When your child mirrors back your worst hour

Sometimes a child hands us, in a single sentence, the exact tone we used yesterday. It is uncomfortable. It is also a gift, if we can stay with it.

Our children are not trying to expose us. They are simply growing in the soil we have laid down, and occasionally the soil is louder than we realised.

A gentler response

Instead of shame, try curiosity. Where did they learn that? What was I carrying that day? What would I like them to inherit instead?

The work of parenting is, often, the work of meeting our own unfinished feelings — and choosing, this time, to finish them gently.