I used to watch other parents enjoying quality time and family activities with their children, and longingly wonder why my own reality of motherhood and “family time” was so different. Why couldn’t I just enjoy my children? Why did I always feel like I was enduring them? It was a soul-crushing feeling, and one I beat myself up for daily. I wanted so much to have the experiences I saw other mothers having… family nature walks, baking together, game night, quiet Sunday afternoons reading books together while bread was baking in the oven.
Instead, I was dealing with meltdowns by the hour with children who couldn’t calm. Game nights turned into fight club, and apparently the mere idea of baking with me was a death sentence. I spent so much time and energy managing behaviour, emotions and arguments that I barely had the energy to bathe, let alone bake bread.
Managing the emotional tsunamis of intense children can be so exhausting, it can be hard to keep your head above the water of frustration and overwhelm. Nothing makes you diagnose your own family as a disaster faster than the sight of another family calmly enjoying themselves. Believe me, I get it. But my dear reader, if you are up at night googling “how to parent an intense child,” it’s because you are a good and loving parent, trying to do and be the best you can for your child. Before you call yourself a failure because you are struggling to have grace for your tough-to-raise child, remember that first you have to have some grace for yourself.
For me, this shift happened slowly over time as I learned to embrace two basic practices:
Set Realistic Expectations
When I was looking around me at the experiences of other families’ best moments and comparing it to our worst ones, I was already setting myself up for disillusionment and frustration. Holding tightly to how I thought our famiy “should” be, highlighted only what we couldn’t do, instead of what we could. The first step to having grace for my children and myself was examining the expectations I had for our family, where they were coming from, and whether they were helping or harming us. I had to let go of my expectations of perfection, and instead embrace what was possible.
For Your Child
I remember vividly a day a number of years ago when my son and I were in a screaming match. I was furious because I had made what I thought was a simple request and got a tantrum instead. And I lost it. We were both losing it. After he slammed the door to his room, I went into the kitchen and sobberd. This was not what I dreamed motherhood would be like! Why did everything have to be so, SO, hard? As I stood in my kitchen, crying and praying and asking God why I just couldn’t seem to get this right, a picture came into my mind:
I was a picture of my son, sitting in a wheelchair at the bottom of a staircase, and me yelling at him to get up the stairs. Climbing stairs is easy! JUST DO IT!
In that instant, I understood the root of the problem. I was expecting something from my son that he was not capapble of doing. Just like phyisical factors would prevent a child in a wheelchair from climbing the stairs, there were emotional and cognitive factors preventing my son from complying with my request. I’m not a bad parent. He’s not a bad kid. He just isn’t able to do it.
Getting my mind around the fact that my child is not giving me a hard time, my child is having a hard time, was instrumental in shaping my reactions to my child’s episodes. Instead of immediately thinking “why are you doing this to me?!” or “why can’t you just…!” I instead began asking, “what do you need?” and “what is going wrong for you?” This was a subtle shift in approach with significant impact. If I think my child is being defiant and rebellious, it’s too easy to take personal offense, which affects my reaction. If I know my child is not being defiant, but is actually in emotional crisis, that is not personal to me, so it’s easier to respond with compassion. Understanding the nature of my child’s limitations and adjusting my expectations accordingly is key.
For yourself
Just as important as understanding your child’s limitations, is also knowing your own. Parenting this amazing child takes more of everything. More time, more energy, more emotion, more resources, more effort. Just more. And because this reality costs you more than it costs parents of typical kids, you will need to budget your energy resources differently. Are there things in your life you are committed to that you just don’t have the energy for? What does your calendar look like? What things in your life can change so that you have more energy for the things that can’t change?
Asking these questions led us to sell our large, two storey home and move into a smaller, one level home in a less expensive neighbourhood. I just did not have the physical or emotional energy to take care of a big house. Moving to a smaller home not only alleviated the physical toll of the bigger house, but it also freed up some of our finances to help with all the additional medical/therapeutic costs of having high needs children and allowed me to put off going back to work for longer. Two years later, it is the best decision we’ve ever made for our family! We are all in a much healthier place as a result!
For others
Parenting intense, high-needs children can be so lonely. Other parents just don’t get it. And how could they? Their experience is just different. And in order for them to “get it,” they would have to be living the same reality, and is that really what we want?
A few years ago a dear friend of mine battled cancer. I could imagine what she was going through, but I couldn’t truly know, because I have never had cancer. I’m sure that there were many times that my friend felt alone, and that none of her friends could truly understand, but then in order for us to truly “get it,” we would have to have had cancer also, which she would never want. You see what I mean?
Accepting that other people who have not shared your experience will probably never truly “get it” can help you have grace and patience for them when you find yourself explaining your child’s needs over and over again. It can also help free you from the frustration and hurt when they miss the mark. After all, they’re doing their best too. Let them make mistakes. And let them try again.
Prioritize Self-Care
Defining what self-care is and what it looks like can be tricky because it will be different for all of us. Basically, self-care means taking care of yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually so that you can be the healthiest version of yourself, and it means believing that your needs in these areas are equally as important as your family’s needs. When we give equal effort and enegery to our own wellness as we do to our children’s, we are healthier in all of these areas, and better care for our people from a place of wholeness, which helps them be their best selves also. Spend some time considering what you need in these areas:
- How is your energy, lately? How is your overall physical health? Are you getting enough sleep? How long has it been since you visited the doctor for a check-up?
- What do you need for your mind to be well? What are your thought patterns like? Are you getting enough alone time? Are there activities you enjoy that you have given up because it feels “selfish?”
- Do you have someone to talk to who can listen with empathy? Do you have compassion for yourself? If you don’t journal already, it might be helpful to start. Pour all your feelings onto the pages, and then tell yourself what you would say to your best friend if she had just confided those things in you.
- Are you making time for prayer, meditation and reflection? For so many years I thought of this time as something I had to offer God, another thing on my neverending “to-do” list, another expectation that I just couldn’t meet. But it isn’t that. It’s actually something Jesus does for me. It’s a time for me to recieve something, rather than give it. This time apart with the Lord is so restorative, and a critical part of self-care for me!
Self-care is important for any parent, but it is especially important for parents of intense children. You can’t give what you don’t have, so if you’re not taking time regularly to fill your own cup, you won’t have anything left to give your child. Creating a more peaceful home starts with you!
Resources For Support
When the fog of exhaustion makes your brain feel like scrambled eggs, it’s overwhelming to even begin thinking about where to start, so I’ve compiled a list of starting places for you: where to go, and what to read to help you get started.
We’re in this together!
Websites
Davidson Institute for Talent Development
Brain Balance Achievement Centers
Pediatric Sleep Disordered Breathing
Books
The Explosive Child by Ross W. Greene
Smart But Scattered Dawson, EdD, & Richard Guare, PhD
Different by Sally Clarkson
Lavona says
Great insight it is for every parent young and old alike. With or without intense children. Thank you for once again sharing your thoughts with us and helping each of us in our own circumstances. Love you for all you do and share. May God richly bless you and your home today and always.
Jennifer says
Thank you Lavona! Grace is so needed in every area of our lives, but I have definately found it the hardest at home. Preaching to my own heart, here!
Rachel Evans says
Jenn, there’s a lot of great insights in here! Thanks for sharing your journey! It is such an encouragement. I especially love your analogy of asking the child to climb stairs when they aren’t physically able to do so!