Is Your Parenting Style Helping or Hurting Your Child? Try These Counseling-Based Techniques

Today, being a parent is no longer limited to following the age-old techniques and tricks to raise kids.

You must explore new-age ways and tricks to create a supportive environment that fosters your child’s growth. But is your parenting style helpful, or is it hurting your child? Here’s all you need to know.

Common Parenting Styles and Their Impact

Helpful Parenting Styles

• Friendly Parenting – Active listening and respecting boundaries.
• Lead by Example Parenting – Teaching children by actions, and not just words.
• Authoritative Parenting – Conducting emotional checks for balanced parenting.
• Free Range Parenting – Allowing children to make decisions and solve issues on their own.

Hurtful Parenting Styles

• Overprotective Parenting – Limiting the child to play, go out and meet people due to worry.
• Strict Parenting – Setting strict boundaries and limits for everyday activities.
• Uninvolved Parenting – Neglecting the child and letting them be too independent.
• Authoritarian Parenting – Encouraging excessive discipline but limited open communication.

Must-Try Parenting Counseling Techniques For You

Spend Quality Time With Children

The first parenting counseling tip is to spend quality time with your children. Being involved with them on a daily basis will give you that much-needed time for regular check-ins, asking them about their day at school, and more. This will help you build a good relationship with them, where they look forward to spending time together.

Encourage Them To Communicate Openly

A good parenting counseling tip that will bridge any communication gap between you and your child is to create an atmosphere where everyone can talk freely. Encourage them to address their concerns, feelings, emotions, and thoughts openly with you.

Set aside 10-20 minutes a day to ask them about their day, what they did, what they did or didn’t like, and how they are feeling, to build a trusting bond.

Set Healthy and Flexible Boundaries

Limiting the child with strict “No-Nos” is not a healthy practice, but leaving them fully free is also not ideal. Here, you must create a balance by instilling healthy and flexible boundaries. Instead of cutting their screentime as punishment, explain to them why they should watch less screen and see the change.

You must also validate their concerns and fears instead of pushing them against their will, as that can confuse them and cause them to feel distant and neglected.

Encourage Decision-Making

Telling the child what to do in a specific situation does not contribute to their development. A healthy parenting counseling tip is to let them be independent as much as possible. For instance, for young kids, let them decide their next McDonald’s order, for teenagers, let them choose their clothes after school, and so on.

The type of decisions they can make is up to you, but giving them some responsibility can help them become more responsible and confident.

Be Patient With Them

One underrated tip that can make a significant difference in your parenting is being patient with your child. Young minds are curious about too many things that they see every day. Instead of shutting their questions down, patiently understand where they are coming from.

This way, they will develop a healthy dependence on you and your thoughts for assistance, as opposed to observing all the confusing information available on the internet.

Set a Good Example

Young children pick up habits and behaviors from their surroundings. So, instead of telling them what to do, start doing things you want them to adopt around them.

For example, instead of forcing them to have milk before bed, start drinking a glass yourself, and soon, you will see them mimic the same behavior before bedtime.

Why Does the Right Parenting Style Matter?

Your parenting style directly impacts your relationship with your child, their growth and emotional awareness.

By choosing a balanced approach, you can give your child a better environment to grow up in, along with the following benefits:

• A trusting relationship between the parent and child
• Open communication
• Healthy boundaries
• Mutual respect, etc.

Conclusion

Having a healthy relationship with your child is the biggest gift for both you and them. The way you treat them directly impacts how they grow up. Try to adopt the parenting counseling tips mentioned above and see the difference.

For more expert advice on building stronger parent–child connections, this collection on Parenting Preparedness offers practical guidance.