Child and parent friendly

I find it hard to believe any report saying that Sweden is the second most difficult country to be a parent in. It has the most generous maternity leave in the world.

I dont find it difficult to believe, because there is more to it than the generous maternity leave. Germany pours plenty of money into child services and education and provides top medical facilities for mothers and children, and that would make it seem like a very child and parent friendly country to some.

Mostly the difficulty in places like Germany and probably Sweden too is how parents with little children are viewed by society in general. No amount of money or maternity leave will make up for not being welcome anywhere except the designated mutter and Kind facilities, because your child does not behave like an adult. Things like having to comfort your cring baby in -10 C degrees weather or else stay at home because cafes etc dont want the noise is quite depressing.

...childcare is free and abundant.

Yeah, childcare is great sometimes, but it should not be something that we have to use because society wants to interact with us, but not our children.

..than the rest of us are of the charts...

If by the rest of us you mean the Netherlands, people are a bit less rigid about it in the Netherland than they are in Germany, but it certainly does not compare with the absolute without conditions child friendliness of Thailand for example

In my opinion, a major aspect of how child friendly a country is, is the level of acceptance and understanding displayed by people you encounter during your parenting years. It is about the attitude of people in general towards us as parents. It is great when a country is wealthy enough to provide cutting edge facilities, but it not enough.

Being half Swedish, I must protect the honour of my mothers country 😊

Well, dont protect the honour for the sake of it. 😉 Reply to this

It would mean that grandparents, uncles, aunties, and other family members would have to look after the kids if the parents would want to work, or not work. At least they have the choice now.

Yes, there should be choices for women, and it is a good thing that there are. Where things like choices and child friendliness are concerned, I am certainly not suggesting that one should be traded for the other. From my personal prespective, I want to feel included in society as a mother with a little child, and I dont want to sacrifice my choices or rights in general as a women.

Some would probably say I am an idealist, while others would probably say that all improvements are possible as our societies develop even more.

And I have never seen Sweden as being unfriendly towards childeren.

You have never been the primary long term carer of a child, so can only point towards observations rather than see things from a parents point of view.

I have never been in Sweden so cant really comment, but in Germany the way people will treat a mother with a small child is similiar to how people would treat you if you insisted on going everywhere with a tarantuala on your shoulder. If you can maybe leave the tarantuala with somebody else for a while, then you will be treated differently in shops, cafes, churches.....

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Wow Mel, I had no idea that Germany was that Child unfriendly.

Based on what I experienced while traveling alone with my son, I began to think of him as my invisability cloak. I spent a lot of time in Australia and New Zealand feeling pretty lonley as all the other backpackers my age looked right though me when they saw I had a young child. But then, I understood that they were all out for a good time, and I obviously couldn't join in the things they were doing, but an acknolagment of my existance would have been nice. I think that ties in what you said Mel about seeing things from a parents perspective.


Not that I think Aus and NZ are not child freindly, they are the most child friendly places I think I have been (apart from Asia) but I guess it depends on whom you meet. Your tarantula annalogy reinded me of how I felt!

The UK is getting much better with child friendlyness, it certainly is more accepting than when I was a child. Resteraunts almost always cater for children now, the only downside is that the kids menus are always the same old junk, burgers, sausages or chicken nuggets served with a mountain of greasy chips!

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2 posts merged into this topic from: ''More and more people are opting to own pets instead of having kids'' Reply to this

Apart from the ultra cool back-packers ignoring me, Australia has always been wonderful. People seem to generally like having children around. In London it is rare to see families out late in the eveing enjoying dinner together, but I was so happy to see families all out together in cities such as Brisbane and Sydney. I traveled via train a lot in Australia and I was dreading it due to experiences I have had with rude and unhelpful staff in the UK, but the Australian train staff were bending over backwards to help me, it was actually embarrasing at times. I found New Zealand to be very family friendly as well, I had a wonderful time from the get go with NZ, my son was made welcome everywhere, we had a campervan and stayed on a lot of farm sites and he was always invited to go round helping the farmers, it was lovely.

Iceland was pretty easy as well, they really seem to value thier children there and take a real interrest in them. The culture seemed very child centered.

China was a breeze to travel with a child in, I was so nervous about taking him there, but again people couldn't do enough to help me and seemed to enjoy talking to children.

My husband works in the Netherlands during the week and I always love taking my son over. If we are haivng a conversation with my husbands dutch friends, they always make sure to include my son instead of ignoring him. His friends there seem much more family orientated than this work mates in the UK.

One place I found to be very child unfriendly, and this came as a real shock, was Rome. I blogged about it last year, my son seemed to be a real annoyance to the entire population! He was pushed and shoved, walked over when he fell down. One evening, I was told by three resteraunts that they did not allow children in because they made too much mess and noise (these were not posh places either, just little cafes across the road from the Colesseum). I was always told that the Italians were very child friendly. I know I only experienced one city, and some of the people being so rude would have been tourists, but it was relentless and totally ruined our time in Rome.

Morocco was very strange. Not many places were welcoming to children at all .Or women, but my husband was with us for that trip. It seemed to be a very 'us and them' kind of society (we were staying in and around Taroudant mainly). I can't quite descibe it, but with the families we stayed with, there didn't seem to be much interraction between children and adults at all. I think it is because we went to quite a lot of rural places, where the parents were working so hard to make ends meet, just to feed thier children, it can't be easy to interract when you are physically exhausted everyday.

I stated that I wouldn't be surprised if home ed was banned in the UK soon - this is because of a goverment review into it at the moment. The gist of it is, that the goverment suspect home education is a cover for child abuse, so all home educated kids must be inspected and questioned without a parent present. Parents in the UK are bullied to conform to the goverments whims, they hange their policies on Sex education so much that in one area they are giving pretty explicit sex education classes to five year olds, and in other areas, families are being investigated by social services becasue a child of the same age knows the correct names for reproductive body parts and teachers have suspected abuse.

