Spare the rod: Is gentle parenting just another trend?

‎A few years ago, the concept of gentle parenting in Kenya seemed far-fetched.

This is because for generations, most Kenyan households embodied the typical African household. A household where the parents run the home with an iron fist.

The children in this type of household are expected to never question or deviate from the guidelines set by the parents.

Any type of rebellion, no matter how trivial, is swiftly met with heavy repercussions, including physical punishments.

‎However, gentle parenting has been steadily gaining traction among Kenyan parents. 

‎According to the Children’s Health Clinic, gentle parenting is a parenting approach focused on building a strong, positive relationship with children through empathy, respect, and understanding. 

‎This type of parenting emphasises understanding a child's feelings and needs, setting clear boundaries with kindness, and using positive discipline techniques to guide behavior, rather than relying on punishment or control.

‎Speaking to The Star, Hannah Nduku, a parent with two children, explains that her tumultuous childhood made gentle parenting her future goal when she had children of her own.

From a young age, Nduku realised that her family set-up was different from other family set-ups.

Though her family was somewhat affluent, the happy façade that they put up was a far cry from the reality.

Behind closed doors, her father was physically abusive to both her and her mother. 

‎When Nduku was younger, she tried to reason that the intense work environment in her father’s business was the catalyst for her father’s violence.

However, after years of enduring physical abuse, Nduku came face to face with the hard reality that there would never be any rationale for her father’s violence.

One particular incident etched in her mind is one of the sports events that happened in her primary school.

When she came second place in the marathon, her father slapped her on their way home back home complaining about how much of a disappointment she was.

‎The dagger to her heart was however when her mother joined the train of physically abusing her.

Out of the blue, her mother’s personality turned cold. Things that would normally not upset her mother suddenly warranted blows, kicks and slaps.

In that moment, she had lost the one confidant who made life at home easier. Knowing that the abuse would never stop, Nduku ran away from home on her eighteenth birthday.

‎“Looking at my scars that are a constant reminder of the abuse I endured, physical punishment for my children is out of the question,” Nduku states.

‎Joseph Kang’ethe, a parent with three children, believes that any resistance to gentle parenting is society simply turning a blind eye to the implications of physical punishments on children. 

Coming from a single-mother household, the normal challenges that any household faced were amplified.

To begin with, finances were always a constant headache. The meagre earnings that his mother got from her mama mboga business barely catered for their basic needs. 

‎Moreover, the neighbours and even church members would be constantly whispering behind their backs.

One time, these people went as far as claiming that his father left because his mother had a tendency of being promiscuous.

Whether it was the financial stress or the constant jabs, his mother ended up being bitter with the world. Soon, his mother did not hold back from projecting her frustrations on him.

‎What began as emotional abuse progressively snowballed to intense physical punishments. His mother expected him to be the ‘perfect child’.

According to his mother, this was the only way Kang’ethe could truly appreciate the effort his mother made to keep them afloat.

Nothing was off the table when it came to physical punishments. For instance, in class eight, he decided to keep mum during one of the lectures. Taking his silence as a sign of rebellion, his mother beat him with the biggest wooden spoon in the house till it broke.

‎“Gentle parenting for me is a way to break the cycle of inflicting personal trauma on innocent children,” Kang’ethe emphasises.

‎Nevertheless, there are some Kenyan parents who are against the idea of gentle parenting.

The sentiment in this group of parents is that the concept of gentle parenting is just another trend the West is trying to force down the throats of Africans.

Being a parent to four children, Salome Mukami believes that gentle parenting is a form of ‘lazy parenting’.

According to Mukami, Kenyans should stop trying to fix the system of physical punishments that was never broken.

‎Though she does not support parents who are physically abusive to their children, she believes that a lot of good comes from physical punishments.

The younger version of herself would never have believed that she would in the future stand ten toes behind physical punishments for children.

Mukami firmly believes that her good character and discipline in life was only made possible by the many times her parents curbed her rebellion with numerous physical punishments.

‎“Expecting me to do gentle parenting on my four sons is quite unrealistic and would make my time harder- any words spoken to them fly right over their heads,” Mukami explains.

‎Sharing with The Star, Moses Opiyo, a parent to a current teenager, details his vain attempts at gentle parenting when his daughter was younger.

After years of dejection, Opiyo was over the moon when his wife broke the news to him that she was pregnant.

Trying to leave no stone unturned, Opiyo and his wife went above and beyond to prepare for their child.

Moving to a bigger house with a nursery, buying numerous baby clothes, keeping a stock of diapers, and religiously showing up for all the prenatal clinics, Opiyo and his wife were headstrong in their dream of being the best parents.

‎Therefore, it is no surprise that after their daughter was born, he and his wife decided to implement gentle parenting. Looking at the miracle in their hands, they could not imagine a scenario where they would physically punish their daughter.

In the beginning, gentle parenting was a walk in the park. However, when their daughter turned six, all hell broke loose.

‎It was as if a switch flipped. Warnings and time-outs that had previously worked soon became vain.

From morning, their daughter would begin her ‘reign of terror’ by turning the lives of Opiyo and his wife into nightmares.

Screaming loudly throughout the day, throwing food, refusing to take a bath, explosive tantrums when the television was switched off- the rebellion was insistent.

When he would go back home in the evenings after work, he would find his wife seated hopelessly with teary eyes while their daughter was in the hundredth tantrum of the day.

As if not enough, their daughter seemed to be on a mission to stay awake throughout the night. 

Screaming and wailing at random times, their daughter kept Opiyo and his wife at her beck and call for all her needs, no matter how unnecessary.

‎After five months of trying to stay afloat, Opiyo and his wife had enough. Coming to terms with the fact that gentle parenting would ultimately drown them, he decided to switch to physical punishments.

For him, the switch was a hard adjustment because despite the rebellion, their daughter had always been a daddy’s girl.

In spite of his soft spot for her, he knew the switch was the only way their daughter would grow into a decent human being who was not a menace to society.

‎“If we still did gentle parenting on our daughter, the teenager phase would have brought us to our knees- at least she now knows better than to intentionally stray away,” Opiyo says candidly.