At a basic level, there must be food. There must be shelter. There must be love, there must be fulfillment. If parents do not provide this, kids will seek it out. It may come from an uncle, it may come from a neighbor, it may come from the mailman, it may come from within.

I was raised that no matter what, don't involve grownups. I had a place to sleep and there was food in the fridge but everything else was pretty much fend for yourself. Which was actually preferable to "family functions" where I mostly wished I was alone. So my "parenting" was an ad-hoc self-run tutorial.

Not all kids will instinctively avoid parental figures like I did. But when the basic lessons one would get from a parent aren't coming from a parent, the kids will find places to get them. Television. Video games. Friends. Whatever.

I've had a kid for 10 months now and I gotta say - it has been far less impactful on my life than having a motorcycle or having an SLR camera. She's totally awesome and I love her to bits but she's presented exactly zero surprises so far. You've been around kids and parents your entire life - if you don't have a few theories by now you need to pay better attention.