Are there ways for parents to minimize stress?
Stress is a state of mental or emotional strain or tension resulting from adverse or very demanding circumstances. In other words, Parenting = Stress.
The adversity which causes stress comes at work, in traffic, in friendships and most definitely at home. The kids won’t cooperate, the spouse doesn’t communicate, and the demands of managing home and work weigh heavy.
The demanding circumstances include those little minions known as kids, who monopolize your time, money, energy and emotions.
Honestly, there’s not much hope for cutting down on the things in life that cause stress. They will come in different forms every day. However, there are ways to minimize the culprits that add to stress and the way that parents respond to them.
Protect and Manage your time to give yourself margin.
This is a simple concept, and probably not new to you. But unfortunately, it is one that many parents still neglect to do. You can protect and manage your time by listing your priorities and using them to determine what you say yes and no to. Having margin–a cushion of time where you are not scheduled every single moment of the day–allows you to have downtime AND gives you the option to respond to urgent matters that you were not counting on.
Impossible, you say. I’ve got too many responsibilities. If that’s you, then it’s time to decide which of those commitments are really priorities in your life and start cleaning house on your calendar.
Employ parenting strategies that are truly effective.
Parents get stressed because they have to nag and yell at kids who don’t listen and respond. They get stressed because it seems like they are always in conflict with their teens. They feel overwhelmed because their child encounters problems that they cannot fix, yet they try to rescue them anyway.
Yelling, nagging, fighting, rescuing, threatening–these parenting strategies will exhaust every parent and in the long-run, they are not effective.
Responding not reacting, listening more, seeking to understand–these are some parenting tools that will cut down on your stress and make your parenting way more effective.
In my coaching package, The Parenting Toolbelt, we talk about numerous tools parents can use to cut down on stress and get better long-term results. Schedule a free call here to learn more.
Find a support system.
Whether it’s your family, a group of parent friends, or your work people, it’s important to have a support system that will see you, hear you, encourage you and support you on your parenting journey.
You can choose to parent without anyone’s help, but that is a heavy burden to bear all alone. Find your people and rely on them.
My support system includes my older sister, an old friend and a group of moms with grown kids. They all live in different cities, but we support each other through group texts, zoom calls, facetime, and marco polo. They are who I turn to when I need prayer and support for my family.
Finding that support system may mean that you have to back up and do a better job of prioritizing your time and then become intentional about pursuing it. It probably won’t jump out in front of you.
I saw a quote recently that encourages stressed people to “just breathe.” That is definitely a first step, but it is not a complete strategy. If you are unsure of how to get out of the web of stress that has you stuck, start with these three suggestions, and if you need more help, please reach out and schedule a free call here.