Since moving to the UK almost a year ago I find I have slipped back into my British-ness. Like a swallow returning after the winter, like a duck to water, I have embraced the cultural foibles of this fabled isle. I have embraced apologizing profusely when someone bumps into me; I’ve mastered the art of communicating immense gratitude for someone just doing their job; I use the phrase ‘I’m terribly sorry but would you mind…’ when I actually mean, ‘now, listen here, you had better…’ and I’ve learned to express my disdain for a person by talking very loudly to my child: ‘Oh dear darling, can you still see with that lady in front of you, darling?’ My passive aggressive skills are impressive. Really.
But there is one thing I cannot get used to, one part of being British that I am simply useless at: parenting.
I literally do not know how to parent in this country.
My first whiff that something was amiss was when I took my one and a half year old to a mum’s and babies group and a little boy snatched a red Duplo block out of Saxon’s hand. Saxon wasn’t fussed so I figured, ‘fair game little guy’, but holy moly did that mother come striding across the room, remove said block from her son’s grasp and declare that they should share darling.
So here’s what I think about sharing between toddlers: they don’t want to.
Sharing comes with empathy, and no one-and-a half-year old has the slightest interest in anyone but themselves. Forcing a toddler to share does nothing other than make the parent feel good by making themselves believe that their kid has social etiquette. Except they don’t. Not yet. Which is why they scream in protest. The screaming is apparently part of the learning curve, not actually the child expressing frustration at a lesson he/she is simply not ready to grasp. Yes, our children need to learn to share eventually, our society depends on it. But there are other ways to do this: https://www.verywellfamily.com/forcing-your-kid-to-share-4126426
The second thing that happened was that Saxon fell down in the playground…and I didn’t rush over and make a fuss. What a terrible, unfeeling parent I must be. I certainly got glares. One mother even went over to him to dust him off. Seriously.
So here’s what I think about falling: it happens. A lot.
My approach to falling is no tears, no fuss. And guess what? My two year old can climb by himself, slide by himself, balance by himself, and yes, even pick himself up when he falls. When we over react at the slightest fall or knock we teach our toddlers that it’s a big deal, which makes them cry more easily, which makes us react more. Vicious circle. If one of my boys falls and cries, you bet I’m there. If there’s blood involved I’m there to mop it up and kiss it better. But fuss over every fall? No.
It doesn’t stop there either. I have discovered countless transgressions in my parenting standards.
My kids are often barefoot. Especially when they were younger.
My only answer to ‘I’m bored’ is ‘good.’
I firmly believe that my dislike of mud should never interfere with the unbounded joy it elicits in my kids. Dirt is good.
Temporary hardship creates grit. In The Netherlands we biked in all weather. One morning was -6 Celsius, our gears froze. My kids had to suck it up and cope. It is immensely character building.
My umbilical snap is at least four times longer than average. What’s an umbilical snap? It’s the distance (in meters) you’ll let your kid wander from your side. And yes, I made it up.
The interplay between parenting culture and parenting abroad
So after the rude awakening that I am hopelessly inept at conforming to the parenting culture in the UK I started to think about the interplay between parenting style or culture and parenting abroad in general. There are challenges inherent to raising a family outside of your ‘home’ culture, we all face them on a daily basis. But for me, the really taxing part is specifically the cultural differences in parenting. I feel like I’m always doing something ‘wrong’ in the eyes of others. And that is exhausting.
It doesn’t change the way I parent, but it’s an added emotional burden that quite frankly I could do without.
As globally mobile families we talk a lot about cultural sensitivity, learning important cultural cues, parenting third culture kids, but what about Third Culture Parenting? Can we talk about the challenges faced by parents negotiating the impossible waters of parenting culture in their host countries?
Facing parenting challenges in your host country
In my own case I have three children, each born in a different country and there have definitely been challenges in each. I’m sure some of these will ring a bell in your own lives.
