It's Summertime. The Children are Feral. Time to Give "Good Enough" Parenting a Try.
If you’re a parent who isn’t jumping up and down with excitement that school’s out for the summer, you’ve landed in the right place - you’re in good company here. Don’t get me wrong now - I’d move mountains for my kids. I’m super grateful to have extra time with them. And also! Summertime tests my patience as a mother like no other.
The Reality of Spending Summer with a House of Feral (yet adorable) Goblins
As a mom of teenagers, I’ve lived through the various stages of what it means to have kids home for the summer, and at this point I know enough to realize that I probably need 4 more jobs to pay for the groceries they’ll consume over the next 2 months. There will inevitably be more bickering between siblings. The battle to pull them away from screens will be ever present. And I’ll probably question my parenting skills (and sanity - let’s be real here) more times than I can count. They’ll give me Oscar-worthy speeches about why they don’t need a shower or why they don’t need to go outside for fresh air or why it’s totally fine to consume nothing but chicken nuggets and cheese sticks for 8 days straight.
I don’t have a ton of time left with my kiddos before they fly the coop and are out there on their own. And I’d rather make these last few years with them at home as conflict-free as possible. One way to do this is to embrace the idea of “good enough” parenting (shoutout to the legendary D.W. Winnicott, the pediatrician/psychoanalyst who first came up with this brilliant concept). This post highlights the aspects of good enough parenting that really resonated with me, but there are lots of other great tips. If you want to take a deeper dive, click here to read a great article about good enough parenting over at Psychology Today.
Good Enough Parenting Means It’s Time to Send Perfectionism Packing
The basic premise of this parenting style is just what it sounds like - you just need to be…you guessed it - GOOD ENOUGH. Perfectionism has no place for parents - or for kids - with this approach to parenting. If our kids observe us striving for perfection, they’ll try super hard to live up to that (impossible) standard as well. As a therapist, I can tell you - that shit will follow your kid into adulthood where they’ll end up spending lots of time and money trying to undo those tendencies. Do yourself (and your kids) a favor, let them see you mess up from time to time - it’ll give them permission to do the same.
Meet Their Basic Needs, Nurture their Wild Spirits and Accept Them Unconditionally
One strict guideline is that you need to meet your kid’s basic needs - make sure those little creatures have food, shelter, water and love. After that? You can sit back and relax a bit. Good enough parenting also means you support your kids for who they are, not for who you want them to be or who you wish they were. Your 5-year-old truly believes they’re the Incredible Hulk and they’re gonna marry Iron Man someday? Go get ‘em, buddy. Why the hell not? Maybe your teenager is convinced they’ll make a living as a YouTuber who comments on other people playing video games? Hey, who knows - they might be right. And that means they pick a nicer nursing home for you someday, so don’t be a hater. What can you do to support them in actually achieving that?
Embracing Imperfection
The bottom line is, if your kid eats pizza every day for a week, oh well. If you let them go 5 days without a shower, the world goes on. (Sidenote: my mom told me when I was super little I didn’t want to eat anything but yogurt and fish sticks for, like, an entire year, and I turned out ok!) If you lose your patience with them and respond in a way that isn’t ideal - just own up to it. Take the time you need to feel a bit better, go back to your kid and apologize, and tell them what you’ll try to do better next time. When your kid messes up, try to give them a little grace, too.
Your kids don’t need you to be perfect. They just need you to make them feel loved, safe, accepted and supported.
Could you benefit from some support figuring out how to be easier on yourself and how to let go of perfectionism? Reach out for a free consultation with me today by clicking here. Sure, I’m a therapist - but I’m also an imperfect mom, and I totally get it.
Sera Gray is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in Arizona. As a neurodivergent therapist with ADHD, she is passionate about providing neurodivergent-affirming care to Highly Sensitive People (HSP) and adults with ADHD and trauma. When she’s not in therapy sessions she can be found with her nose in a book, hanging out in the forest or spending time with her family. Click here to learn more about Sera and here to schedule a free consultation.