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"I have 11 parenting books in the bookshelf in my bedroom and two on the dresser. There are six more in the living room and one on my phone, bringing my grand total of parenting books to 20. (That&amp;#039;s not counting the various pregnancy books\u2014at least a dozen\u2014that have been shared with expecting friends or relegated to the basement.) I also have more back issues of Parents and Parenting than I feel like counting right now.  All this, and my son still bites, he freaks out in the grocery store on a regular basis, and I&amp;#039;m pretty sure at least 70 percent of what I say to him doesn&amp;#039;t register. (Either because he&amp;#039;s sick of hearing me talk (I talk a LOT) or he&amp;#039;s already doing that thing that guys do, where you know they hear you, but they maintain a blank look and act oblivious, regardless.) I have almost two dozen books telling me exactly how to parent, and it seems I&amp;#039;m still not getting it right. Or maybe the books are getting it wrong.  Researchers at England&amp;#039;s University of Warwick recently studied motherhood manuals from the past 50 years, and came to the conclusion that despite the differences in the books, they&amp;#039;ve always set &amp;quot;unattainably high standards for new mums and babies.&amp;quot; Huh.  Read the full article here.  Says Dr. Angela Davis\u2014who turned the research into a book, Modern Motherhood: &amp;quot;Despite all the differences in advice advocated by these childcare &amp;#039;bibles&amp;#039; over the years, it is interesting that they all have striking similarities in terms of how the experts presented their advice. Whatever the message, the advice was given in the form of an order and the authors highlighted extreme consequences if mothers did not follow the methods of childrearing that they advocated. ... More than 50 years on and experts still cannot agree on the best way to approach motherhood, and all this conflicting advice just leaves women feeling confused and disillusioned.&amp;quot; Okay, so chucking my parenting books in the trash is pretty tempting. But then what? Parent by instinct alone? Yikes! Are parents today qualified for that? I was recently hanging out with my friend Jillian, and her son, who&amp;#039;s a little older than Emmett, demanded something LOUDLY. So she gave it to him. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m scared of him,&amp;quot; she confessed. &amp;quot;He gets this devilish look in his eyes, and it frightens me, so I just give him what he wants.&amp;quot; Any parenting book will tell you that it&amp;#039;s wrong to give in to a toddler&amp;#039;s demands\u2014and my instincts tell me the same. I think most people would agree that letting a tiny, 2-year-old tyrant run your home is a bad idea.  But Jillian&amp;#039;s son doesn&amp;#039;t bite and mine does. So who&amp;#039;s right now? Do I need to take a break from parenting books and give my instincts a try? Is it possible to parent by instinct alone? I mean, I know cavemen did it, but their toddlers had brontosaurus bones to take out their aggression on. All my toddler has are the glass panes in our French doors\u2014which he will NOT stop banging. Even though I&amp;#039;m following the advice in the baby bibles to the letter.  p.s. The links in yesterday&amp;#039;s post are working now\u2014and the projects are really cute! Go see! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.womansday.com/relationships/family-friends/a46886/parenting-books-getting-it-wrong/>