A mom is working to reverse 10 years of gentle parenting after seeing the long-term effects on her children .

Jaclyn Williams (@breakingcycles.co) shared a reel on Instagram describing the approach she’d practiced for a decade—validating emotions, explaining boundaries in detail , compromising often, avoiding punishments—as something she thought fit the modern “gentle” model.

But as her children grew older, she began noticing patterns that didn’t align with the calm, confident emotional development she expected.

The realization arrived through a slow accumulation of red flags, which surfaced after a cross-country move uprooted her family .

Williams was carrying guilt about the transition and found herself easing up on rules and joining her kids emotionally rather than helping

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