I’ll be honest, I struggle with positive parenting – not all the time, sometimes I rock at it, but quite often I don’t.  I think I know the basics, but often life, challenges and simply being human get in the way and I dissolve in to a ranting, angry negative parent, someone I don’t like and often find hard to put back in her box.

I wanted to share with you a couple of Facebook posts that I have found particularly insightful and helpful.  Let me introduce to Mel, a Private Parenting Coach from PPB – Positive Parenting and Beyond (feel free to give her FB page a LIKE – its well worth it, I can promise you www.facebook.com/positive-parenting-beyond ),

Here’s a little of what she has to say:

“As parents we are forever learning & growing. Parenting is a journey – not a destination. We may of had a picture in our head what parenting was going to be like, however, reality hasn’t turned out to be that picture.

There is no such thing as a perfect parent – just a real one. Parenting is about raising & celebrating the child you have been blessed with. You learn very early on about the strengths you didn’t know were in you, whilst dealing with the fears you didn’t know existed.”

I love how she puts that parenting is a journey – not a destination.  We don’t have to know it all now, we don’t have to get it right first, second or third time, we just have to continue learning and trying. Very comforting words in deed.

Another of Mels posts that really gave me a lift on a particularly stressful day:

“A hard day in parenting doesn’t make you a bad parent. ?A series of hard days in parenting doesn’t make you a bad parent.?

Parenting is hard work.
Parenting is challenging.
Parenting is overwhelming.
Parenting is exhausting.
Parenting makes you look deeper.
Parenting makes you fight harder.

Parenting is about understanding that you’re on a journey with good times as well as challenging times – the key is to celebrate the good times, whilst having an understanding of the challenging times. During the challenges, this is the time that you grow, you learn more, you develop new strategies, you problem solve & you prioritise self-care. ?

If today has been a hard day & had its challenges –

Keep the focus that there are positive days to come.

Parenting comes in phases
Embrace it & trust the process.
Never trust your fears.
They don’t know your strengths”

Reading that really helped turn my day and week around.. I was able to acknowledge that just because I was finding mothering my feral children hard  – it didn’t mean that I was a bad parent, and it gave me resolve to stop rocking in the corner, take a look at what I could do to make things better, make a plan and even though it was through gritted teeth at the time tell my children that I love them and lets get on with our day.

There is more I want to share from Mel, but I’ll leave that for another day (she posted about dealing with challenging behaviour – something I think most of us experience!)

A huge thank you to Mel from Positive Parenting & Beyond for giving me permission to use her words, advice and insights.

Honestly, go check out her page no matter what age your children are, there’s great advice and support to be found.

Positive Parenting & Beyond – Private Parenting Coach

www.facebook.com/positive-parenting-beyond

www.instagram.com/positive_parenting_beyond

About Mel

I am honoured to be invited into parents inner thoughts about their children and family life, and for that I am truly grateful and humbled by their trust. My role as a parenting coach is to listen, listen to understand and let you see that you are enough. Then, we explore practical, realistic techniques to be able to move forward bringing healthy, positive relationships together.