Im a gentle parent I wont make my kid say sorry because its disingenuous

A ‘gentle parent’ says she doesn’t force her five-year-old son to say sorry as it is “disingenuous” – and says it’s taught him to “hold empathy” and communicate his feelings.Kelly Medina Enos, 34, turned to gentle parenting when she was struggling with her son, George, then 18 months old, hitting her.The mom turned to TikTok to share her worries and a stranger recommended she looked into gentle parenting – a style that focuses on empathy, respect, and understanding.Kelly found it “ridiculous” at first but after researching she started to try it out – dropping “don’t” from her vocabulary and telling George what she’d like him to do instead.She also stopped forcing him to apologize and instead guided George to step back and look at what’s happened in a situation.Kelly doesn’t force any isolation – such as the ‘naughty step’ or ‘time out’ – but will offer ‘calm down corner’ as an option if he wants to some alone.She is now mom to a daughter, Ariella, 14 months old, and has started to gentle parent her too – teaching her baby sign language so she can communicate if she wants more food or drink.Kelly, a certified gentle parenting coach, from York, North Yorkshire, said: “I don’t force my child to say sorry.“A child doesn’t develop empathy until they are around 11 years old.“Expecting a child to have empathy is a learnt skill.“If we say ‘go and say sorry’ – if say they snatched a toy – it’s forced.“You find you haven’t allowed child to step back.Instead say – ‘what’s happened here? ‘How do you think that person is feeling?’ ‘What can we say?’“Otherwise it’s disingenuous.“It’s not that we don’t want them to say sorry but there is a difference between telling them what to do.“We still guide them through.“We teach our children how to be better next time.”Kelly was struggling with George when he was 18 months old and says she had “no parenting style”.She said: ...