by Samantha Straub

When your child has a setback, remember that, often, parents need support, too! 

It hurts to watch your kid struggle.  When they are treated poorly by others, feel misunderstood, get left out, don’t make the team, aren’t admitted, or experience most any sort of set back, it’s not just the kid that suffers.  Parents’ hearts walk around inside of these people, and when our children hurt, our own hearts can break a little bit too. They may even break a lot.

A wise grief therapist friend of mine uses an image of concentric circles to illustrate the best way to “be there” for someone in the aftermath of a loss.  If the loss is at the bullseye, she says, the people closest to the loss make up the ring that circles that center.  Each subsequent ring is comprised of folks less and less directly affected by the loss.  When it comes to “being there for someone in need”, we need to figure out what circle we fall in.  We ought to offer support to those in the circles closer to the loss than we are, and ought to lean on those in the circles outside of our own. 

When our kids experience a setback, that moment can feel like a loss for both child AND parent.  Still, it’s important to remember who is closer to the center of that bullseye: the child.  Therefore, parents need to figure out the sometimes Herculean task of offering level-headed, dependable support to a disappointed, dejected, guilt-ridden, or grieving child while the parents might also be feeling these same negative emotions. This is tough stuff, I might add. It’s the stuff that breeds helicopter and bulldozer parenting.  And it’s the stuff that can make parenting feel like an endurance sport.  But please, oh please, for the sake of your teen’s developing coping tools, problem solving strategies, and resilience, find your level head in these moments.

And once you’re done comforting your child, identify those folks in the circles just outside of your own, and lean on them.  It truly does take a village to raise a kid—and to keep a parent standing.