There are just so many examples in day to day life, you cannot do wrong for doing right anymore. Parents seem to get the blame for everything. Mothers get the blame for society going down the pan for going back to work, but mothers that choose to stay at home but have to claim benifits get vilified as well. There are so many more examples that I cannot think of right now. I am sure your friend is not exaggereating with the things she tells you!

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Wow Mel, I had no idea that Germany was that Child unfriendly.

I think the report about Germany being the worst for parents was broadcasted on some TV shows, because for a while after it people here started be friendly and helpful to me. I was so shocked by it, that instead of smiling graciously and thanking them for their kind consideration, I backed away and said no thank you. :D

I think people here are getting seriously worried about the dropping birth rate, because there wont be enough people paying taxes to supply their pensions when they get old. There are often new incentives to encourage people here to have more children. I am sometimes critisised for not having more babies, because Germany needs them. People often say that if I am not going to do that, I should get a job to supply more taxes for Germany. I wish they would pay more attention to what I am actually doing which is nurturing another human being, rather than thinking about me in economic terms only. My boyfriend earns enough money for all 3 of us anyway. As far as so many people are concerned here, I would be worthy of more respect, if I was being payed to look after somebody elses child instead of looking after my own.

We also lived in Ireland before my daughter was born and for a year after. Ireland is certainly a more child friendly country in respect to how I was generally treated when I was out and about with my child. I dont think Ireland has the money to pour into medical and educational services and childcare that Germany has, but the medical care I received when I was pregnant, having the baby and the after care that both of us received was more than adequate and it was also free of charge for mothers and children.
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Ah, so in Germany, do you have to pay for medical services?

That is quite a grey area.

People have insurance to cover medial expenses, that is officially payed for by their employers, except my boyfriend has to contribute 200 Euros per month towards it. Also, people have to pay 10 Euros every quarter year if they visit doctors and dentists. Also, despite that if we were married I would be covered under my boyfriends medical insurance. We are having a hard time getting married in Germany because the paperwork is complicated, so I have to have insurance for 200 Euros per month. I can stop paying this 200 Euros after we get married, but getting married wont be as simple as going to the town hall. We will have to go to Denmark to do it. So, free? Everything is organised and modern and works in Germany, so long as you can figure out the paperwork and the proceedures. It would be a little easier for Germans, but I am not so sure it is easy for them either because they are always complaining about it.

After you have a baby here, you dont just fill in some form in the hospital to get childrens allowance, and the HR at work dont just automatically organise your maternity leave payments etc like they do in Ireland. You have to go to different government offices for everything and fill in forms. Well, you can immagine what an ordeal that would be for a new mother. I dont know what you have to do to get the birth cert. I havent asked anybody about it.

One of the most horrifying things I heard from a mother about paperwork hassle in Germany was, she had a baby and they released her from the hospital but not the baby. She said, the baby was released after the insurance came through which took around a week. They kept making excuses not to release the baby. The money and burocracy thing here is ridiculous and you cant get things done until you get over the burocracy hurdle.

Bet you want to know why we stay here? Well, having my daughter go to school here and speak a third language is a real selling point. And, if I put aside the attitude towards children and the burocracy it is in many ways a great place to live. I find living in a foreign country more stimulating than living in the one I spent most of my life in. Would I have moved to here, knowing what I now about Germany? Only if I did not have children. I am not sure that the burocracy would put me off enough to avoid living here, even though it is very annoying. Reply to this

Wow. It sounds as of the German Goverment really loves paperwork! I remember your posts about what a hassle it was for you to get married in Germany.

That's one of the good points about the UK, in my experience, legal things have been pretty easy to sort out. Getting married only took a trip to the registry office to answer a few questions and say what date we would like, it is easier than ever to register birth now as the registras visit maternity wards a couple of days a week so you can register your baby while still in hospital in most places, the child benefit forms are given to you in hospital as well, or you just print them from the internet. The only thing that is a long drawn out process is selling/buying houses, but that is mainly down to solicitors and estate agents being a bit slow at their jobs.

That is terrible about paperwork keeping a baby in hospital though, really, really awful. Reply to this

Apart from the ultra cool back-packers ignoring me .....

I dont remember meeting any ultra cool ones. :D My boyfriend said some of the backpackers in India were a grumpy lot. Maybe those are the cool ones. :D I dont think my boyfriend has developed that backpacker antennae yet, to sense who is approachable and who isnt, so gets frowned at by the cool ones. :D

But I am not talking out of total ignorance...

Of course not, but being a parent is an enormous responsibility and it goes on for a very long time. It would be easier if we could just do it for a week, or even for 3 hours per day for 18 years, and maybe skip the pregnancy and birth. 😉 Anyway, maybe you will some time in the future be telling us about your own parenting experiences. 😉

About Sweden, I dont have a personal opinion because I was never there. I just know that the report seems accurate where Germany is concerened.

My guess is that as a person without a child, people would to a large extent tailor how much and what parenting issues they would tell you about, with the assumption that you would be bored by it. I do the same, unless the childless person seems particularly interested in the details. Young girls in their 20s are often very interested, because they want to know if it is something they would be able to manage. Reply to this

Parents seem to get the blame for everything. Mothers get the blame for society going down the pan for going back to work, but mothers that choose to stay at home but have to claim benifits get vilified as well. There are so many more examples that I cannot think of right now.

I think when there is a lot of stress in society, which there seems to be in many societies these days people do a lot of blaming, whether it is reasonable or not. Reply to this