GEMMA Atkinson has strongly denied pinching her son ‘hard’ after she was slammed for ‘teaching him a lesson’ in a controversial parenting move.
The 39-year-old actress shares two children with her Strictly star partner Gorka Marquez – Mia, five, and one-year-old Thiago.
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In a recent Instagram story, Gemma wrote: “Really noticing the differences in how Mia was to Thiago.
“It’s fun to watch. Toys are just banged or slid across the floor and the tantrums are new as Mia didn’t have them.
“He pretend cries and throws himself on the floor. I stand and watch until he realises it’s getting him nowhere and they are slowly getting shorter.
“He pinches when he gets frustrated. I did it back to him on Wednesday as he did it hard to Mia. He’s not done it since.”
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After receiving backlash for the controversial parenting move, but Gemma has defended herself.
She took to her Instagram stories, and said: “I didn’t do a post and then delete it, it was Instagram stories. So it deletes itself after 24 hours.”
Gemma then explained her agent had been in touch after she received backlash, and asked “what did you say on your story?”
To which Gemma replied: “I said about the differences between boys and girls and Tiago’s going through that phase at the minute where he’s nipping and biting.
“I said he really nipped Mia the other day and so I went like this back to him and said ‘oi’ we don’t nip.”
Gemma signalled what she was doing to encourage her son not to ‘nip’ Mia.
She added: “I didn’t ‘ughh’ as if I would.”
Gemma confirmed it wasn’t a post she’d panicked about and taken down.
It comes after Gemma’s partner Gorka shared an emotional update last month as he got prepared for a new series of Strictly.
Despite being excited to embark on this new venture, Gorka has also admitted that he feels guilty about leaving his family behind to compete in the series.
He posted a photo of himself in tears on Instagram in a moment of vulnerability, saying: “Sometimes I feel like in here we all share happy things, or things that can make others go Wow look at him/her…how amazing.
“Maybe scared to show the other side of us, more vulnerable, but that is still us.
“So…here is me, having a moment of those that sometimes we hide or keep for our selves, especially being a man.”
Gorka went on to elaborate on the mixed emotions he has as a new season of Strictly kicks off.
He added: “I feel like today should be one of those days where everyone might think is all happiness, joy, excitement, for all what is about to start with Strictly…And YES it is.
“But at the same time I get a feeling of sadness, guilt, for going away for what ever long it is. A feeling of letting them down for not being there, a sense of failure to them…”
The dad-of-two went on to clarify that his family is excited to watch him dance but supports his career, but it still is difficult to spend long periods of time away from them.
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