Dear Dan:

How to go about self-parenting: first, realize that you are already parenting yourself (the italicized in the following are acts of self-parenting, positive and negative): you are hungry=> you feed yourself, you are cold= you put on a sweater, you are tired=> you go to bed, you feel stressed=>you listen to relaxing music or watch TV, etc.

Second, realize that you can do a better job parenting yourself, ex.: you are hungry=> eat something nutritious, you feel stressed=>talk to an empathetic friend (instead of watching hours and hours of TV, abusing a drug, etc.).

Doing a better job parenting yourself takes paying attention and rethinking behaviors and habits, ex.: many people who feel stressed parent themselves by overeating, a whole cake in a sitting, let’s say. Imagine a real-life father, whenever he sees his son stressed and upset, he places cake in front of the boy, saying: eat, you will feel better!

Is that good parenting? Of course not. A good parent will sit with the child and gently inquire: what is bothering you, what happened in school today? A good parent will then listen empathetically and non-judgmentally, validate the boy’s experience, and that would make the boy feel that he is taken care of, that there is someone on his side, and so, the boy will feel better.

I would very much want to continue our conversation on self-parenting for as long as it takes. Please let me know what you think about this reply and we can keep talking, for as long as you would like.

anita