In Istanbul I was publicly admonished on a daily basis for dressing my child inappropriately. The thing is, a snow-suit in 20 degree (68 Fahrenheit) weather? I’m sorry, I just can’t. Allowing my son to drink water with ice would draw stunned looks from waiters and disapproving patrons alike. Yet when I showed that I was uncomfortable with strangers kissing my baby on his face, or picking him up out of his pram while he was asleep, suddenly I’m the bad mama?
South Africa, I’ll admit was pretty fantastic for my more laissez-faire parenting style. Bare feet are normal. In fact, children are encouraged to take their shoes off in the classroom and definitely whilst climbing in the playground. The perfect weekend is swimming all day with sandwiches for dinner, eaten on the grass whilst still dripping wet, or maybe pizza in front of the TV. If I had to pinpoint one sticking point in SA it was the overarching presence of religion in schools. When my son was four he asked how dinosaurs evolved, to which his teacher responded: Jesus made the dinosaurs. Yeah, that went down a treat.
Parenting in The Netherlands was like coming home to me. Children are encouraged to be independent. They cycle to school on their own when they are eight or nine. Twelve year olds go around in giggling bicycle gangs, stopping off for ice cream here, hanging out in a park there, with all the freedom in the world. What a wonder. You will not see a helicopter parent in sight. Kids are left to sort things out for themselves, from falling over, to playground politics. But the consequence of this Lord of the Flies existence is that Dutch kids are hectic. And what I mean by that is when expat kids see the Dutchies roll in, they evacuate. I’m a live and let live sort, but one time my five-year-old Noah was shoved hard to the ground and a bucket of sand dumped over his head. The mother saw everything happen but did nothing to control her feral child. When I marched over to tell her she and her child were bang out of order, she merely glanced over to her boy standing guiltily next to a spluttering, shell-shocked Noah and said with a dismissive shrug, ‘they seem to have figured it out for themselves.’ That’s laissez-too-freaking-far in my book.
And the UK, well, it’s a misfit of gargantuan proportions.
So here is a question: when you have been faced with cultural differences in your everyday life abroad, how have you dealt with them?
I think we should always try to be respectful of our host country’s culture, and that often means behaving accordingly. I worked hard to stifle my instinct to rant and rave when I lived in Asia, because the culture of saving face is so strong. Smile no matter what. It’s hard. But I can’t adopt a way of parenting that flies in the face of everything that comes naturally to me. And why should I have to? But where there is no cultural conformity there will always be discomfort.
Valid concern vs Cultural belief
After mulling it over, I believe the crux of the matter comes down to this: it’s really difficult to distinguish between a valid concern and a cultural belief. So, for example the lady who says, ‘I’ve just seen broken glass over there, better put his shoes on: valid concern. The lady who says, ‘only poor children go around with bare feet’: cultural belief.
And I classify the molly coddling of children here in the UK as a cultural belief. Parents routinely mistake their cultural beliefs for valid concern. Go into any playground here and you’ll hear parents/caregivers telling their children to ‘be careful’ or ‘mind your head’ or ‘don’t fall darling!’ It’s a culture of chronic risk aversion. Go to that same playground in The Netherlands and you’ll find parents chatting on the fringes whilst their kids get on with it. No hovering. No pre-emptive injury warnings (which invariably end up being self fulfilling prophesies), risk aversion is low.
Setting sensible boundaries for your children at all ages: valid concern. Being so over-protective that you hinder your child’s natural ability to be adventurous and learn for themselves: cultural belief. This is a great article on why ‘be careful’ and other senseless warnings do not actually help your child: https://www.backwoodsmama.com/2018/02/stop-telling-kids-be-careful-and-what-to-say-instead.html
Generation Wuss
Britain is facing a mental health crisis in schools. 78% of teachers say they have dealt with a child with anxiety or depression. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jun/23/schoolchildren-facing-mental-help-epidemic
Whilst in The Netherlands, children are routinely rated as being the happiest in the world. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/17/why-dutch-bring-up-worlds-happiest-teenagers
And yes we can compare school systems, talk about how success is defined differently which has a direct impact on anxiety levels, and even about how society is more equal in The Netherlands, but in my life in the UK, right now, I am witnessing a culture of paranoia that is severely limiting our children. In my mind a clear line can be drawn from the over-protectiveness in the toddler stage (alongside forced social behaviours such as sharing), to risk aversion later in childhood combined with a fear of failure (we never let our kids fail!), culminating in what American Psycho author Bret Easton Ellis calls ‘Generation Wuss’, a generation so molly coddled they struggle to cope with the rigors of everyday life.
