Why Parenting Feels So Hard—The Answer Isn’t What You Think

Parenting is hard. You’re constantly triggered by your kids’ emotions. When your child has a meltdown, it can leave you in a tailspin or, worse, you lose your temper. Everyone desires to raise emotionally healthy kids, but sometimes we find we lack the basic tools to do so. The reason parenting is so hard might surprise you—it’s your nervous system. Yep, there’s science behind why parenting can be some of the hardest work you’ll ever do. It’s the work most of us were not taught to do—regulation, repair, and reparenting yourself while raising your child.

Deena Margolin and Kristin Gallant, cohosts of After Bedtime Big Little Feelings, discuss how to become the parent you never had in a recent episode. The process is necessary, and full of grief, healing, and learning, but the work reaps rewards. Once you’re on the other side, you’ll be able to model emotional regulation for your kids and be the parent you always needed.

Breaking generational cycles `

Margolin, a millennial mom of two boys, explains that her generation learned obedience over emotional intelligence. “It was quiet over communication. Compliance over connection,” she explains. “Emotions were seen as disruptive, disrespectful, and even at times, dangerous. Control was safety, and parenting was shaped by survival.”

Our parents had the best intentions, but culturally, parenting in the 90s and early 2000s was centered on behavior, and behavior was managed through fear. According to Margolin, the fear toolbox looked like shame, spankings, bribes, and the classic warning, “Because I said so.”

Gallant agrees that the millennial generation never learned to regulate their emotions. “A lot of us were shamed or shut down for expressing very normal feelings,” she adds. “I can remember being 5 and knowing that I needed to suck my little tears back in.” 

Now as adults, Gallant and her millennial parent peers are dictated by the internal voice that apologies for feeling or that doesn’t want to upset anyone. “Because of that, my nervous system goes into a full panic attack when my kid cries,” she says. “I had no idea that my body was thinking there was an emergency because I learned that crying meant danger.”

How to build regulation skills in real time

The pattern that Gallant experienced as a child—where she was shamed for her emotions—is common because that generation largely lacked co-regulation. Co-regulation is when a calm, emotional present adult helps a child regulate their emotions in the moment. If you never got that as a kid consistently, your brain probably didn’t build healthy pathways to regulation. This can result in suppressing emotions, exploding, numbing feelings, and shutting down. 

So how do you figure out co-regulation, as an adult when you did not have caregivers who were in tune with your emotions? It starts with asking yourself, “What’s one thing you wish you received as a child?” Not the big stuff, but the emotional stuff. Maybe it’s that you are not too much, that you’re allowed to feel this, that or you are seen and loved. 

Parents, the healing comes when you can tell yourself the thing you needed to hear as a kid. It’s a part of the reparenting process. For Gallant, it was: “You’re not too much. You’re just a kid with a lot of big feelings, and I’ve got you.” Gallant now uses this tool to help reparent herself in hard moments. 

Grief is a part of the regulation process 

Stopping generational cycles is the real work—the unglamorous, uncomfortable, and transformational work. You’re not just raising a child, but you’re raising yourself when you choose to parent differently. It’s hard, and it can stir up a lot of emotions.

Gallant admits that she felt grief when she understood what co-regulation was and that she never received it. “Honestly, I felt really sad for the little me who did not have the parent who was saying the words that I am now saying to my children,” she says. “It’s an ache in your chest when you sit on the floor and stay calm during your child’s meltdown, and you realize that no one ever did this for me. You feel that ache and that wound, but you still decide to show up differently—that’s healing.”

What generational healing looks like

The good news is that the human brain can change, grow, and rewire, aka neuroplasticity. There’s so much potential for how you think and function to change, even when it comes to how you parent. “Every time you pause, take a breath, and choose connection over control, you are changing the wiring of your brain,” Margolin says. “It’s hard at first, but the more you practice, the easier it eventually becomes.”

Gallant explains that with repetition of reacting to your kid’s meltdowns in a different way, that new behavior essentially creates a groove in your brain. The more you choose this calm and present response, the more it becomes the default for your brain to go to. “At the beginning, it feels hard, but it’s not because you are broken. It’s because you are growing, so keep going,” Margolin agrees. 

4 tools for breaking cycles

1. Pause and name your feeling. Name the feeling to yourself. Whether you are feeling sad, mad, frustrated, or scared, naming it helps contain the internal chaos. It prevents you from feeling overwhelmed in the moment.

2. Calm your nervous system and ground yourself. When you are having a hard time, your nervous system is in the red. To bring it back to the baseline, put one hand on your chest and one hand on your stomach and take a deep breath. Other tools include leaning your back against a wall and breathing or smelling a strong scent like a candle or an orange.

3. Monitor how you talk to yourself. Pause and intentionally say nurturing things to yourself like, “This feeling will pass,” or “I am safe right now.” Saying these things will help you switch from reaction mode to response mode.
4. Do an inner child check-in. Pause and ask yourself, “What did I need when I was upset when I was little? Can I give that to myself right now?” Giving yourself intentional comfort and soothing can change everything.

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