Stop apologizing for your kids

I was at a playdate with my six month old, Christopher. My girlfriend’s baby was three months old at the time. Christopher, my wild child, is crawling everywhere. He is exploring every nook and cranny and completely trampling my friend’s baby. He had a huge grin on his face as he smashed his hands into her hair and tried to nuzzle her with all his might. Naturally, I redirect Christopher so that he does not crush the baby. Then I found myself apologizing—I felt embarrassed by his behavior. 

I apologized for his completely normal 6-month-old behavior. As a psychologist, I have all the education and I know that his behavior is nothing but developmentally appropriate, yet I am still apologizing. Since then, I have noticed myself and even other moms doing the same thing at nearly every playdate. Everyone is apologizing for their toddler having a meltdown during a transition away from an activity they were enjoying and apologizing for their four year old having trouble sharing. None of these children are doing anything egregious or even strange, but we are all somehow apologizing again and again.

It soon became clear all of the apologizing had nothing to do with Christopher or the other children. Perhaps, it’s about me feeling like I’m not a good enough mother? Or, possibly my own self-doubt about whether I am doing something wrong or not doing something I should be doing so my baby is turning out to be some sort of dreamy, blue-eyed, aggressive child? 

I realized that what it boils down to is that motherhood is vulnerable and insecurity surfaces in masked ways, like apologizing for our children’s perfectly normal behavior. Somewhere along the way we’ve set the bar too high for mothers. Our culture is hard on mothers. Society sets impossible standards. There’s this unspoken expectation that we should be able to do ALL the things ALL the time and that we should want to do it all. Not only that, but we moms should enjoy it while we are doing it and we should be good at it. There’s this idea that since motherhood should be “natural” it therefore should be easy. My passion for the deleterious affects of impossible standards like this has led me to co-found FemFwd, a relationship resource for women, as I believe our internal dialogue and the dialogue we are having with others is so important in revising these standards and therefore, improving our overall wellness. 

I wonder what it would be like to replace the apology with something like “I am so worried I’m not getting this right”. We should be evoking compassion—for ourselves and our fellow mothers—to change the narrative of motherhood. 

Now, I am not suggesting that we let our children exist without any guidance.  I am such a fan of teaching our children and educating parents that I even have workshops on the subject. I am suggesting that we change our internal dialogue and extend grace to ourselves in this parenting process. I’m suggesting that we parent through a lens of self-compassion.

Doing this will allow us to be the “good enough” mother. 

It means that it’s OK that we don’t always know what to do or how to handle our children’s behavior or big emotions. 

It means that our children having difficulties or big feelings is not a direct reflection on who we are as mothers. 

It means that our children are allowed to take up space in the world. They are allowed to inconvenience others, to make too much noise sometimes, and to have tantrums in environments that are not conducive. 

It also means that it’s OK to not always enjoy this parenting gig and that it’s OK to need, want and to accept help. 

It means that there is no need to apologize for being a perfectly imperfect parent or for our children appropriately stumbling their way through their development. 

After all, mothers are doing the same thing. We are on our own developmental trajectory. Just like our children, we stumble and get back up again. Rinse and repeat. So next time you hear a mama apologizing for her child’s perfectly normal behavior, offer them a supportive smile, encouraging words or a gentle reminder that they’re doing the best that they can and that that is enough.