Hey Parent, Your Child is Stressed AF

Can I get the attention of the parents real quick?

You fine folks here now? Great. Now, let me apologize. For what? I'm glad you asked.

A couple months ago, a few "how to's" on study habits and writing skills previous published in Education. And I told you I would be back with some more. And while I gave advice to students along their study to protect their finances at some point, most of the rest of my content has been more problem-oriented than solution-oriented.

That is not okay, so allow me to make this up to you. Let's begin.

You're stressed, right? Of course you are. You're a parent. Even in the most spiritually-balanced of households, parents have struggles. And parenting can be eustress (the "good stress"), versus distress (the "bad stress"). And it's a deep investment, and getting all the momentum straight is good, and can lead to a sense of fulfillment, but there is a library of conditions and circumstances that can make stress as a parent just crazy. So, grab a juice, a coffee, a shot of whiskey, or whatever you do to relax. Hey veteran parent, for what it's worth, this rookie bonus parent sees you.

But I also see your kids. No, not like that. And I'm not saying you don't. Please allow me, before I go into my "solution", to present the problem from a new perspective. There are some parents that parent based on their perceptions from their childhood, and others still who break away completely from what they learned as kids, but the practical answer is that with the exception of a few cases, the answer is probably in some happy medium most parents miss, because parents are human. Instead of digressing into a post on the five types of parenting, let's just conclude this: you're human. Your child, however, is even more human. I mean, imagine being exposed to almost everything you are now, with a minute fraction of the life skills. And as much as we would love to think we insulate our children from everything, life still comes at our children hard, pressuring them to grow up much faster than we would ever want them to.

Before I continue, I don't write this to disparage anyone's parenting style, but I want you to think about this. Our fight as parents to keep our kids healthy and balanced is way more difficult now for many reasons: social media, the current health crisis that will go unnamed, unprecedented access to electronics, cyberbullying, classic bullying, multiple body image disorders, unprecedented mental health concerns, burnt out teachers, and the world using those electronics to further distort developing perspectives. And let me say now; whatever choices your child grows up to make are fine with me; I can't police your household. But if not me, then none of these other jokers out here on "Al Gore's internet" either. Even after the things that affect every family in some way, you can now add the things specific to your family. In most households, that equation adds up to stress. And if it's affecting you, I'd bet the farm it's hitting them harder.

You may be looking at this and you're saying, "of course this is the case; this isn't rocket science. But can't they just cope?" And if this is you, I'd counter with "How are you coping?" And I get it (sort of); I was one of those kids who never made it a habit of challenging parents or even crying out for help, no matter how stressed I was (it hurt, maybe a little lol). This may have been your childhood too (if it wasn't that's awesome). That era I think is dead (I personally think it should be cremated with no funeral, and punted into the sea). There's a lot parenting may have to compromise on to do well, but keeping our kids' stress down is a line in the sand and a hill parents have to be willing to "die" on.

And no formula will work universally, but because I want every kid everywhere to be well, please stay tuned for Part 2 of this article where I go into some worthwhile solutions to help your child mitigate stress.