How Parents Can Help Children to Not Feel Abandoned with Their Feelings

It Starts with Parents: We Nurture Our Inner Space to Benefit Ourselves and Our Children

Maintaining and improving our inner space maximizes our effectiveness at life. We want to fully be who we truly are and in the most positively powerful way. We want to thrive at everything we are and at everything we do. And in doing so, we benefit both ourselves and others. This has never been a zero-sum achievement. Any time you take care of yourself in order to be a more fulfilled and refined human, you benefit others. You can only love others as much as you love yourself. We owe it to our children to love ourselves as genuinely as possible. This is the only way we can love them as genuinely as possible. And loving children genuinely means honoring their experience of life, through their personal lens. We need to consider and respect their viewpoint instead of only our own. Far too often do adults honor only their own.

Children Have Their Own Perspective and Interpretation of Reality

When teaching our children, it is important to always try to understand their point of view. We may have a very noble objective with good intentions to bring about some improvement – whether in their behavior, schedule, or any pattern. And to bring about this objective, we go to certain ends. The things we do or say may truly be harmless, so our child is certainly not abused or abandoned. Our child, on the other hand, may feel abused or abandoned because that is how he/she experiences the situation.

When we consider all of the huge and scary feelings that our child may have for any situation no matter how ridiculous or puzzling they may seem to us, we are taking the first step to consciously understanding and honoring their experience. The point here is to identify the sometimes stark difference between an event and our child’s interpretation of the event.

We Owe Children Consideration of Their Point of View

When we only focus on an event from our educated adult perspective, we inevitably give preference to a reality that someone our age (and in our shoes and body size) values and experiences. We are neglecting the reality that someone much younger and much smaller than us values and experiences. We assume that they will, by emotional osmosis, understand and accept our adult perspective. That is why we cannot understand their seemingly irrational behaviour toward our reasonable demands.

The reality is that our children’s reality can differ vastly from ours, and for good reason: they are not us! As Kahlil Gibran wrote in ‘Your Children Are Not Your Children, ‘you may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts.’ Even though we may love our children tremendously and take actions that we reasonably believe are in their best interest, we fail to truly do so when we don’t consider the way that they alone experience these actions.

Children Experience Extreme Emotions in Minor Situations

When we adults experience a difficult situation such as depression or any emotional hardship, we are encouraged to seek help. We are told to connect with a friend or loved one, to share our feelings and to not suffer alone. Why is it, then, that we should ever expect our children to suffer through any difficult experience on their own? And difficult experiences they will have. Not getting something that they want can be a difficult experience. That is not always the case, but for mysterious reasons we do not understand, the most seemingly minor things can seem like the most upsetting thing in the world. Of course this can seem ridiculous and certainly exasperating, but children deserve respect, too. The most loving thing we can do is respect their experience by meeting them at their level and empathizing there.

When Children Feel Abandoned if Left Alone to Navigate Difficult Emotions

This does not mean we give them what they want if there is good reason not to. But it means we provide company so they aren’t left alone with their (sometimes terrifying) feelings. It shows them that they are loved, regardless of their behaviour and feelings.

We shouldn’t take an easy out and give them what they want just to placate them, which encourages unproductive behaviour. But we never let the behaviour separate them from our love and our presence. If you leave a young child alone in a room or other place due to their behaviour, you are not actually abandoning them but if children feel abandoned, the result is no different. They will interpret the situation as if they are abandoned, even if you are just outside the door. The point is not whether your child actually is abandoned or neglected, but whether he feels abandoned or neglected.

We Cannot Change How Our Children Feel, But We Can Give Them Reason to Feel Supported

There isn’t much we can do about how our children feel. We can do every good thing to meet our child’s every need and to demonstrate our love for him. He will still feel however he’s going to feel when we change his diaper at a time he doesn’t prefer. He will still burst into tears and tantrum as we gently explain that he can’t remain in a soiled diaper.

We cannot change his feelings about this situation. But we can be patient and present with our child as he processes them. We may have to wait a little longer while he tantrums before we can change his diaper, but we are prepared to wait because that is the reality of raising children (plans change, patience required). We don’t acquiesce to his desire and not change his diaper just because he isn’t feeling it. That encourages the behaviour as a way to get what he wants. But neither do we leave him, which unintentionally teaches him that he will be abandoned (his interpretation) when he doesn’t act the way we expect.

When Temporarily Removing Ourselves from a Situation is in Everyone’s Best Interest

We won’t always have the ability to be patient and present with our children during difficult situations. Sometimes, we will need to remove ourselves from the situation in order to cool off after a particularly stressful experience. This is important and necessary so long as you leave your child in a safe place and for only a few minutes (or as few as safely necessary for you to regain calm). Everybody will need to do this sometimes unless you have help 24/7 or a completely stress-free life. But taking care of ourselves, first, helps us to get to that point as infrequently as possible so that we are able to calmly and lovingly stay with our children during their rough times.

To love well is to love patiently, firmly and consistently. It is to consider our children’s perspective and to be empathetic in how we respond to their behaviour. We remain with them even when they lose control, doing what we need to do to keep them and ourselves safe from harm and injury. We firmly show them that we expect them to behave within the limits that we specify (i.e. to not bite/scratch mom, bang head, etc.) and that we still love them and are available to help when they struggle to do so.

Though We Cannot Know Exactly What Children Feel, We Can Support Them Consistently

Even if we don’t know when or if children feel abandoned (or neglected, abused, or otherwise mistreated) when ostracized for their behaviour, why risk it? The reality is that no matter how much parenting ‘experts’ or professionals tell us otherwise, nobody really knows what is going on in children’s minds. It will always be a mystery. We can guess, speculate, and make educated assumptions, but at the end of the day, they are their own individual human minds that we will never fully grasp.

The best we can do is to always give children the benefit of the doubt and offer patient, consistent love through any trying situation so that we constantly affirm them in love. At the least, this will show our children that we are there for them while they are upset. At the most, this can help them to not feel abandoned while going through difficult feelings. To love is to take action. Loving children through happy times comes naturally and enriches their lives. Consciously loving children through challenging times takes more effort and also makes a much more significant impact on their emotional development and well-being!