Gentle Parenting: How Does That Work with Twins?

Last updated on October 24th, 2024 at 03:19 pm

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Nat chats with Rebekah Robinson about how she’s raising her toddler twins using gentle parenting. Rebekah shares her approach and all the details on how she manages her twin toddler boys to keep the peace and avoid time-outs, and Nat plays Devil’s advocate to find out how this actually works.

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Gentle Parenting: How Does That Work with Twins?

Does Gentle Parenting Work?

Gentle parenting works for a lot of parents, but it does take time, patience, and consistency. Gentle parenting is not a quick fix. If you’re not willing to put in the extra time and effort (which is totally understandable, especially when you’re raising twins) then gentle parenting may not work for your family. Every family is different and you have to find what works best for you and your kids.

What Are the Four Parenting Styles?

The four Baumrind parenting styles are:

Authoritarian or Disciplinarian
Permissive or Indulgent
Uninvolved
Authoritative

These parenting styles are specific to the United States and it is not clear how well these styles describe parents across different cultures. Each parenting style varies in at least four areas: discipline style, communication, nurturance, and expectations.

How Do I Practice Gentle Parenting?

Gentle parenting is a parenting style that encourages family partnership instead of the traditional authoritative power dynamic between parents and their children.

Choices over commands – parents give children more choices so they feel involved in decision making and more in control of their environment.
Being playful and reducing tension – parents create a calm environment and encourage chores and tasks to be fun while everyone participates together to get the job done.
No forcing of affections – if a child doesn’t want to hug an extended family member or friend, it’s okay.
Children are partners in the family – children help with family tasks/chores and participate in decision making as they get older.
Parents create a safe environment – parents try to not yell at children, but instead get on their level and communicate calmly to show children how to gently work through their emotions.

What Are the 8 Principles of Attachment Parenting?

Prepare for pregnancy, birth, and parenting.
Feed with love and respect.
Respond with sensitivity.
Use nurturing touch.
Engage in nighttime parenting.
Provide constant, loving care.
Practice positive discipline.
Strive for balance in personal and family life.

Rebekah Robinson is a stay at home mom to three (a 4-year-old girl and 2-year-old fraternal twin boys) via IVF and gestational carrier surrogacy. From start to finish it took Rebekah, and her husband Ed, nine years, four IUI cycles, five IVF cycles, endless miscarriages, a gestational surrogate, and suffering through a whole lot of hormonal crazy to get to where they are now. Which is, living life as a crazy, chaotic, and fun-filled adventure with three littles under the age of three. Rebekah has a blog where she writes about twin momming, momming after infertility, and just life in general, you can find her blog at beingrobinson.com. She also co-writes a blog with her two sisters who also suffer from infertility at insanitytimesthree.com. In all that spare time she has Rebekah loves to workout, travel, write, work on her Etsy shop, workout, eat, and binge on really excellent TV shows. Rebekah’s social accounts: Instagram | Twitter

Do you have twin toddlers and struggle with tantrums? Try gentle parenting and read our 4 tips for dealing with toddler tantrums.

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