5 Guilt Free Reasons to Invest in a Parenting Course

Your social media feed might be flooded with momfluencers trying to get you to buy the latest and greatest item or product in the parenting industry, but you might be asking yourself if a parenting course is really worth the investment.

Perhaps you might even feel a bit of mom guilt wondering why you even need a parenting course.

Shouldn’t this come naturally?

However, I’m here today to tell you 5 guilt free reasons why you should invest in a parenting course and put all of your worries aside.

With the right research on parenting courses and guides, you can be on your way to a happier, calmer, and more confident household.

1. Parenting Doesn’t Come With a Manual

See the thing is we have teachers and bosses for our jobs.

We have coaches for athletes.

We have trainers or instructors when we want to get in shape.

When we want to learn a new skill or hobby, we watch videos, take courses, or even hire someone to help out.

So why is it that the greatest and hardest job – parenting – of all comes with nothing?

We are expected for everything to come instinctually and naturally and when it doesn’t, we blame ourselves.

Our kids won’t sleep –> It’s our fault.

Our kids throw tantrums –> We blame our parenting.

Our kids won’t eat –> There’s something wrong with us.

Instead, society should tell us to turn outward and look for resources, education, and research instead of looking inwardly and blaming ourselves.

We should have pamphlets or brochures of all the different parenting courses out there handed to us when we go for appointments while pregnant and at the hospital after we give birth.

Then, we can pick the one we want to invest in.

Just like we do college.

And then given time to study it and learn it.

So the next time your kid has a tantrum in public or refuses to eat the food you serve, remember that no one taught you or prepared you for what to do.

You should need help. I needed help to be a teacher. I needed help to learn to blog.

I needed help when I ran cross country in college.

Being all of those things didn’t just happen or come naturally.

Why wouldn’t you need help to be a parent then?

Invest in the parenting course.

Guilt free.

2. They’re A Relatively Low Cost

Compared to the cost of higher education, parenting courses are relatively cheap.

If I’m going to pay thousands of dollars to go to college and take away from it only a very few number of classes that actually prepared me for my job, you better believe I’m not going to hesitate when it comes to buying parenting guides that I need to help me do my job as Mom better.

For me personally, I bought a sleeping guide for only $40 some dollars when my son was a baby, and the improvement of the quality and quantity of sleep my son and I benefited from was well worth every penny.

Take the money you spend on these courses as an investment into not only your time, energy, and happiness but your kids’ as well.

That is invaluable.

3. Builds Your Toolkit

I always say that not every strategy works for every kid all the time because kids are all different.

That is the reason I like a well-stocked toolkit.

With parenting courses or guides, I get a ton of strategies that I’m able to see if they are helpful to our family.

If they are, great! I add them to my list.

Then, when I encounter a difficult parenting moment, I’m able to run down my list until I find something that works.

I feel more confident, and when I feel more confident, I act more confident, and when I act more confident, my child doesn’t get as dysregulated as often because he realizes that his mom isn’t scared of his big feelings and knows what to do.

Kids like it when their parents know what to do. It’s too much for them when they feel like they control a situation.

4. Parenting Has Changed

Let’s face it, parenting has changed because we have more research.

So always relying on the ways of the past might not always work in this day and age.

Getting a parenting guide or course is either reassuring or reflective.

Reassuring in that research affirms some parenting strategies of the past.

Reflective in that maybe I learn something new, and I can think about if this new way of doing something would work for my family and me.

Here are some things I remember when I see this information:

I’m doing the best I can with the information I have now.
Learning is lifelong. The way of doing things changes as we learn more.
When I see something that is new to me or that I was doing “wrong,” I pause and consider it for a time.
Then, I come back to it and ask myself these questions because I know my child best:
- “Would this new information work for our family?”
- “Are things currently not working, and we need an adjustment?”
- “Is this information backed in research?”
- “Am I open to learning and trying new things?”

A parenting course will help with all of these questions.

5. Research Shows the Benefits of Parenting Education

Research actually shows the benefits of parenting education.

Based on their research, they were able to find a number of positive correlations:

Improves child behavior
Improves parent-child interactions
Improves parental mental health and well-being
Increases social connections
Increases positive parenting practices
Decreases corporal punishment.

With those findings, we shouldn’t feel anything other than 100% guilt-free for engaging in parenting education.

The more books, guides, or courses I invest in, the more competent and better I feel about my parenting.

We should be encouraging, begging, and incentivizing parents to take parenting courses. In the long run, it would be beneficial for all of our society if parents are well taken care of.

Parenting Courses I Recommend

Maybe, in the end, you decide that you don’t need a parenting course, that’s totally cool. There’s a lot of free resources out there too.

If you do decide to invest in a parenting course, remember you are not alone.

You are not doing anything wrong.

You and your kid deserve this course.

Give yourself a high five for recognizing your needs. You go mama!