Developmental Parenting?
We all know how important childhood development is, and quite a bit is known about adult development, but parenting as a developmental process is is not as well understood. What I mean is, just as children and adults progress through a series of well-characterized cognitive, affective, and physical stages, I believe people as parents do, too. Parenting as a developmental process has its roots in psychoanalytic theory. As that story goes, “normal” individual development consists of sequential transformations determined by interactions with the environment. But when development goes awry, we get “stuck.” In most cases, we get over it, but sometimes when our own kids’ developmental ebb and flow reminds us of our own early struggles, we become vulnerable to…
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