Would you say the biggest challenge to parenting...?

Sometimes you don't know what to do, but sometimes you do know the right thing to do, but do the wrong thing anyway, because it's easier, and you want to let your anger and frustration out. I'm not saying this to you, I'm saying it from experiencing my own parents parenting.

Do you realize you are saying you don't know how to raise your child/children? It is not the hospitals job to give you parenting skills, just like teachers aren't responsible for your child's overall behavior. You went through childhood. What did you want? What did you like that you will keep? What will you improve upon?

All households are different. Usually lifestyle dictates expectation. Our kids are driven to school on our way to work so there are expectations of us all that have to be met in order that everyone is on time. My girls are 6. They dress themselves. They have to have their beds made, shower and dress, jammies put away and be in the kitchen by 7:30am, same with our 8 year old. My husband and I both work some days at home, so on those days where we all have to leave, we help the 4 year old and we get the baby ready to go to my mothers, aka, daycare..lol

You have to find a way to deal with chores. Chores are a right of passage here and get assigned at age 5. My husband and I talked about this a last year. At some point, the kids will be responsible for the family room, great room, entire back side of the house, movie room and the half bath off of it, along with their bedrooms mainly because that is where they will be. They will also wash their own clothes and have some responsibility to cook meals and clean the kitchen later and yes, there is a caveat that goes, and other duties as assigned. Knowing that, I know how to assign their chores. We all live here, so we will all work at keeping it nice.

The greater challenge imo, is keeping our kids grounded and giving them the tools to deal with and not be persuaded by peer pressures. Getting them through school and on to college with out them falling prey to it.

Knowing whether you're doing the right thing by them or not. Its such a huge responsibility, you are shaping their future and most of the time doing it subconsciously. That's why its so so important to make the right decisions all of the time.

It's not a hopsital's job or place to tell us how to parent. There are some general stages out there that we can go by but parenting to your specific child is more productive than parenting by paper. Of course if there are specific concerns, you can discuss them with your pediatrician and she/he can help you find materials or resources to help you but most parenting is trial and error because we are individuals.