Parenting a child is a lifelong responsibility. You are responsible for the child’s well-being and physical safety, as well as their emotional development and intellectual growth. This should be taken into consideration before the child is born. Ask yourself if you are ready to take on this commitment. If you are already pregnant and are ready to commit to a baby, sometimes relatives such as siblings, grandparents, or other relatives can provide care. Putting the baby up for adoption or surrendering it to a foster parent home may be another way to go if you are unfit to provide for all your baby’s needs.

Childhood Development

As a parent you must provide a safe and warm house for your child, you must ensure your child gets a proper education and has all their basic needs such as food, clothing and medical care. You are also responsible for the child’s emotional development. Parents must provide love and care for their children and teach them values of respect and honesty. Parenting is a huge financial burden. There are costs to feed and clothe your child. Additional costs come as your child ages and you must pay for education, any extra curricular activities, and other needs.

In order for a child to develop properly, a parent needs to provide for all of the child’s needs. Parents need to devote a large amount of their time to their children and teach them the values and ethics they want their children to grow up with.

Before the Baby Comes

Before the baby comes, parents must ensure they can provide the baby with a warm and loving home environment. The mother must be healthy and able to carry a baby to term – this mean getting proper nutrition and avoiding things that may harm a baby such as smoking, drinking alcohol and taking drugs. Some experts agree that even while babies are in the womb, they have a sense of their surroundings. Babies may be able to hear what is going on outside the womb and can sense if they are in a positive or negative environment. Parents must embrace prenatal parenting.

After prenatal parenting, there are many stages of parenting. They must provide needs to their children during all stages of their child’s life, such as infancy, school age and young and maturing adulthood.

Providing Spiritual Development

If parents are religious or spiritual, they may chose to raise their children to have the same beliefs. Christian parents may chose to raise their children according to how the bible and church tells them to parent. Christian parents may also teach their children rules to follow and biblical principals to live by.