Part of good parenting is about having realistic expectations. But the problem is...."What is realistic?"
I often say that life is a balancing act of a lot of things. If life is not challenging enough, then the child does not thrive. If it is too challenging, then they might get overwhelmed and get traumatised by the experience. The trick is to set some challenges, but to have the support behind them in order to help them get up if they fail, and eventually help them to succeed in that challenge. If they are getting distressed, anxious, and depressed from the experience, then we may have to ask the following:
1 Are they at the right developmental age for what I expect them to do?
2 They might be good at other things but do they actually have the skills in this area?
3 Do they have enough support in order to learn the skills to overcome the challenges?
4 Are we pushing them too much?
Depending on what the answer is, will dictate our next line of action...
