Are we projecting an impossible ideal of parenting perfection onto our children – for them to also be perfect, to represent to the world that we are good parents? So, what if there are problems? What is a person without problems? Our child may develop depression and anxiety, or an addiction, or be insecure, or reckless. They may partner up with someone who is mean to them, or struggle to figure out a professional path. Are we to blame this all on ourselves as parents, or is this part of LIFE?

With the expanded knowledge and awareness about children’s emotional and behavioral health, chances are that at some point in your parenting journey, you may need professional support. If in doubt, even scheduling an evaluation with a mental health professional can either give you peace of mind, or move you toward getting the help your child needs. So, even as we should work on accepting that what counts as “normal” is wide and diverse, I hope we can also accept that needing help at some points along the way has also become more and more normal.

Parenting will never be simple, but what we focus on can be. Even as we struggle with HOW to set limits as an authoritative parent, we keep trying within the context of connecting with our children. Even when we spend a few days away from our baby to stay psychologically afloat, we know our attachment can withstand the break. Even after regrettable interactions where we weren’t our best selves, we give hugs and apologies and know not only how much we love them, but that they still love us.

You can read and re-read this post (and the next one, part 2) when you feel overwhelmed by it all. When it feels impossible to use all the strategies. When your family’s basic survival is all that matters. When you just want to reassure yourself that what you are doing is good enough. It probably is.

So are saving money and streamlining the drop-off and pick-up routine making this decision at the expense of his academic and social success?

We work more, parent more, and stress more than any previous generation of parents, and it has ramifications for our health, physical and mental. It’s too much, and we are crumbling under the pressures. These ramifications trickle down to negatively affect our children. We need to change the universe of modern parenting guidance to be more compassionate and realistic, supporting us so we can more fully support our children. When we are better, our children do better.

I have heard from too many that too often we feel like failures after reading a parenting book, or unsuccessfully piloting new parenting strategies with an unreceptive audience (our children).

As with all things 2020 version, this holiday season will feel different. Most of us will be grieving some form of loss, whether it is the loss of travel, usual traditions, or the first holiday without a loved one. When we are grieving, especially a profound loss, this holiday joy can feel distant and wrong. If this describes you right now, you are not alone and you can get through whatever version of “holiday spirit” is true for you this year, even if you have grief as a companion.

This year, our brains, which unfortunately work like magnets for the negative input (fear, worries, the one bad interaction in an otherwise good day) are likely heavily focusing on dire and doom. “Winter Is Coming” has never felt so viscerally full of dread. Exactly all of this builds the case for why our brains need gratitude this Thanksgiving 2020 more than ever. It feels so hard because we need it so much. To persuade you, I offer a breakdown of the science of gratitude and strategies to make it simple. We have enough hard right now, but trust me, this can be really easy with big benefits to get us through the next few months.

You may not have the (enormous) benefit of a therapist in your life right now, yet you are feeling the weight of a thousand stress pounds bearing down on your shoulders. If that is the case for you or someone you know, I am sharing a cliff notes version of my expertise-based analysis of the reasons why you’re so tired, and what to do about it.

There is more and more evidence for how stress directly affects our immune systems, how our major organs work, our lifespans, and our emotional health. So besides running away to a Hawaiian island far away from it all, what can we do?

What CAN we do in the day-to-day grind of taking care of ourselves and our families in this current state of surreal? I mean, wildfires are consuming blue sky in huge swaths of the country, how much more apocalyptic can it all look? We need to balance staying informed and aware of the world around us, while staying out of its quicksand of hopelessness and helplessness, focusing on our pieces of the world: our homes and families.

The word “politics” may bring up notions of greed, power, deceit, manipulation, and all sorts of bad values we would not promote with our children. But if we can re-frame politics as a necessary and intrinsic part of our functioning society, maybe we can actually see this as an opportunity for this next generation we are currently raising.

 A reward system has dug my kids out of many a behavioral rut in our almost decade of parenting. That’s why reading the recent warnings about using rewards with children has simply confused me. I looked more deeply into what was going on, and I found the exact problem I set out to take on as the Art and Science of Mom – a well-intentioned misunderstanding of research findings.

Recent surveys indicating a mental health crisis due to the pandemic unfortunately support my observations and concerns, and prompted me to write a guide that offers a condensed version of what we know helps psychological health and coping.

The careful and artful application of behavior plans can accomplish even more than making our lives easier. It helps teach our children to master important skills for life, building their confidence that they can in fact do something that seemed difficult or overwhelming.

Allowance is just one more parenting area where I have great aspirations, but the execution has lagged far behind. After doing the research, I concluded it’s time to change that. Now.  

We are all scared. Fear is what I see playing out in the heated and emotional debates about parenting decisions in the age of COVID. We are all grieving the loss of normal while managing chronic, high anxiety. Where our fears may have been lurking in the backseat before, they are now in the driver’s seat, taking the wheel.

I think we can all agree with the stance that having screen time limits is good. The confusing part comes in the details – what are those limits? How much screen time is too much? How do we enforce limits in a pandemic involving an unprecedented level of being homebound?

The science is clear: chores have huge benefits for kids. So how do we bridge this gap between what we know is best for our kids and doing it?