Are you wondering about what your parenting responsibilities are? Do you feel guilty every time your child cries or throws a tantrum? Raising a child is not an easy task; parents also grow and evolve along with the parenting journey. Every child is unique and hence each parenting style is unique and thus, we really cannot define standard algorithms of parenting responsibilities. In this article, we shall try and explore some of the important aspects of parenting responsibilities.
“Role modelling is the most basic responsibility of parents. Parents are handling life’s scripts to their children, scripts that likely will be acted out for the rest of the children’s lives”. – Stephen Covey
All parents have legal rights and responsibilities known as “parental responsibility”.
Parenting Responsibilities-Duties as a parent
Duties of parents include:
1. Protect and maintain the child:
It is the prime responsibility of a parent to keep your child away from any kind of abuse like physical, sexual abuse, or emotional abuse. Parents need to ensure that they themselves as well as the daycare or school that the child is sent to are following certain standards of behavior and that the child is treated with love and warmth.
2. Provide a SAFE home:
Parents should take care of the necessities of the child. The home should be enabled with good ambiance, nutritious food, water, medicines, and proper sanitation, etc. For younger children, it is the duty of the parent to ensure child/baby safety. For instance, any sharp tools/delicate glass objects/lamps or furniture which could potentially harm the child should be kept away from children’s reach. For older children, the parent needs to ensure a safe and healthy social environment. For instance, refraining from abusive behavior towards the child, spouse, etc.
3. Respect your child and earn mutual respect:
Every child is different; every child is an individual with a unique set of talents and emotions. It is necessary to respect their feelings and take their feedback /opinions constructively and positively. They have all the right to disagree or say “No” in case they do not agree to your point. Parents can always explain the pros and cons of situations and let the child decide. Understanding the reason for their denial and perhaps then trying to convince them with logic and reasoning and not power helps parents to get better acceptance from their children.
4. Ethics, Morals & Value Education:
Knowing good values, morals such as kindness, honesty, generosity, patience, forgiveness, etc. is a life skill. It is the duty of parents to lead by example and children learn and experience those values while growing and eventually start implementing it in their lives.
5. Aiding academic development:
For younger children, parents should also be actively involved in academic education and should ensure that they finish their home assignments and projects on time. Attend the parent-teachers meeting to understand the teacher’s perspective about your child and work on the feedback provided accordingly. Talk to your child about any subject they are facing any challenges or difficulty and you may then make arrangements for the child to regain the lost confidence in the subject.
6. Motivation and support:
Regular rewards and recognition, words of encouragement can boost the self-esteem of children. Words have a long-lasting impact on children. Words of kindness and motivation can help you to boost your child’s confidence and can help in raising them as resilient and strong individuals.
What are you responsible for?
To sum up, parents are responsible for giving the child a safe home, sound education, and ensure they are supported emotionally, financially, and morally. Also, in case they need any clinical or medical help, parents must seek them on time. There is no standard rule book or guidelines. But some of the duties and rights mentioned above are the fundamental ones.
What are parents not responsible for?
Being a parent doesn’t mean we need to give in to all the demands that a child makes. Setting limits, having family rules, child discipline, etc. is an integral part of the parenting journey. Giving in to everything your child demands would turn them into arrogant, over-pampered, and ungrateful individuals. Here are a few things that may not be considered as parenting responsibilities and shall be dealt with on a situational basis.
1. Providing a child with branded and expensive clothes & footwear even though you find it hard to meet the family expenses.
2. Cleaning up every time your children have made a mess. Having strict family rules and getting the children to do age-appropriate household chores would help.
3. Giving your child access to electronic gadgets, mobiles, computers, video games, etc. and high-speed internet without any parental guidance or supervision or without setting limits on screen time.
4. Surrendering yourself to all tantrums and asks of your child. They need to be taught the difference between a need and a desire and made to realize that they cannot have all toys or gadgets in the world as their friends have.
5. Buying new toys in place of the lost ones. Pampering them unnecessarily with junk food like chips and soft drinks. Allowing them to take undue advantage of situations.
6. Leaving everything behind as soon as your child cries or demands anything. They need to be taught patience and discipline. This will increase their ability to wait for their turn and deal with things patiently.
Sharing parenting responsibilities with your partner
“We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It’s easy to say, “It’s not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem.” Then some see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes.” ~ Fred Rogers
Some of the points below can help in understanding how to share the responsibilities and why it is important to do load sharing in any relationship especially after the child is born: –
1. The world around is changing, family life is changing and so the role of parents or to be precise mother and fathers at work and home. Gone are the days of joint family and elderly people, our grandparents taking care of children.Though some are still lucky to have them. Also, most of the mothers were stay at home ones, so typically mothers used to take care of children and household chores.
