Mother: “When my peers had children, almost all of them decided to do things differently than their own educators. They read books about parenting and some have gone to therapy to unravel their past so as not to make the same mistakes with their own children. Most of them also have more money to spend than their own educators at the time.”
“Yet, among the 25 children of the friends in my group of friends, there are only six without a diagnosis, who are not stuck in education, or who are not vulnerable in today’s society. Why is it that our children, raised so consciously and with attention, still seem to be less firmly positioned in the world than we ourselves are? We were raised by parents who often did not think at all about their parenting style or the needs of their children. Doesn’t all that attention to a good upbringing actually mean that we miss the mark? miss?”
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Accept own
Steven Pont: “It is possible that the adults you see who are more firmly established in the world have suppressed some feelings. Many of them grew up in the era of decency, when you had to keep your mouth shut as a child. For example, you sometimes hear adults who were hit in the past say: ‘I haven’t become any worse myself.’ I think this has indeed damaged them, but that they do not recognize these feelings out of loyalty to their parents.”
“It is, especially from this point of view, an effort worth pursuing not to want to transfer one’s own themes and possible traumas to one’s children. The question is to what extent this is successful. Especially when parents are under tension, you can still see the frayed edges.”
“The increased vulnerability you observe may partly be due to the overprotection of parents. Anyone who wants to remove every obstacle for children denies them the experiences to gain resilience. But in addition, the context in which children grow up has become more complicated. There are more crises: in the areas of climate, housing, international security. On social media, children experience all the suffering of the world.”
“The question is whether we can accept the child’s personality without diagnosing it as ‘deviant’. Should a shy girl with not many friends be diagnosed with a social anxiety disorder and take a social skills course?”
Tolerating imperfection
Frank van der Horst: “Children have not essentially changed, but the world in which they grow up has. Society has become more complex and performance-oriented. This puts pressure on parents and children. Many parents want to do ‘right’ in their upbringing and prevent mistakes, which can cause them to be unconsciously overprotective. ‘Supporting’ in upbringing then becomes ‘controlling’.
“About the diagnoses you see: they are often classifications intended to organize help. Parents seek help more quickly, even for milder problems, and that automatically leads to a ‘disorder’ in healthcare. That does not always say something about the child; it also says something about a society that has less tolerance for differences.”
“It is precisely when we as a society accept that children do not behave exactly according to the norm that space is created for diversity. This requires educators to tolerate imperfections in education. And professionals to normalize instead of medicalizing. Sometimes children are not helped by a ‘diagnosis’, but it requires flexibility from the environment to make room for those differences.”
“It takes courage from parents to let go of children and trust that they will become resilient, even if things don’t go perfectly in their upbringing.”
Steven Pont is a developmental psychologist. Frank van der Horst is a pedagogue at Erasmus University Rotterdam, and a psychotherapist in mental health care.
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