In her book The Mindful Parent, Dr. Charlotte Peterson describes permissive parents as those who, “…plead, bribe, and make requests” when a limit needs to be set. Parents who act permissively often have very good intentions but lack the boundaries required to follow through. Permissive parenting is often a reaction to a parent’s own childhood experience of punitive, authoritarian parenting. In an effort to avoid propagating the pain they experienced as children, these parents instead fail to provide appropriate limits. Unfortunately many permissive parents also fear that telling their child “no” will negatively impact the relationship, when setting limits with respect actually models boundaries and can strengthen the parent/child bond.