Parents are under unrealistic pressure to always be ‘nice’!
It is just not possible! I get tired, irritable, annoyed, frustrated, down, depressed, upset—the list goes on. For me, parenting is about balance. Am I creating a safe space for my children? Am I working to improve on this every day? That is me as a parent. It is also the social narrative. What I feel is missing from the social narrative around children is an understanding that ‘safe spaces’ for children need to be safe spaces for parents. The simple truth is children can be toxic sometimes, and we, as parents, try to navigate them through their toxicity. It is not all learned toxicity with children; some of it they bring with them when they are born, some of it is theirs alone, children are born with shadows. Karma, call it what you will, past life experience. Children bring unresolved issues with them (but that’s a whole other post). Shadows need to be worked through in life. We are all here to grow beyond our shadow. The focus here is defining ‘safe’. Understanding ‘safe...