Then when she has a kid, her kid learns exactly the mental tricks needed to be able to disobey her, by virtue of spending 24×7 with her.
Nature equips kids with instincts, one of which is to be selfish, the others of which can be exploited by parents to override that instinct. But nature also equips kids with a brain, and it is only natural that selfishness uses the brain to learn how not to be manipulated by those other instincts. But that takes time; hence the above results.
Some kids have physical issues like bags of energy or stomach/sleep issues and some parents equally have physical or mental problems dealing with that. And everything goes out the window when you've had a month or four with no sleep. I think a lot of people discount that side of things - it's like in the fight world: everyone has a game plan until they get punched in the face.
Something very similar happens in business, IMO. Managers talk about different styles or techniques but in the end, the success of their team is as much about the team members' skills and dynamics as it is about the manager.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/family/kathryn-mewes-the-su...
Totally unaware of this woman, and her show.
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[1] Edit: It's Jo Frost.
All parents become a wreck with kids, and having a nanny come to help you focus on alternative parenting strategies is helpful.
Once you're down in the trenches, it's sometimes hard to rise above the tantrums and emotions and calmly reason about the latest psychological parenting research methods instead of just screaming, "GO TO YOUR ROOM!"
Fast forward till she had her own child, and I saw an interview with her. She was completely shattered. Like a wreck. She had her own difficult child, and coupled with little available help from others, she couldn't cope. She looked and sounded defeated and expressed that she felt guilty that, of all people, she was not coping.
There is a reason some parents "get it right" and, I'm sorry to say, but thats just as likely down to the kid.