My two year old has just started nursery a few mornings a week, and soon they will have a sports day. ‘Great!’ I said, ‘Saxon loves running!’ ‘Oh no,’ his teacher replied, ‘we don’t let them run on their own, they must race holding a teachers hand.’
So there it is. I literally cannot parent in this country. My parenting ethos simply does not fit. And yes, of course I turn a blind eye or smile and do it my own way anyway, but when you have an irate parent glaring at you expecting you to act in a way that goes against everything you believe in, the pressure is huge.
I don’t have all the answers. Maybe, dear reader, you do. But as I raise my brood around the world and witness first hand the different ways of informing our children, I see what a huge part culture plays in parenting. In fact I think culture may be the biggest driving force behind our parenting styles. The problem with culture is that it’s so deeply ingrained in us that we never question or scrutinize it. It never occurs to us that we should. But I think we should always question everything, isn’t that the gift of living our global lives?
Hey, ‘cile’, Elodie tells me I was ahead of my time …eating hummus, climbing trees, cycling in the dark and sleeping under the stars….. we had so much fun bringing you all up and are so glad that you are doing so too xx
The best childhood ever. Lots of love xx
Eating hummus! hahaha bunch of hippies!
Holy cow this hits the mark. I’ve actually left my American culture where my parenting (and teaching style for that matter) did not fit in and feel much more comfortable in our adoptive Swiss parenting culture. I know my umbilical snap should be longer than prescribed by the American culture in order to make a healthier child. But it is something that I am working on in a culture that welcomes it.
Wonderful observations! Thank you.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head April, you are observing and learning from other cultures, then you hold up that aspect to what feels comfortable to you as a parent and say, yep, I can try that, or no ways, not for me. But you are open to things being done differently and that’s amazing.
Lucille
I love this aspect of parenting internationally that you have raised. I think it is important to understand your own personal parenting values and understanding cultural Expectations. Great article. It even works Fr Texan girl going back home. Very interesting! Best wishes Marci
Hey Marci, I often think of all the Texan mamas who moved home from NL and how different it must be. Look, I don’t agree with the idea of saying ‘let’s parent the Dutch way!’ if you don’t live in NL because the infrastructure is different, distances are different, attitudes, what is even legal is different, but I do think taking small elements from different parenting cultures makes us stronger, or at least more open minded parents. xx
My god..
I could relate to everything and my baby is still 7months and I feel this in France.
Hope you find the right balance and most importantly keep your sanity.
I fully agree with you on the stress part.. kids need to distinguish between discomfort and stress..everything cant be stress and parents need to breath and stop being such a umbrella all the time..
We do need to learn a few tips from our grand parents may be
Pooja, I agree 100%. We can totally learn a thing or two from our grand parents generation. Actually, I think back to my childhood in the UK in the 80s and we were so free. My parents didn’t know where we were half the time, swimming, running off with friends, exploring the countryside. It’s sad that my kids will not experience that. Good luck in France!
This is so interesting to me. I’m a UK parent raising my kids in an Eastern European culture. Everything you described about England is SO different to my experience (I was in the North of England though maybe that makes a difference). My culture in England was barefoot kids, just letting the kids get on with it and there being an expectation that kids get messy. Fast forward to living overseas and I feel similar to how you described – like I’m suffocating with how many people comment on my parenting choices. Not wearing lots of layers, letting kids run off really far ahead, my kids playing in the rain – the list goes on!
I am encouraged to read how you are overcoming these obstacles. I too am differentiating between cultural preferences and actual concern. Sometimes it takes every part of my confidence to keep going – let the kids get messy and play in the rain even when I get criticised.
