This guest article from YourTango was written by Shelley Skas.
As a parent, you want what’s best for your children. You want them to be smarter, better looking and more well-rounded than you are. You want them to be liked by their peers and to succeed in school. As such, you worry. And, with worrying comes anxiety which can turn into depression. Here are five ways to help you stop worrying so much:
1. Trust the facts.
When you look at the facts and evidence of what has actually been occurring, you’ll find that the worried feeling you have is irrational. Examine what’s actually occurring in your life and consider how you feel after that.
2. Stop over-identifying with your kids.
If your child gets into an argument with another child, do you think, ‘I must be a bad mother?’ If so, you’re personalizing events that aren’t your fault. Tell yourself ‘the only person’s behavior that I can control is my own.’ It’s important to remember that you’re not your child and your child isn’t you.
3. Think positively.
Just because something negative happened once before doesn’t mean it will happen again. Negative events allow people to learn from their mistakes, which allows us to grow intellectually. When you think more positively about how the day will turn out, it usually will turn out that way.
4. Stop blowing things out of proportion.
This commonly occurs when you look at your errors or your child’s errors and exaggerate their importance. Try to focus more on your child’s strengths. This will allow you to feel better about your parenting and allow your child’s self esteem to grow. Anxious Parenting: Are You Guilty Of It?
5. Keep an open mind.
Seeing things in black and white is totally unrealistic because life is rarely completely one way or the other. Look at the room your sitting in now, is it perfectly clean? Is every space piled high with dust or dirt? Or is it partially clean? Absolutes do not exist in this universe.
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 20 Sep 2012
Published on PsychCentral.com. All rights reserved.
Experts, Y. (2012). 5 Tips To Help Parents Worry Less. Psych Central. Retrieved on May 25, 2013, from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2012/09/20/5-tips-to-help-parents-worry-less/