However, now the scenes have changed. We are into more and more nuclear families, and both mothers and fathers working. This makes the utmost importance to have load sharing to avoid ego clashes/conflicts and have a peaceful life for all.
Read- Working from home with kids- 14 actionable tips to improve productivity
2. For working mothers who have a husband or soul mate who is more focused on his job than they are, being a working parent may have more implications on career progressions. A mother may not grow at the same rate professionally as her husband due to added and undivided responsibilities. That is why it is very important to do understand the pressures and career aspirations of both and support.
Read- Role of a father in raising kids
3. Full-time working moms also sometimes face the guilt of not being able to spend time with the child or their partner and often are seen rushing, this is probably because of the number of responsibilities she must complete. This can become overwhelming for the mother alone or the partner who is taking up the majority of the responsibilities. This continuous stress and rush have adverse health effects too.
4. The essence of any successful relationship is open communication and trust. You along with your partner should chalk out a plan of equal load sharing. A plan which helps both of you to share the load as well as allow you to have some free time to feel rejuvenated and refreshed from the monotonous routine.
5. You need to make your spouse understand your feelings and pressure at work. Once the child grows a little, you may leverage the help of domestic help, child caretaker, etc., to give you off sometimes away for yourself. However, in the beginning, both of you should be mentally prepared for hard and tough routines striking balance between your self, work, and child needs.
“Interdependence is a fundamental law of nature. Even tiny insects survive by cooperation based on an innate recognition of their interconnectedness. It is because our human existence is so dependent on the help of others that our need for love lies at the very foundation of our existence. Therefore, we need a genuine sense of responsibility and a sincere concern for the welfare of others.” ~ Dalai Lama
The impact of one’s childhood on parenting responsibilities
Parenting is strongly influenced and dependent on one’s childhood and their experiences while growing up, the challenges and hurdles they faced, and their thoughts, expectations, and goals concerning parenting. The ideas, culture, beliefs of others, e.g. those of close acquaintance, cousins, as well as society’s we live in, have an impact on one’s parenting style.
However, it’s a very good idea to sit and recall our childhood whenever you are confused about how to deal with your children may be while handling conflicts, etc.
You might ask yourself –
1) Were you also stubborn about something similar in your childhood?
2)What mechanism your parents used, the power of abuse, authority, or compassion and power of convincing?
3) Is there any alternative you can offer to them or you could delay or postpone etc?
Put yourself in your child’s shoes, remember your childhood and the picture will be clear.
Hope you have enjoyed reading this, as I always say, each one to their own, I would like to conclude this topic with these lines…
“Parenting was difficult in a world of easy access”― Mala Naidoo, What Change May Come
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This is such a detailed and informative blog on parenting and the do’s and don’ts that every parent must follow
With the advent of Technologies & changing society norms , yes duties of parents are increasing & evolving rapidly .
Nice post, agree with all points.
Being little strict about not fulfilling all thier demands is necessary to make them understand Do’s and Don’t’s .
Being a oarent I have relied heavily on internet for some insights, this is a well-detailed and researched post, a good resource
I am so glad that you wrote about this. As parents one sometimes feels overwhelmed, partly because of self-guilt and partly because of societal pressure. Your article is insightful and useful.
Thank you.
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As a parent, I am constantly reading up on bettering my parenting skills, but this is an informational post, packed with almost everything I need to know. Sharing it with the better half too!
Quite a post to ponder upon.
Thats a very insightful post about parenting. These do’s and dont’s must be followed by every parent. This post will be helpful every parent especially new parents
Commendable tips for healthy relationships and personal growth.
Great parenting tips and detailed post. Thanks for sharing.
If you are a new parent then this is a must read. Great post. Always great to learn parenting responsibilities no matter how good one is. Keep writing such informative posts.
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I loved what you mentioned as NOT responsibilities of parents. Wish a lot of new-age parents understood those.
So many millenial parents get burdened with guilt over things that really aren’t their responsibility. Great article highlighting that.
This is really a detailed post of all the respositbilty one has as a parent. I like how you have captured the not responsible parts too, somthing which no body talks about.
This is enlightening and soothing post. Parenting is difficult and absolutely loved your take “Don’t hand out life scripts to your children, be their role model ”
You have enlisted very important aspects of ‘right parenting’.
Thanks for sharing these valuable insights on parenting. Must-read for new gen parents.
