Perfect Parenting and Other Myths

By Frank Main

This book is a humorous approach to the myth of perfect parenting. It is about being parents of encouragement and support for children and depicts real world situations every parent faces every day... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0896380939
• ISBN13: 9780896380936
• Release Date: January 1985
• Publisher: Compcare Pubns
• Length: 211 Pages
• Weight: 0.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 8.5" x 11.0"

Customer Reviews

A must-read for all parents and professionals!

This book provides excellent parenting information for both parents and professionals who are working with families. It will help adults take a clear look at common parenting concerns and discover new ways of addressing the problems. Written in a very positive, straight-forward manner, this book allows the reader to take a step back and actually get a laugh out of the difficulties children can present!

The most humorous and useful book available on parenting

Perfect Parenting & Other Myths is a delightful book, a charming book, a book filled with humor and the fruits of a playful and creative mind. Just when I am convinced that there are more than enough parenting books, I discover Frank Main's witty and innovative presentation of child rearing principles. It is a book that is hard to put down and hard to resist, unless, of course, you hate to have your reading interrupted by giggles. A quick glance at the table of contents and the titles in the heart of the book will grab your attention. Referring to authoritarian parents as "punitive gatekeepers" is a nice twist on an old concept: so is the reference to permissive parents as "pampering gardeners." But you can tell that the real giggles are going to start in Part Three with chapter titles like "Morning Gories: Narcolepsy & Other Morning Sicknesses," "The Supper Suicide Hour: Yuk, Not That Again!," and my personal favorite "Bowel, Bladder, Ovaries And Testes: Handling The Power Tools." And with stories about The Coma Brothers and Polly, the child suffering from juvenile hardening of the arteries (forgetfulness), the fun and the learning just keep rolling right along. Most of the giggles, however, come from that wonderful recognition parents will have as they see themselves and their children in every chapter. Here is a part of Frank Main's wonderful introduction to a section on bowel control. It is a scene that many of us can remember all too well from our own childhoods. Get ready to giggle. "Mike, tell Mommy the truth. Did you go stinky in your pants?" This usually doesn't require a confession. You don't want an indictment; you want a diaper. . . . When moral castigation fails, we resort to idle threats. "If you don't stop going acky in your pants, Santa Claus is going to bring you a stick and a piece of coal for Christmas." The kid thinks coal is a precious metal and isn't sure what s/he is supposed to do with the stick (p. 158). Frank is wonderful at capturing the flavor of family interactions in the stress-dramas of every day life, but this is not a book about how things go wrong. It is a book about encouragement: what it is, how and when to use it, and the hope that it can create in discouraged families. Chapters two and three are must reading for all parents. Each goal and each birth position is outlined for parents with clear and encouraging alternatives suggested for commonly discouraging family interactions. The rest of the book is a primer on systemic encouragement in action with clear guidelines for redirecting misbehavior at the end of almost every section and chapter. Because this book is about the whole family, Frank devotes his last three chapters to the personhood of parents. These are really essential chapters about maintaining self-esteem as an adult parenting alone or parenting with a real partner. The focus on parents as intimate caretakers and leaders