THERE has been a huge parenting pantomime on the telly this week, which has got us mums all a Twitter, and the female gender is once again publicly embroiled in handbag bashing about the supposed right and wrong ways to raise children.

It was on ITV’s This Morning when Princess Peaches Geldof was pitched against the evil witch Hoproach (she called herself this on Twitter) and it was to do with ‘attachment parenting’.

Katie Hopkins, as she is more properly known, made snide comments with sweeping statements about attachment parenting.

On the matter of baby wearing, where mothers hold their children close in a sling, Hoproach said: “I wear a handbag, I don’t wear a baby.

“You see these women with 15 metres worth of Indian print fabric – it’s always Indian print – wrapped around their body and somewhere in there there’s a mewling baby,” she added.

“It’s all a bit knit your own yoghurt.”

And she made a few choice comments about breastfeeding.

On watching this debate, I discover that I am in fact an ‘attachment parent’. I had no idea. It wasn’t a conscious choice and I haven’t read any books on it; I do it because instinctively to me that feels right. I did carry my babies close to me, and I did breastfeed on demand, in public if necessary.

But I also wouldn’t hesitate to give them a bottle of formula to top them up.

And, to be honest, I couldn’t even knit a scarf.

For me, it’s important that my children know they are loved, and I am on their side.

How that love is manifested, or demonstrated to any child is down to the individual; but both my children know that I have their back, that they can come to me, and that I will listen to them, help them if I can, or at least equip them to help themselves.

Of course, they test the boundaries and we battle and discuss, negotiate and agree, and sometimes there is shouting.

It’s normal when growing children are trying to assert their independence. I want my children to have one guaranteed security in their life, which is to know that I love them unconditionally, and if that love is called attachment parenting then so be it.