Dear Dr. Allen: Changing your parental mindset
For many parents, their difficult childhoods, life experiences and the news they hear in the world create a fearful perspective in the guidance of their kids. It is common to believe things we are afraid of will become a reality. It is good to learn from our past experiences. However, just because something happened to parents, doesn’t mean it’s going to happen to us or to their kids. We can be aware of the potential reality of a bad thing reoccurring but it isn’t healthy to act as if it will happen again. You likely learned your best life lessons from going through trying times. We do grow the most from going through life stressors or as some call them, trials and tribulations. We certainly don’t seek these out. However, we know they will come our way and ours kids’ way. While we need to protect our kids as much as we can from bad things happening to them, we can’t prevent difficult life experiences from coming into their lives. The past few years have shown that parents overly prioritizing achievement can lead to mental health problems in their children. These include depression, anxiety and suicidality. The character of a person has often been a secondary emphasis of parents…
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