It is a great, challenging and stretching journey. I truly believe it will grow us and help the kids to have a deeper, more informed view of the world.
It’s so interesting! Tell me more. How long ago did you have little ones? I was raised in Norfolk and my childhood was wild, unsupervised and barefoot. That was the 80s. So I’d love to know, is this an age thing? Are we just living in different times? Is being over protective and risk averse a Surrey thing? Or are we as parents more naturally inclined to surround ourselves with other mums who reflect our parenting philosophy and so we don’t notice the other side so much?
Eastern European cultures have deep belief systems around dressing warm, keeping kids dry and over-clothed, and no bare feet too. I felt this was similar to Turkish culture actually, and I really found that element hard to deal with there.
Perhaps its a rural vs city thing? Kids growing up in the countryside have more space to run and in all weather, and parents are more relaxed? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
I’ve raised my daughter in the US the first 4 years and felt like a fish out of water. Originally having been born and raised in Germany we finally decided to return to my home country. The constant struggle between others making me feel weird for my much longer umbilical snap and my lack of hover-parenting, which went contrary to my naturally developing parenting style and what I remembered my childhood to have been also resulted in a lack of mommy-friends and play dates. Not because I voices my parenting beliefs, but because I think they made other people uncomfortable when they saw my child and me interact. It’s exhausting to have to parent comparing whether what others are expecting is out of genuine concern, or personal belief. It is also not the kind of childhood I wanted for my dd. There were many other reasons that played into the decision as well, but essentially- especially for our 4 yo – this has been a great decision for us!
I would be curious how parenting is in Germany. I’m a mum in the US with a 4.5 and 2 year old. I let my kids run and play as much as I can without following them about. I live in the suburbs of Chicago and one Portland mama moved here and said ‘I cannot stand how much helicoptering happens. Let the kids play and stop hovering!’ So even Portland, Oregon moms notice the difference. I don’t hover too much. My one daughter is 2 and runs everywhere, including into the road so I’m always chasing her but not following her around behind every step. I lived in the UK and Australia but not with kids so I am worried about how they would handle that but I’ve considered a move overseas for a year to get a feel for it. I like Scandinavia and Germany. I love the UK but I follow the papers there and it seems many parents are concerned about the same issues with deterring youth crime, violence, etc and it maybe starts with coddling too young?
Beth, here is an excellent book of what parenting is like in Germany. https://www.amazon.com/Achtung-Baby-American-Self-Reliant-Children/dp/B077YZN8LX/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=achtung+baby&qid=1563735084&s=gateway&sr=8-1
I have had sort of the opposite experience being the child in this scenario. My parents made the decision to move myself and my brother from suburban England not far outside Milton Keynes to the dangerous waters of suburban New Jersey just before I turned 10 and my brother 6 and it had a profound and lasting effect on my life and a prolonged and challenging effect on my relationship with my parents and they’re a classics symptom of what you describe here – not being able to parent in their host country.
My parents were a victim of their own desire to do the right thing – against what their shy little girl was crying out for, quick to conform to socialite and stereotype jersey shore society, against the culture they so wholly embraced in one hand and threw in my face in another.
My mum expected manners, she didn’t under stand my desire to assimilate when the bullying just got too much and she didn’t understand just how detrimental her dismissal of cultural norms like sleep-overs and talk of boys was to a very impressionable pre-teen girl.
Her inability to embrace the very culture she’d submersed me in drew a line between us that would rapidly turn into a crevasse during my teenage years and almost become an untraversable abyss as I fought and screamed my way into pseudo adulthood. I felt abandoned almost immediately – not being old enough or mature enough to understand how isolating the move had been for my mum, who was never a particularly social person as she hung her hat and her self-esteem on how society viewed her. She was the daughter of a coal miner and a housewife who died at 60 after spending most of her childhood taking care of her mother. My mum ran away to London from the dark corridors of Doncaster when she was just 18. I listen to her stories of that time in her life and I am genuinely shocked by her utter naïveté and her ability to float above the darker shades of London that I’m sure she could easily have dabbled in. She married my dad, who she loved but who I don’t believe has been her great love, and she followed his chartered accountant arse around the world as he chased the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow to validate his own rip/torn self-esteem that took a battering during his formative years from overzealous, religious parents who favoured his younger brother and who never told him he was good enough.
