5 Ways Demanding Parents Make It Wrong – Parenthood

Being a parent is not easy. We all want the best for our children, but we all raise them differently. There are demanding parents who want their children to be perfect or nearly perfect in every way and use strategies that are not always the right ones to achieve the proper development of their children.

There are different educational styles: bossy, overprotective, permissive, overly demanding, etc. Not using an appropriate style can hinder the normal development of the child and cause various problems. In the following lines, we will focus on the aspects in which demanding parents make mistakes.

Demanding parents: discipline and effort go too far

There are different ways to educate. Depending on how we teach, interact, empower, and motivate our children, we’ll use a different parenting style.

Demanding parents try to ensure that their children, through discipline and effort, always aspire to the highest level, striving for perfection. This type of parents force their children to achieve all the proposed goals and, moreover, to do so effectively.

These parents tend to have an authoritarian educational style, in which communication is only done in one direction (parents to children) and in the family the hierarchy is clear, with firm rules in which great autonomy is not. given to children.

Discipline and effort are important in raising children, but in their due measure. High demands can lead to problems in the psychological and emotional development of the little ones in the house.

Where difficult parents go wrong

Being demanding at times and occasionally can increase children’s performance and be effective. On the other hand, if we use these demands all the time, without good communication or expression of emotions, it can lead to children having adjustment problems. We will see below some of the aspects where demanding parents go wrong.

Thinking that overwork increases the child’s performance

Encouraging effort in children can be very helpful in increasing their performance if we do it at specific times. If we maintain these demands for a long period of time, we will achieve the opposite effect and the performance will decrease. This happens because the moment the child does not achieve what he is looking for, despite his best efforts, he will think it is not good and his performance will be affected.

Don’t tolerate or consider mistakes

Often demanding parents do not admit or envision their children making mistakes. They teach children that making mistakes or failing is a bad thing that should be avoided at all costs. In this way, we would encourage children not to tolerate mistakes and to seek perfection in pathological ways.

Create unrealistic expectations

That we believe in ourselves and in the abilities of others is positive. The only thing we need to keep in mind is that these expectations are realistic. If they are very high, they will produce frustration when they cannot be met. This can cause children to have a negative perception of their abilities.

Look for excessive perfectionism or demands in children

If parents demand too much of children from early childhood, they will grow up feeling that nothing they do is enough and leave them dissatisfied throughout their lives. Therefore, we must be careful not to over-demand. In the long run, they can grow into people with a constant urge to be perfect, which can hurt them a lot.

Ask for high demands without recognizing the effort

If we demand too much and, most importantly, do not value the effort of children when they want to achieve something, they will think that all the work and effort that they put in is not worth it. This can lead to long-term low self-esteem, anxiety, depression, or even learned helplessness that they think their efforts won’t change the outcome.

What Can Difficult Parents Do to Avoid These Mistakes?

The mistakes we have seen above refer above all to high expectations, intolerance of mistakes and not reinforcing good results. This does not mean that all picky parents make these mistakes, but if they do, they can be avoided with good expression of emotions and good communication with children.

Accompany children, not instruct them

Children who are held to high expectations feel a lot of pressure into thinking that they are not getting what their parents want. We can avoid this by conveying realistic expectations that match their capabilities, without going to extremes.

Teaching children that being wrong or failing is not a bad thing

You don’t have to be intolerant of mistakes. We engage them all and for that we need to teach our children that making mistakes is not negative and that mistakes help us improve and learn and that, even if they fail, we will love them equally.

Value their efforts, not their achievements

Consider the efforts children make when they are doing something. We need to value the work, not the result, which will help them successfully complete what they have started. Sometimes when a child does something right, they are not praised for the work and effort they have put into achieving it because that is what we expect of them.

Confidence in the abilities and abilities of children

If parents trust their children’s abilities, they will be motivated and their self-esteem will increase. They feel valued by the people they love the most and it helps them improve. When we want to correct something, we have to do it in a positive way, never going into criticism.

On the aspects on which demanding parents are wrong, we can say …

Being demanding parents isn’t a problem if we don’t make mistakes like the ones we talked about above. Here, we’ve given you some tips to keep in mind when it comes to improving those mistakes, if you ever make them.

Remember that children need to be valued, loved, and live without pressure to be the best. Sometimes we don’t realize that little ones need to enjoy, to live and not to be perfect. Never forget it.