Do You Ever Feel Like a Failure as a Parent?
It can be easy to feel like a failure as a parent. We say left, and our kids go right. We say green and they say orange. We hide the cookies, and our kids find them and eat ALL of them while we are in the bathroom for 5 minutes or less.
Sometimes it seems like we just cannot connect with our kids. And we feel like we have failed because of that. That is how we feel, but it is not the reality.
What to do when you feel like a failure as a parent
When you feel like a failure as a parent, here are a few things you can do to help yourself:
- Pray for insight and help.
- Manage your expectations.
- Discuss with your spouse.
- Make a plan.
Now we will break down each one in more detail:
Pray for insight and help.
Prayer should always be our first go-to plan.
Pour your heart out to God; tell Him the good, the bad, and the ugly. He knows already, but tell Him. He wants to hear from you and spilling it ALL out can help you process through things and gain some insights as well.
You can pray at home, at church, in front of the Blessed Sacrament in Adoration, on a walk outside, in a journal, or sobbing on the bathroom floor. It does not matter when or where you talk with God. Decide to talk with Him and ask Him to help you. He will.
You can find more ideas about praying in How to “Pray About It.”
Manage your expectations.
Sometimes we feel like a failure as a parent because our kids do not act as we expect them to act. For a larger-than-life example, imagine you are out until 10 pm with your two-year-old who has not had a nap, and you expect her to be 100% well-behaved when your cousin’s son takes the last cookie from her. We know that is an unrealistic expectation. It will not happen.
I know this is not a realistic scenario, but think of times when you realize that you did have an unrealistic expectation for your child. When she did not meet your expectations, you felt like a failure when in actuality, you set yourself up.
Managing our expectations of our kids and ourselves can help us know what is realistic to expect, what is not realistic, and what we can do to bridge the gap between the two.
Discuss with your spouse.
Talk with your spouse about how you are feeling. It may be best to do this after you have done the first two ideas, when it has not been one of those days, and you are at the end of your rope. Going out together on a drive or on a walk to have time to talk in a different environment than at home may be helpful as well. Sometimes that can make a big difference.
Make a plan.
After praying, evaluating your expectations, and talking with your spouse, it is time to make a plan.
What will your expectations be for your kids? What will your expectations be for your kids? How often will you pray about this and ask God for insights and help? How often will you and your spouse talk about this to check in with each other and revise your plan?
Sometimes it is helpful to write this down so you can remember what you have decided to do. Then look at your plan daily to keep it in your mind instead of putting the paper in a drawer and forgetting about it until you clean out that drawer in a few months.
Having a plan only works if you follow through with the plan and do it.
Also important is to take care of yourself. When you are run down, not sleeping or eating well, or dealing with a lot of stress in your life, things seem worse.
Planning time to pray, evaluating your expectations for your children, and discussing these things with your spouse are important. Remember that feeling like a failure as a parent is different than being a failure as a parent. God is with us. He gave our kids to us and gave us as parents to our kids for a reason. He knows what He is doing and He will help us each step of the way.
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