The move to New Jersey highlighted my fathers indifference to my mums emotions and her desperate need to be accepted in this foreign and sometimes vicious social circle his high paying job afforded them access to. I didn’t fit in, I was a thorn in their side for a decade, I was the incredibly smart girl who never lived up to her potential, I was always hiding because I knew they couldn’t see me.
So the host country bestowed a new set of values on my parents and granted me with an almost frightening ability to lie and life a double life where at home I tried as hard as one girl could to pretend to be what they wanted me to be and then left the house and transformed without thought into the wholly American girl who wanted nothing in this world except to be cool.
Navigating parenting is difficult at the best of times, or so I’m told. I don’t have children. Even if I could I wouldn’t trust myself not to fuck them up the way my parents and their good intentioned decisions fucked me up. I mean they did their best – they were rich and honest and athletic and good looking and smart – and they still really really fucked me up when they tried to raise me in a country they did not know how to parent in.
I eventually moved back to England after 17 often sad and angry years in the US – first New Jersey and then, even more detrimental, Los Angeles. London fit like a glove, felt like home immediately no matter what a harsh mistress London can be, felt like I could finally be myself. And my parents grew into the people they were supposed to be and 30 years later they will never leave California and have a fine set of friends who look the part and act the part and are the dream. But there is still this ocean between us and now we often agree to disagree. But even my mum will admit these days that moving me to the US was the worst decision she ever made for me. And she’s said I’m sorry. And that makes the distance just a whisper. But it was very hard.
Thank you for this. My kids are grown adults working and living a their lives following their passions. My kids lived out of the US from their ages of 7 and 9 to HS graduation and both attended college in our home state. I feel so grateful they were barefoot in Africa 🙂 I will warn you about this same thing as teens when it comes to sex and drugs. Knowing my children would be exposed to and participate in using alcohol at college, I created space for my kids to “try” alcohol to prepare them for how it feels etc. like my parents provided for me in the ‘80s. Not hosting or turning a blind eye to parties every week, but an intentional chaperoned exposure that had some reflection built in. I could not have done that in the US. Both of my kids will tell you that it helped them navigate some of their choices in college and strengthened our trusting relationship. I won’t go into detail about sex…I had to decide what are my values and did some eye opening research.
I so appreciate this article! I feel the very same way! I was raised in Germany, lived in the UK (no kids there), USA (kids born there) and now living in Canada. While Canada is still far away from the free-range style of German parenting at least my letting the kids be independent early on did not lead to negative consequences as it would most likely have been in the US. Thank you so much for making people realize how different parenting can be. I told someone yesterday about the “my first errand” show of Japanese kids venturing out on their own to a bakery & butcher at ages 2-3 and people were shocked. The same with the 3- and 4-year-old German preschool kids that were staying at a farm for 2-3 nights with only the preschool teachers present and no parents. It was the highlight of their year!
Karin, you highlight some really important cultural differences when it comes to parenting, and it just reiterates the fact that there are many many MANY different ways to do things. Thanks for reading!
I lived in the UK for 3 years before moving here to Sweden and I can confirm that this text is 100% accurate. I am pregnant with my first child and was very worried about raising her in the UK because it’s not really my parenting style.
I understand that each country have their own way of doing it but I really didn’t want to be judged on the playground like you did. I am glad I’ve moved to a country that works a bit differently on that matter.
Oh thank you! I’m so glad this resonates with you! Part of me thought I would be shouting into the void with people just thinking I was a nutter! Haha. xx
Hi. Just came across this now, but like so many others, I can totally relate. We are also a nomadic family and I have witnessed different parenting styles. And I also got the glaring looks in the park in the UK (London) when I didn’t rush to the side of my toddler who fell over..