Are You An Overindulgent Parent? Take care

Parenting is a sensitive job, do it responsibly.

-  Santosh Pattanaik

There are various styles of parenting, such as authoritative, nurturing, neglectful, overcritical, and supportive. In today’s busy lifestyle, one more style of parenting has come into existence - the “Overindulgent Parenting”, also known as “over-nurturing” parenting. Overindulgence may be defined as ‘giving too much, for too long, too soon’.

There are mainly three types of overindulgence:

Giving kids too much (toys, activities, etc. - children who are overindulged with too much often fail to learn the skill of knowing what is enough).

Over nurturing (doing something for your child that she should be doing for herself - your baby daughter is creeping across the floor to get a toy, you pick it up and give it to her).

Soft structure (not having rules, not enforcing rules, or not requiring kids to do chores. Soft structure is giving children too much freedom).

Overindulgence can take the form of one or a combination of the above three types. Occasional indulgences add colour, joy, and even excitement to life, but when they become a pattern, they become overindulgence.

As parents, we want to see our kids smile. When they're happy, we're happy. This intention emanates from love for our child but it is coupled with a belief that “My child should not lack or fall short of anything he or she wants.”

But there's a fine line between that and going over the boundary of the too-empowered child, who thinks he has the right to every toy he points to.