children, the role of play and the effects of punishment-based approaches. Her articles, many of which are freely available through the Aware Parenting Institute, offer a substantial body of writing for parents and professionals wanting to explore these ideas more deeply.
For me, Aware Parenting includes:
Warmth and clear limits held together. These are related to meeting needs (both ours and our children’s) and safety without relying on punishment, shame or fear.
Curiosity about behaviour. Rather than beginning with 'How do I stop this?', we ask what the child may be communicating.
Space for emotions to be felt and expressed. Children's sadness, anger, fear and disappointment don't always need to be fixed.
Play and connection. Play can offer children opportunities for connection, laughter, emotional expression and healing.
Repair rather than perfection. We will get things wrong. Relationships can withstand rupture, and we can return, reconnect and repair.
The parent's experience matters too. Our needs, histories and feelings belong in the parenting conversation.
That last one is particularly important to me.
Because we cannot talk endlessly about meeting children's needs while ignoring the needs of the adults caring for them.
Gentleness has to include the parent too.
A Word to Nursery Workers, Teachers and Other Professionals
If you work with children and are seeing more children who seem unable to tolerate ordinary limits, I hear you. That is genuinely hard, I was a teacher for 17 years I know! Working with a group of children whose needs and emotions are all competing at once can be enormously demanding.
However before we conclude that parents have given children too much gentleness, it's worth asking what those children are carrying.
How did they sleep?
What happened before nursery that morning?
What transitions are happening in their lives?
Are there developmental or neurodevelopmental differences we need to understand?
Are there unmet needs?
What stress or accumulated feelings might they be carrying?
And what does that child need from the adults around them to feel safe enough to navigate the demands of a group?
A child's behaviour in a group setting is still communication and I don't think this is simply about whether a child can hear "no" from their nursery worker.
It's about whether all of us who care for children - parents, nurseries, schools and professionals - have access to up-to-date, developmentally appropriate, attachment- and trauma-informed understandings of children's behaviour.
A Word to the Parent Who Is Trying So Hard
Perhaps you've read one of the headlines criticising gentle parenting and quietly wondered:
"Am I getting this wrong?"
Perhaps you've tried desperately to stay calm and still shouted this morning.
Perhaps you've read all the books and still don't know what to do when your child hits you.
Perhaps you can offer your child compassion all day but find it almost impossible to offer that same compassion to yourself. I don't think you need to become harsher. And I don't think you need another reason to feel guilty.
I think you may need more support.
Support to notice your own needs before you reach the end of your capacity.
Support to understand why certain moments with your child feel so enormous.
Support to explore the experiences from your own childhood that parenting is bringing to the surface.
And support to trust that you don't have to do any of this perfectly.
Gentle parenting at its best can be a doorway. Aware Parenting invites us to walk through it and keep going.
What I Think the Critics Are Missing
When I read the critics of gentle parenting - from nursery workers to psychologists to columnists - I think some of them are noticing something important, even if I disagree with the conclusions they draw.
Some parents are exhausted.
Some children are struggling with limits.
And trying endlessly to remain calm while suppressing our own needs and feelings isn't sustainable.
But I don't think this tells us that children need less empathy or that parents need to become more controlling. Knowing the principles of gentle parenting isn't always enough.Parents can understand exactly how they want to respond and still find themselves unable to access that response in the hardest moments. Not because they don't care enough and not because gentle parenting has failed. But because parents are human too.
We have needs.
We have limits.
We have histories.
And our children have an extraordinary ability to bring us into contact with all three. So I don't think the answer is less gentleness.
I think it's gentleness that includes the parent too.
I’d love to support you on your journey reach out here.
*Please note I have used AI to help me research some other article’s that have been criticising gentle parenting after I came across the telegraph article. I have also used it to help me edit me article as it was even longer!
Hi, I’m Rebecca.
I’m a parent coach, Aware Parenting Instructor, Soul Collage facilitator, and therapeutic play practitioner. I support parents, caregivers and child care professionals in healing from stress and trauma so they can nurture compassionate connections with themselves and the children in their care. If you’d like to explore ways to support your child’s emotional well-being, I invite you to: Join my Substack for insights on parenting, book a free discovery call, and explore my offerings to help you and children in your care flourish.