---
product_id: 2022705
title: "Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers"
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reviews_count: 8
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---

# Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers

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Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers [Neufeld, Gordon, Maté MD, Gabor] on desertcart.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers

Review: Powerful ideas hidden under tons of wordy rubble - The ideas in this book are valuable and powerful. Reading it I had a eureka moment, suddenly understanding a part of my daughter’s behavior which had eluded me for years. I found eye-opening the ideas about strengthening parent/child relationships through “collecting” moments, family rituals, and family centered activities. Also valuable was the idea that parent influence over the child is only as strong as the attachment connection, and parents who try to force discipline with a weak connection risk utter rupture of the connection. These are brilliant insights that helped me modify my parenting thought and behavior. The book would be stronger if edited to cut down the theory and expand the case study examples of what parents should and should not do, and why. Ten pages of case examples are worth 1000 pages of theory. I found the few cases presented in the book — such as how some parents poorly handled their son misbehaving in the pool, and what they should have done — illuminating and instructive. Another minor criticism is the authors appear dumbfounded about why kids from 1950s on have become increasingly more “peer attached” than before. One obvious culprit is rise of television and mass media targeted at kids and “youth culture.” They do identify the corrosive influence of pervasive online culture. I agree. Overall a worthwhile book that has changed our parenting for the better. Just skim the first two-thirds of the book and spend time on the solution-focused chapters near the end.
Review: Paradigm-shifting book that should be required reading for all parents and at all schools - If you are a parent of a child who has not yet gone off to college, then I implore you to buy this book and actually read it. This book is co-written by the same author of When the Body Says No: the Hidden Signs of Stress. That book is an illuminating study on the lasting impacts of stress in our bodies. I highly recommend reading that if you have struggles with chronic illness that still plague you today. This book discusses parenting. Specifically, the impacts on our children due to the decimation of the parent-oriented attachment norms that have historically guided societies all around the world since humanity's origins. Since about the 1940s our Western society has seen a dynamic shift of children reorienting to peer-oriented attachments with cataclysmic results. To learn about how this has happened and just how devastating this has been for our children, read this book. I urge you not to buy into the lie that what is happening today is an acceptable new normal for a liberated society. It is not acceptable. It is not healthy, and it is not something caring adults should stay silent about. Our children do not belong to the schools, their friends, or their activities, and it is in their best interest for us to fight for them--especially when they say they don't want us to. This book comprehensively destroys the notion that it is healthy for children's core attachments to be peer-oriented rather than parent-oriented. Although it has become normalized, it is not healthy. Our children's sense of security, identity, and acceptance, not to mention their experience with vulnerability, and their opportunity to take creative risks should not be entrusted to the volatility and immaturity of their peers. Adolescents are often inherently fickle and selfish when it comes to interacting with one another. They are in a nearly constant flux of acceptance and rejection of each other. Step into most cafeterias around our country for a quick reality check if you think I'm exaggerating. Children who are peer-oriented rather than parent-oriented for their core attachments are much more at risk when, not if, they get emotionally tossed about and rejected by their peers. Peers certainly have their place in a child's life, but a child's fundamental grounding should not be dependent on such fluidity. It should come from the security of their home life. This book emphasizes the importance of raising children in a multigenerational village of invested supporters. We were not created to live in isolation or raise our children in isolation. The breakdown of fundamental emotional and social needs examined in this book is a much-needed reality check for parents. Our children spend their days in schools where anxiety, depression, bullying, isolation, and addiction are alarming experiences they are or soon will be exposed to. There is a rise in dependence on superficial social connectivity through technological devices in lieu of deep interpersonal attachments. Online gaming systems breed addiction as they supplant in-person connections and divert children from what is truly nourishing for their development. Information that is wholly inappropriate for their age is at their fingertips and being processed through brains and hearts not yet ready to digest such adult knowledge. The authors emphasize that all is not lost and hope is very much alive. Parents and adults in caretaker positions need to reclaim their God intended roles in the lives of the children entrusted to our care. Make no mistake, if the adults are not filling the biologically embedded attachment needs of their children, voids will exist. Children will seek to fill these vacuums by reorienting their attachments to be primarily peer-centric and the fallout from this will be damaging. Safeguarding our children from being in that position is vital to raising children who are healthy, resilient, vulnerable in the ways they should be, and as creative as they were designed to be. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ This book is a soul-searching, potentially paradigm-shifting must read for every parent.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #3,992 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #4 in Parenting Teenagers (Books) #5 in Medical Child Psychology #7 in Popular Child Psychology |
| Customer Reviews | 4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars (4,073) |
| Dimensions  | 5.19 x 0.79 x 7.96 inches |
| Edition  | Reprint |
| ISBN-10  | 0375760288 |
| ISBN-13  | 978-0375760280 |
| Item Weight  | 2.31 pounds |
| Language  | English |
| Print length  | 368 pages |
| Publication date  | August 15, 2006 |
| Publisher  | Ballantine Books |

## Images

![Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71igDCL5ZdL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Powerful ideas hidden under tons of wordy rubble
*by C***D on January 18, 2023*

