parenting – Crook In A Book

Currently, I only have a daughter, but a parent I trust recommended this book to me and told me I didn’t need a son to enjoy it. And she was right. This book is charming and lighthearted, humorous and relevant for any parent.

Backman is a total jokester, and I know a lot of people would love this book for all the small quips throughout his writing. But for me it was really the anecdotes that made me laugh – the kind of oversights and accidents that all of us sleep-deprived parents are prone to. Things like showing up to work with a toddler because we forgot to drop them at daycare, or the crazy online purchases we make in a late-night panic when our kids won’t sleep… Backman captures these moments with a perfect balance of empathy and exasperation.

This was such a quick and easy read, and was exactly what I needed in a week where I was busy and a little stressed. It’s the kind of book you can read out of order, or take long breaks from, coming back to it when you need a laugh or something that is both light-hearted and heart-warming. I don’t know any parents who wouldn’t benefit from keeping this on their side table.

As you may know, I’m not particularly big on non-fiction (outside of memoir), and it has been a struggle to find many parenting books that really grab my attention. But The Whole-Brain Child was recommended to me several times, so I had to give it a shot.

The verdict? This is a fantastic book to help new parents better understand the way their child’s brain is developing in the early years, and how they can help foster that growth. In a word, invaluable.

As someone who hasn’t had any formal education around child psychology (or any psychology, really), I really appreciated how this book was able to break down complex functions of the brain so that I could grasp them. More importantly, it paired this learning with tactical, realistic ways that I could leverage that knowledge in my parenting to better help my child develop intellectually and emotionally. From little cartoon graphics to “Refrigerator sheets” for helping you put parenting techniques into practice, this book really goes the extra mile to make things realistic and accessible for parents.

I will say that a few times I felt like concepts were a little redundant, but I also think that slightly different approaches will work for different parents (and children), so I wasn’t too bothered by the overlap between sections of the book. I’ll definitely be flipping back through this one time and time again in the years to come.

I’ve tried several times to start reading books on pregnancy, parenting, or child development, and haven’t stuck with any of them. Not because I know everything (in fact, I’m learning every day how little I know about parenting), but because most of the books stress me out. Making decisions about your child is hard – the information seems endless and the stakes are high.

A colleague of my husband’s gifted him Emily Oster’s Cribsheet, and I picked it up one night at 3 a.m., because it was the only book lying close enough to reach while nursing my 2-week old. And in two pages I was hooked. Because in this book, Oster isn’t offering solutions or prophesizing catastrophic results for you and your child if you stray from her advice. Rather, from the beginning, Oster promises only to present the data and some helpful considerations as you make your own parenting decisions.

So when the Washington Post called this book “freeing” for parents, I had to agree. Oster presents the information you need to make informed decisions, without all the fear-mongering or judgement of so many other parenting books. I’d highly recommend this one for new or soon-to-be parents.

And if you like cribsheet, you might like to know that Oster also has two other books for parents, including Expecting Better and The Family Firm. The later of these is on my TBR list now – have you read it? What did you think?

Tag: parenting

Things My Son Needs to Know About the World, by Fredrik Backman

The Whole Brain Child, by Daniel Seigel & Tina Payne Bryson

Cribsheet: A Data-driven Guide to Better, More Relaxed Parenting…