parenthood

Empathy and my Two Year Old

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The definition of empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. I’m pretty sure we’re all on the same page about wanting our kids to develop this trait. 

The way I do it is helping Ezra name his own emotions.

When Ezra is crying he’s not showing me that he feels OK, he’s showing me that he currently feels something other than OK. Crying doesn’t signal to me “you’re OK” it signals “you’re angry/upset/frustrated/sad” and I really want my son to learn this. I display empathy by showing him I understand his feelings. I model it. I don’t want to encourage him to repress his emotions. I also don’t want to teach him that as an adult who can see that nothing is actually wrong and he truly is OK, that I have the last say on how he feels. 

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What I Didn’t Expect

motherhood

I’ve had very little experience with peers having babies. Here are some things that I have found to be true in my experience as the first person in my friend group to have a baby.

Non-parents compare parenthood to their experiences in pet ownership

It’s hard to have a conversation about what I’m going through and learning about when someone relates it back to pet ownership. It feels more like an interruption than part of the conversation because the two are so entirely different. Even constantly being woken up in the night by a pet is not the same as having a baby who does not sleep through the night. A lot of times I felt misunderstood when I’d talk about sleepless nights. I would get “yeah I have a new puppy and these sleepless nights are tough.”

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