We need to learn that our kids will thrive when we don’t project our own negative feelings onto them.
The Splashing Little Girl
My dad taught me to swim by throwing me into the Danube River, so I was terrified of letting my child near water, haunted by the thought she might fall in and start drowning like I almost did. My sister took me by the hand and brought me to a therapist. She said it was time to heal this trauma because they had just bought a boat and didn’t want me to deny my daughter the joy of splashing around with her cousins. Now, it’s my daughter teaching me how to swim.
The Race
My son ran his first race and he wasn’t nervous—but I was. I kept telling him not to sprint at the start, to watch his breathing and pace, until my husband stopped me. I stopped giving instructions but then started bombarding my husband with questions. What if he falls and gets hurt? What if he comes in last? What if he loses to his best friend? “Honey, this isn’t your swim meet. Let him enjoy himself.” my husband said, and I realized he was right. I used to swim competitively and had my share of disqualifications, injuries, and heartbreaks. All those memories—the wins, the losses, the tears—came rushing back. And I projected that anxiety onto my eight-year-old son, who was just running a casual weekend race. He finished third, laughing and crossing the finish line with his friend, clearly having a blast.
And then?
As a helicopter parent, I hovered anxiously around my climbing daughter until my brother walked away. I asked, “But what if she falls?!” (I had fallen out of a swing as a kid and wanted to protect her.) He said, “She’ll just bump herself and be running again in a minute. Leave the poor kid alone—you’re stressing her out, and she might end up as neurotic as you.” His words were, to say the least, eye-opening.
Appearance
I worried through high school because looking good felt like everything. Even at 117 lbs (53 kg), I was always dieting, waking up an hour early to fix my hair, yet convinced I was ugly. I feared my daughter’s life would be miserable in high school because she’s strong-boned and doesn’t care about looks. She dresses tomboyish, has short hair, and while she’s the most beautiful to me, she’s not a conventional beauty. To my surprise, she started dating the most popular guy in her grade during the first semester.
The Learning Process
I wanted to shield my son from every failure so much that the school psychologist had to explain to me that my behavior was counterproductive. “Mom, understand this is necessary. If a child never loses, they won’t learn from mistakes and will crumble under the slightest pressure as an adult.”
The Good Kid
My strict parents punished me harshly when I “misbehaved,” and I tried to pass that childhood baggage onto my son by overcompensating and letting him have his way. My husband told me not to turn our child into a rebellious anarchist because of my past—and he was right.
Fitting In
A big break in my childhood was when my dad’s job moved us to Austria. I lost my best friend and didn’t speak to anyone at my new school for months—I didn’t speak German and was angry about being uprooted. It took me two years to adjust, so I felt awful when we moved to the countryside and my daughter had to switch schools. I proactively found a local child psychologist to help her process the change. After three sessions, the specialist said, “Mom, your extroverted child is fine, she already has friends, and there’s no need to keep coming.”
Grades
My parents never pressured me, but I felt the need to be top of my class. The pressure I put on myself made me sick before graduation, so I told my son every week that his dad and I have no expectations, he can study wherever he wants, and we don’t expect straight A’s. After one of my many speeches, he said, “Mom, I’m not as stressed or overachieving as you. Trust me, it’s all good, chill out!”
The Gentleman
I yelled at my son when he ran up to an older man in the park because memories of the “Boogeyman”—a scruffy “sugar daddy” figure adults warned us about—flooded back. Other moms looked at me like I was crazy, but that man was actually the cute park ranger every kid adored.
The Melody
I went to music school and had stomach knots when my child said he wanted to be a pianist too. I couldn’t sleep for days before his performances, but he just smiled because he was never the nervous type like me. It turned out he went to an audition without telling me so I wouldn’t worry. He didn’t get in, but shrugged it off, while I cried for a month when the same happened to me. He didn’t become a pianist but an engineer who still loves to play piano for fun. To me, that’s a bigger success than becoming a world-famous musician.
