Habits that can affect your relationship with your kids

As parents, we want our children to succeed. Sometimes, we show “tough love” to our loved ones with the intention to push them further in life. By showing ‘tough love’ to our loved ones, we are unintentionally bringing them down. Intensive tough love is more likely to create shame and guilt in the mind of our children. Although we believe tough love may be necessary to push someone further, it does not promote healthy self-growth.

Next, comparing our children to others can lead our children into trying hard to please us, as parents. When constantly being compared to others, children can find themselves as very anxious. Children who are constantly compared to others may develop lower self-esteem as they start to believe everyone is better than they are.

Thirdly, when children try to express themselves in creative ways it can result in their parents being judgemental towards them. Judgement coming from parents can negatively affect our children’s self-esteem. It is important to stay non-judgemental so our children can be more open with us as parents. This will allow for more opportunities for us as parents to help our children by nurturing an open relationship.

Lastly, as parents we only want our children to do their best. We do as much as we can for them to see their best. Sometimes, we pressure our children without realizing it. Constant pressure can be detrimental to our children and may cause anxiety. In turn, our children can become stressed by trying to meet our expectations and of feeling overly pressured. High amounts of stress may place children at a greater risk of developing depression or other mental health conditions compared to children who are not under constant pressure.

Overall, It is important to have realistic ideals of our children and to most importantly stay positive in our relationships by understanding no one is perfect.

Janelle DeLeon

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