Parenting Principles: From the Heart of a Pediatrician (ISBN 0805427244)

Stay Away:
I am horrified that respected Christian publisher Broadman & Holman has published this book. Clearly they did not do adequate medical review before doing so, or they would have realized how significantly the pediatrician author's advice departs from the standards of his own professional organization, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). The feeding advice in the book regarding breastfeeding, formula feeding, and starting solids directly contradicts the AAP recommendations. It is likely to contribute significantly to the failure of breastfeeding, to food allergies, and possibly even to low weight gain or failure to thrive. The discipline advice is equally troubling. As a Christian, I am grieved by the harsh, hyper-controlling attitude Dr. Slonecker advocates. Yes, God expects obedience and so should Christian (and nonChristian) parents. But Dr. Slonecker is not mirroring God's approach by focusing on parental power, rather than nurture. Further, some of his stories, presumably from years ago during his practice, today would constitute legally actionable child abuse in most communities. A dentist not only remaining alone in an exam room with a child who has stripped naked, but then forcing that child to walk naked through the outer office and parking lot? This, plus the story of packing a defiant ill child in ice to teach her who was in charge is nothing more than the legally questionable exercise of raw power, not real training in healthy attitudes toward authority. Stay away from this book. The author may be a pediatrician (now retired, I believe), but he is seriously out of step with current medical knowledge and with generally accepted Christian standards from other respected parenting authors like Dr. Kevin Leman, Dr. Ross Campbell, and Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend.

This book is SCARY:
I've read some pretty bad parenting books in my lifetime, but this book takes the cake! The feeding advice comes straight out of the 1940s. Even the breastfeeding information is based on a formula feeding model and is designed to make sure that the mother's milk is completely depleted within 2 weeks. He states that women should start training their babies to sleep through the night starting from the first night home from the hospital, which includes letting the baby cry it out for a minimum of 20 minutes to "assure that the baby is truly hungry and to aerate the lungs." Aerate the lungs? The lungs are as fully aerated at 30 minutes after birth as they are ever going to be. Slonecker assures his readers that by stretching out the time that you let the baby cry at night just a little every night, by two weeks the baby will be sleeping through. Is THIS the goal of parenting? To destroy any shred of trust a baby may be developing in the people he loves most in the world? The entire section on feeding is completely contrary to what any feeding expert knows is good for infants. Start the baby on cereal at 2 weeks? Put the baby on low iron formula if formula fed -- but then the reason cereal is started is because there isn't enough iron in milk? If a mother followed the feeding guidelines she would be setting her child up for obesity, allergies, and a host of other illnesses. Discipline measures border on sadistic. If a child's first understanding of the person of God is in how he views his parents, then his perception would be that God is not loving, but punitive; not accessible, but remote, and not willing to meet the needs of his child. Stay far, far away from this book. You will do far better in learning how to relate to your baby and will be empowered as a parent by reading "Christian Parenting and Childcare" by Sears.

conservative Christian:
I would like to address the last reviewer who states that anyone who objects to Slonecker is a "Howard Deanesque left-winger who wouldn't know Jesus if He walked in through the front door." I am a VERY conservative Christian...my family and I adhere to EXTREMELY conservative views...much more conservative views than even the average Christian. (Just one example, I wear a headcovering to show my submissiveness as a wife.) I have known the Lord personally and intimately for 16 years. It is precisely because of my extremely conservative views that I find fault with Slonecker's poor exegesis of Scripture and terribly poor advice for parenting infants and children. Put simply, his advice is not "the old way" as is often espoused. It is a way that came into vogue within the last 100 years or so. This was NOT the way Jesus was raised---treating children this way was simply not done in His culture. Experts tell us that Jewish mothers of the Bible breastfed for at least 2-3 years (see I Samuel 1:21-23), co-slept with their families (see Jesus' parable in Luke 11:5-7), breastfed when the baby indicated a hunger or comfort need rather than on a schedule (see Isaiah 66:10-13), and did not immediately give solid foods to infants (see Hebrews 5:12-14). And we know that the TRUE older way of the Scriptures is best, as is evidenced by the mounds and mounds of scientific research today that shows the benefit of God's older and more natural way and the outright health risks and harms of man's (i.e., Slonecker's) new and improved way. For a better and more Scripturally sound way of raising children, conservative Christian readers will find a haven and encouragement in books written by such conservative authors as Dr. Ross Campbell (How To Really Love Your Child, Relational Parenting), Dr. and Mrs. William Sears (The Baby Book, The Discipline Book, The Complete Book of Christian Parenting and Child Care), Dr. Brenda Hunter (Home By Choice, The Power of Motherlove), and Clay and Sally Clarkson (Heartfelt Discipline, The Mission of Motherhood). I hope new and vulnerable parents will see through the harmful and unnatural techniques of Slonecker and will seek their advice elsewhere. That is my sincere prayer.

For the record....:
Just for the record, the reviewer who characterizes those of us who have written critical reviews here as "left-wingers who wouldn't know Jesus if he walked in the door" could not be more wrong. One person has already responded. I am the co-founder and 26-year head of an evangelical ministry for Christian childbirth educators, and I have been a born-again Christian since I was four years old. I also happen to know Jan Barger, another reviewer, personally, and she is a committed Christian who is very active in evangelical ministries. She also has a solid Christian family heritage; her great-grandfather was one of the most noted Christian leaders of the early 20th century, and her mother was a published Christian author. It is perfectly appropriate for other Christians to disagree with us if they wish. It is inappropriate for them to malign us as non-Christian. I hope for a little more restraint from others who post reviews on this book.

Excellent Advice for Parents:
It is disappointing but not surprising in our current society to see folks bashing Dr. Slonecker's advice on raising children. He was our doctor through two children and both have responded well to his methods. One slept throught the night at 3 weeks and the other at about 10 days and neither have suffered for it or felt any detachment or lack of trust in their parents. "Affluenza" runs rampent in Brentwood and the parents have lost control, buying everything in sight that their kids ask for. If more folks would listen to Dr. Slonecker and learn to use the tried and true methods from the past that he espouses, we wouldn't have the problems with kids that we see in society today. He is the "Dave Ramsey" of pediatricians that tell how to raise a child like your grandparents did. If you are a conservative, thinking, Christian, you should easily see that the negative reviews published here are by Howard Deanesque left wingers who wouldn't know Jesus if he walked in through the front door and simply don't like a conservative approach to anything.