I was really interested in what Im not responsible for. As Indian parents we have a tendency to take everything upon ourselves. Great, interesting post.
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Wow . I love this write up . I am glad you addresses all the curial points. Very well written
Thank you Hema.
This is indeed an excellent post for all the parents out there. It would avoid parents guilt tripping. They are not responsible for everything.
Thanks so much.
Very true, In India parents are blamed for everything yes people need to understand that parents are not to be held responsible for everything.
Amazing you young people are. When I was a parent we had to just go by instinct and I was all of 20 years! You have shared so much info I am sure many new moms will benefit from it all.
Sharing parental responsibilities is so important while raising kids. A really good detailed posts indeed.
I believe that we must become our kids’ friends but not at the cost of forgetting our parental responsibilities. This is a well-written post. We must raise our kids with love and care, not overindulgence.
Brilliant post. In the gist, drawing boundaries and making your child realizes them is important.
You have really written a detailed post on parenting and its various aspects. It is certainly a very useful resource. I agree that both parents should play an equal role in child rearing. I believe that irrespective of whether the mother is working or not, both parents should have shared responsibilities for the growth of the child. It will only help to raise an emotionally strong human being.
Parenting is one of the non stop process and these are really great pointers how we should carry out our responsibilty as a parent!!
Parenting is not easy and sometimes we are out of answers. Your post is very informative with some good points.
So very well written. Parenting has its dos and don’ts. This was very much in detail to understand better. #tmmreads
This is so true. In a country like India, parents get blamed for the behavior of the child. Provide kids with an environment to help them grow. But don’t mollycoddle or spoonfeed them.
Parenting is definitely an enduring responsibility and charge, I believe in thoughtful parenting and we give equal importance to kids choices here. This is a great post, and will help many learn important things.
I completely agree that parents are not meant to do each and every task in their Parenting journey. Instilling self-work is very essential part of being independent too.
So needed this reminders buddy
Avery important topic to discuss.We tend to get confused about responsible parenting
nicely penned down post. i hope parents read it and find it helpful in raising the children well. sharing it
A very structured post indeed…As a parent, it is important to read such posts and assess oneself. Indeed a great job by you!!
That is quite a detailed list that explains what a parent can and is supposed to do. Best part was mentioning things that are not required to be done as well.
such a helpful post for me,as I’m a mom and sometimes my baby shows stubbornness ,I wait for the moment to pass. But its really not easy. the emotion is so high that I have to control mine and make her feel that I’m too worried about her.
As I’m a mom and sometimes my baby shows stubbornness ,I wait for the moment to pass. But its really not easy. the emotion is so high that I have to control mine and make her feel that I’m too worried about her.
Valid points, helping in small chores and keeping their room tidy are the basic steps but needs a bit of patience and being by them to get them used to such ways of being responsible..
These are some amazing and insightful tips. Thank you for sharing it with us.
While reading your post I was struck by the thought that most parents actually skip their responsibility of giving children correst moral values, but think their parenting is done when they buy iPhone for children!! Loved the way you have broken down everything!
Good parenting tips. Usually, we learn these things after gaining experience but I’m sure your guide will help many.
An excellent post filled with parenting wisdom, Swiddle! I’m bookmarking this one. It’s gold. Thank you for writing this. 🙂 #MyFriendAlexa #TinaReads
Awww. Thanks a ton for your wonderful feedback Tina.
Very interesting post …it will really help parents to cope up with the responsibilities towards there children.
Thank you, Sneha. Hope it helps.
Great post! Very well written. Thanks for sharing dear. Will surely help many.
Great post! Very well written. Will surely help many.
Thanks, Helena.
Hi, very well written and agree with all the do’s and don’ts. Though parenting is not a set of rules and regulations to be followed…but definitely these are very important tips … towards a better, beutiful and healthy parent child relationship. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you. Yes, the ultimate goal is a better parent-child relationship.
Wish i had this post by me when I was a young parent. Maybe I would have handled/managed things a bit better.
Not that I’ve done a bad job but it came at a bit of a price.
Lovely, exhaustive post for all young mothers and to be mothers.
Thank you Radhika. I am sure you must have done a good job.
An exhaustive list for all parents and to-be parents, the tips here you have managed to include from every nook and corner of life, which is so essential..we take care of some aspects and completely ignore some. Amazing post!
Your post is quite balanced in terms of putting things in teh right perspective of what parents should do & not do, in order to raise sensible, mature & kind children. Very insightful. Yes, strictness should be there without which kids are likely to become brats.