The ideas in this book are valuable and powerful. Reading it I had a eureka moment, suddenly understanding a part of my daughter’s behavior which had eluded me for years. I found eye-opening the ideas about strengthening parent/child relationships through “collecting” moments, family rituals, and family centered activities. Also valuable was the idea that parent influence over the child is only as strong as the attachment connection, and parents who try to force discipline with a weak connection risk utter rupture of the connection. These are brilliant insights that helped me modify my parenting thought and behavior. The book would be stronger if edited to cut down the theory and expand the case study examples of what parents should and should not do, and why. Ten pages of case examples are worth 1000 pages of theory. I found the few cases presented in the book — such as how some parents poorly handled their son misbehaving in the pool, and what they should have done — illuminating and instructive. Another minor criticism is the authors appear dumbfounded about why kids from 1950s on have become increasingly more “peer attached” than before. One obvious culprit is rise of television and mass media targeted at kids and “youth culture.” They do identify the corrosive influence of pervasive online culture. I agree. Overall a worthwhile book that has changed our parenting for the better. Just skim the first two-thirds of the book and spend time on the solution-focused chapters near the end.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Paradigm-shifting book that should be required reading for all parents and at all schools
*by E***E on May 10, 2025*

If you are a parent of a child who has not yet gone off to college, then I implore you to buy this book and actually read it. This book is co-written by the same author of When the Body Says No: the Hidden Signs of Stress. That book is an illuminating study on the lasting impacts of stress in our bodies. I highly recommend reading that if you have struggles with chronic illness that still plague you today. This book discusses parenting. Specifically, the impacts on our children due to the decimation of the parent-oriented attachment norms that have historically guided societies all around the world since humanity's origins. Since about the 1940s our Western society has seen a dynamic shift of children reorienting to peer-oriented attachments with cataclysmic results. To learn about how this has happened and just how devastating this has been for our children, read this book. I urge you not to buy into the lie that what is happening today is an acceptable new normal for a liberated society. It is not acceptable. It is not healthy, and it is not something caring adults should stay silent about. Our children do not belong to the schools, their friends, or their activities, and it is in their best interest for us to fight for them--especially when they say they don't want us to. This book comprehensively destroys the notion that it is healthy for children's core attachments to be peer-oriented rather than parent-oriented. Although it has become normalized, it is not healthy. Our children's sense of security, identity, and acceptance, not to mention their experience with vulnerability, and their opportunity to take creative risks should not be entrusted to the volatility and immaturity of their peers. Adolescents are often inherently fickle and selfish when it comes to interacting with one another. They are in a nearly constant flux of acceptance and rejection of each other. Step into most cafeterias around our country for a quick reality check if you think I'm exaggerating. Children who are peer-oriented rather than parent-oriented for their core attachments are much more at risk when, not if, they get emotionally tossed about and rejected by their peers. Peers certainly have their place in a child's life, but a child's fundamental grounding should not be dependent on such fluidity. It should come from the security of their home life. This book emphasizes the importance of raising children in a multigenerational village of invested supporters. We were not created to live in isolation or raise our children in isolation. The breakdown of fundamental emotional and social needs examined in this book is a much-needed reality check for parents. Our children spend their days in schools where anxiety, depression, bullying, isolation, and addiction are alarming experiences they are or soon will be exposed to. There is a rise in dependence on superficial social connectivity through technological devices in lieu of deep interpersonal attachments. Online gaming systems breed addiction as they supplant in-person connections and divert children from what is truly nourishing for their development. Information that is wholly inappropriate for their age is at their fingertips and being processed through brains and hearts not yet ready to digest such adult knowledge. The authors emphasize that all is not lost and hope is very much alive. Parents and adults in caretaker positions need to reclaim their God intended roles in the lives of the children entrusted to our care. Make no mistake, if the adults are not filling the biologically embedded attachment needs of their children, voids will exist. Children will seek to fill these vacuums by reorienting their attachments to be primarily peer-centric and the fallout from this will be damaging. Safeguarding our children from being in that position is vital to raising children who are healthy, resilient, vulnerable in the ways they should be, and as creative as they were designed to be. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ This book is a soul-searching, potentially paradigm-shifting must read for every parent.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Especially if you enjoyed Unconditional Parenting
*by C***Y on May 15, 2018*

A MUST READ FOR EVERY PARENT!!! Especially if you enjoyed Unconditional Parenting, the Continuum Concept, Magical Child, etc you NEED this book. Everyone needs this book. Society is headed in the wrong direction despite "well meaning" parents who are actually doing the WRONG thing. I'm a parent of 2 myself and this is great if you have young children so you know what to avoid AND for those with teens that they are having a hard time with. Trust me it's you, not them. This book will make complete sense to some where if you are like me will be nodding you head throughout and will have some light bulb moments. If you are more traditional/conventional style parenting i.e. Spanking, time outs "positive reinforcements", consequences, punishments, or even those who think they are doing better with their "spirited children", etc (CAN PARENTS PLEASE STOP DOING THESE THINGS? Ugh) you will be quite enlightened and may have a harder time accepting this amazing book. But I do dare you to Open your mind and question if your current parenting "skills" are healthy and actually working. Take the chance to be vulnerable and admit to mistakes and read this book already!! Better late than never to repairing your relationship with your children. "You're dealing not with a behavior problem but a relationship problem" "Trying to punish or control behaviors without addressing the underlying dynamics is like a doctor prescribing something for symptoms while ignoring their causes" "Our society puts a higher value on consumerism than the healthy development of children" -Hold on to Your Kids

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*Last updated: 2026-03-10*