Nurse’s genius approach to help parents deal with unwanted advice

There’s no handbook to parenting, and if it’s your first time, you’ll absolutely be making it up as you go.

While you know what’s best for your baby, there’s always going to be that person who dishes out unwanted advice and derails your confidence.

Penny, a paediatric nurse, and mum sees this all the time. Taking to Instagram, she has some great tips on how to deal with those conversations.

“All parents come up against well-meaning friends, families, and acquaintances,” she writes on a slide. 

“Try this. Do that. Why aren’t you doing this? We did this and it was the best. I can’t believe you’re doing that,” she adds.

Let’s face it, we’ve all experienced this at some stage.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Penny | Paediatric Nurse + Mum (@sick.happens)

5 alternatives to saying no

Instead of saying yes, or nodding politely, Penny has come up with five ways parents can easily say “no thanks to opinions and advice.”

1. Thanks for your input but that option doesn’t work for us, we are doing X, Y, and Z.
2. We have chatted about this a lot. This is what we have decided will work best for us.
3. Thank goodness there are so many ways to approach this. 
4. Things may change later and I’d love to talk to you about your thoughts then if that’s okay. But for now, we are comfortable with our choice.
5. No thanks. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. 

But saying no isn’t limited to the above – these are just to get you started. Penny says to “whip these prompters out the next time you’re eye-rolling whilst having one of *those* conversations with Chatty McChat Chat.”

“Love this”

Penny’s followers couldn’t love this post more. Lots of parents said the post popped up at just the right time. 

“Love this! Have definitely experienced situations in which all of these could be used,” said one parent. “In relation to option #1 I would even totally leave off the second sentence “we are doing xyz” – what you decide to do ain’t nobody’s business!”

One parent said they don’t even respond to unwanted advice anymore. 

“I smile and nod… then keep carrying on doing what I’m doing,” they commented. 

Another mum says it can help to tell people you aren’t looking for advice, just someone to listen to you. 

She says it can help to say, “We’re not looking for any advice or opinions, just want a listening ear.”

And let’s face it, sometimes all we really want is someone to listen to us without offering advice or judgment.