Parenting without punishment in a punishing world

I will admit it. I'm a bit of a control freak. Actually, I need a lot of control, because I am a "Type-A," "Judgement," "Gold color" or whatever those personality tests use to describe me. I need people to do things when I ask them to do it, and I feel frustrated when they don't listen to me. It's often hard for me to remember that my partner and children are not trying to drive me crazy when they don't listen to what I ask of them, that it's simply that my needs are just not on their radar for that moment. Like many others who grew up in the 1970s, my parents used bribery and punishment to control their children. In spite of changing societal views on spanking, they did what their parents did and hung a wooden board in the kitchen called "The Board of Education." We were regularly spanked as small children.

Parent educator, author, cofounder of Attachment Parenting Canada and mother of 5 -- Judy Arnall explains on The Attached Family about her personal journey from a punishment-based parenting style to one that invites parent-child collaboration and centers on healthy relationships and positive discipline.