I know a lot of people struggle with old school parents and grandparents telling them to wean early, or give solids early or whatever. But I wondered if anyone else had an "old school" parent express regret or jealousy about how things are handled now - say, essentially, that standard practice at the time went against their own instincts.
(background: my sister and I are twins, born via emergency c-section in 1973, and there were a lot of complications. This was considered an impossible breastfeeding situation at the time (and would be pretty challenging even today) so we were bottle fed from birth.)
My mother asked me how I was weaning my son from the bottle and I explained my slow, compassionate approach. She said that she had abruptly taken the bottles from us at age one year, as was the recommendation, but in retrospect she regretted that and wishes (particularly, to her, in the case of my sister who was more attached) that she'd done it more slowly and thought that a few more months of some bottles wouldn't have been a big deal.
I just found it interesting - she didn't follow her instincts at the time, but 35 or so years later, she realizes she was wrong.
Has anyone else had a parent or grandparent express regret over the standard practice of child-rearing at the time (or, alternatively, admit that they didn't follow their doctors advice and actually wound up doing something more in line with current thinking.)
The only other one I can think of is that my father *constantly* is jealous of the various baby carriers and backpacks that are available now, because the only option for the two of us as newborns was two enormous prams and later, the world's biggest, unportable, double stroller.
(background: my sister and I are twins, born via emergency c-section in 1973, and there were a lot of complications. This was considered an impossible breastfeeding situation at the time (and would be pretty challenging even today) so we were bottle fed from birth.)
My mother asked me how I was weaning my son from the bottle and I explained my slow, compassionate approach. She said that she had abruptly taken the bottles from us at age one year, as was the recommendation, but in retrospect she regretted that and wishes (particularly, to her, in the case of my sister who was more attached) that she'd done it more slowly and thought that a few more months of some bottles wouldn't have been a big deal.
I just found it interesting - she didn't follow her instincts at the time, but 35 or so years later, she realizes she was wrong.
Has anyone else had a parent or grandparent express regret over the standard practice of child-rearing at the time (or, alternatively, admit that they didn't follow their doctors advice and actually wound up doing something more in line with current thinking.)
The only other one I can think of is that my father *constantly* is jealous of the various baby carriers and backpacks that are available now, because the only option for the two of us as newborns was two enormous prams and later, the world's biggest, unportable, double stroller.