I’M LUCKY. When I had my first child, I had three “experts” (my mother, older sister and sister-in-law) to ask for advice. I listened hard, muddled along, and it seemed to work.

I have no desire to sound smug. Yes, my daughter slept through the night from an early age, but my son didn’t. He also cried more and slept less in the day. That’s when I realised that my daughter’s angelic behaviour had not been (entirely) due to my fabulous parenting skills, but to her own personality. Each baby is different, and that’s the most important thing to remember. You can’t shoehorn a newborn baby into someone else’s routine.

This appears to be something that many women either don’t, or don’t want to, realise. Can 21st-century parenting really be that much harder than it was for our mothers and grandmothers? I’m not convinced. Why do so many of us want to be told exactly what to do with our babies? Far too many women allow the multitude of parenting manuals to run their lives. It’s almost as if they can’t trust themselves without rules.

Many women now have children later. In fact, they have them while also enjoying successful careers and knowing what it’s like to be in control of their lives. When they produce a baby, they want that same feeling of control. They feel a need to know what the baby will do and when.

That could explain the plethora of baby books and gurus. If you don’t have children, you may not have heard of Gina Ford’s Contented Little Baby Book, or of Tracy Hogg, the Baby Whisperer. You may not be a parenting voyeur — watching Supernanny or House of Little Angels, or logging on to a parenting website.

But if you are a parent, it’s likely at least one of these things will be familiar. Why? I think it may be to do with a lack of extended family.

Many women don’t have mothers, grandmothers, sisters or aunts to give advice. Instead, they turn to the minefield of the written or broadcast word.

Different parenting experts often offer completely conflicting advice. That means that the parents who favour the prescriptive routines of Gina Ford, for example, are in direct opposition to those who favour the more liberal proposals of Penelope Leach. Both are convinced (using their perfect children as illustrations) that they are right.

Now Ford has become so irate about being criticised on a parenting website, Mumsnet, that her lawyers have demanded that it should be disabled because it is “defamatory”.

It’s an astonishing state of affairs, combining the whole issue of the freedom of the internet with that of parenting. Mumsnet is a vast website with 10,000 posts a day (meaning it would be very difficult to vet) and 250,000 monthly visitors. It allows its members to chat and give advice about anything from breast-feeding to going back to work, and is so popular that David Cameron was one recent interviewee.

It is ironic that Ford has such a problem with Mumsnet, since both provide mothers with something they crave — advice. It is also ironic, because in Ford’s latest book she claimed that she was saddened because she had “inadvertently created a war among mothers”. And it is ridiculous because the site has taken down the offensive comments and begged members not to make any more.

War among parents is not a good thing. It’s probably better to remember that, whatever Ford’s advice, she has never given birth. Actually being a mother should allow you to trust yourself, even just a little.

• THE ASHLEY COLE saga continues. And, may I say, as a Spurs fan, that it is most enjoyable to watch.

  The Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger is clearly getting most annoyed with Cole, for “unsettling” his team, and Chelsea for making their interest so transparent. So when will Cole actually join Chelsea from their long-standing rivals? Just a few years ago Spurs also had a great England defender whom we didn’t really want to lose. Unlike Cole, however, Sol Campbell was our captain, and swore that he would stay a Spurs player. Soon afterwards he left — for our greatest (footballing) enemy. And he then went on to win the double.

  Now Wenger is annoyed that Chelsea and Cole are doing the same as he did with Campbell and Spurs. I think I’m feeling Schadenfreude.

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