For Parents Starting Therapy

 For Parents

Dear Parents,

Welcome to Family Therapy. I applaud you for reaching out for help. Though we all know it takes a village to raise a child, it’s hard to admit personally that we can’t do it on our own. Parenting is the world’s most admirable calling--one with arguably the strongest influence on the outcome of a person’s life. This is a high risk/high reward venture, and it is incredibly courageous of you to be a part of it.

In therapy, we work from the assumption that you are doing your very best with the knowledge and resources you have. We assume that you love your children unconditionally (even if you don’t like them sometimes). At no point should your love or intentions be called into question. If you feel they are, please confront me about it.

We are not here to judge you or your parenting. We are here to increase the knowledge and resources you have to help you get better results with your children. There are no perfect parents. We all make mistakes, AND there is always something we can do better or try differently.

As you learn through sessions and homework assignments, you will be informed of practices you didn’t know before, and of things you have done that may be harmful to children, and ways your own upbringing have affected your parenting now. This information may not be applicable to all children, but can inform your parenting decisions. It is not wrong to not know what you didn’t before, or that you may have done something harmful. It is impossible to keep your child’s feelings from being hurt. The goal is to make repairs where possible and keep trying to improve relationships. 

Sometimes, we do our best, learn all the parenting research that exists, control our emotions perfectly, and our children still have less-than-ideal outcomes. This can be heartbreaking, and is worth grieving about, but is never worth feeling ashamed of. We must be careful to not judge our worthiness as individuals on our children’s outcomes. Though there is much we can do to shape their lives, there are many factors outside of our control that may lead to crisis or tragedy regardless of our best efforts: trauma, friendships, cultural influence, the emotional resources we were given by our parents, a child's freedom of choice, genetics, etc.

The key point is that your best is enough. No one can ask more than that.

I am glad you are on this journey, and I am happy to be a part of it. It can be long and rough for many families, with lots of trial and error, but I am determined to stick it out with you. You are amazing and inspiring, and I hope to learn from you as we work on this together.

Sincerely,

Boone