You Can't Earn Their Love by Fixing Their Problems

Photo by Lori K Walters

In my coaching practice, I've heard many parents say, “I feel so restless and useless when nobody needs me. I just can't relax.”

But this isn't just a moment of anxiety and uneasiness. It's a pattern that developed in your nervous system. And it developed for a very good reason – because at some point in your past, probably when you were young, you discovered that you could only get the feeling of connection by helping someone. Or you realized that how much love you received from your caregivers was proportional to how well you performed or how much you gave of yourself.

You logically concluded that, if you could stay tuned to what people need and meet those needs, then you would be loved. Your nervous system became wired around the belief that being still meant being disconnected. And it makes sense that you developed your ways of being around this equation: Helpfulness = Love, Safety and Belonging.

Now you’re an adult and a parent and those ways of being aren’t working.

Because, even in peaceful moments when you want to rest and replenish yourself, you can't. You analyze, overthink, and loop through certain incidents over and over and over. Or you try to see the future, anticipating, catastrophizing and creating 100 potential solutions to 100 potential scenarios.

You spend your time stressing and trying to solve what’s not yours to solve. And then you stress about the time you spend stressing… (Oof, I know. I’ve been there so many times.)

And when we're talking about teenagers, this causes problems, because even if your teenager feels lost and says they want you to tell them the solutions to their problems, they don't. It undermines their confidence, weakens their agency and threatens their independence.

“Stop interfering. Leave me alone. Stop treating me like a little kid.”

You know they’re right in saying this. But you’re not sure how to break out of this habit.

Belonging

We all need to feel love and belonging. And if this article is resonating with you, then it may be that your idea of Belonging got redefined as Being Needed.

So that, when no one needs you, you feel wobbly. Like the ground is moving underneath your feet. Or like you’re a boat that's not tied to the dock. Like you might not Belong at any moment. That Love could slip away… and so you look for where you can be useful, where you can fill a need.

And your kids’ lives are just the natural place to look. Surely, they need something. A reminder to pay their phone bill, some research for their school project, an article about how to talk to their friends, or more parental advice.

It feels good to you – yay, I did something nice, they’ll thank me and I’ll have earned some connection with them. But contrary to what you learned as a child, connection is not earned. And your act of kindness? It annoys the heck out of them. They resent the interference in their life and, on top of that, being made to feel like they owe you something. Then it’s not really kindness, it’s self-serving.

From an overwhelmed mom: “When I'm working with my daughter to solve her problem, it makes me feel close to her. But I'm going about connecting in the wrong way, by making her need me for something so I can feel good about helping. I need to find other ways to feel that connection that aren't based on me acting like a rescuer or repairman.”

When you're overthinking, it’s your nervous system that’s desperately seeking a role for you to fill, a way to be useful so that you're not dismissible or leave-able.

And let me say that you’re not messed up or failing. Little you figured out what you had to do to feel safe and wanted. It was brilliant for a 4-year-old, right?

You’re grown up now and you know that your worth and lovability aren’t dependent on what you fix, who you help or how you perform.

“It feels like ever since my son was crying in the crib, I've been scrambling and trying to calm his distress. I felt urgency and panic pulsing through my body and tried to show my love by being responsive. Now he’s 16 and I still have that reaction when I hear his distress. When he’s upset, I’m immediately upset.”

And so, we jump in

Whether it's needed or not, we offer a solution (or five).

Whether it's asked for or not, we interfere, take over, advise and obstruct.

Even if we're exhausted, we do something

To eliminate their upset

To restore our own nervous systems

To look like confident parents of well-regulated children

To feel like we're doing it right

To feel safe

To feel wanted

To belong

To be loved.

Practices for Healing

Catch yourself feeling unappreciated for “everything I do for them” and recognize it as a reflection of you, not them.

Notice when you’re shape-shifting and evading your own needs, boundaries and values to orchestrate connection with your teenager.

When you're seeking out the company of others, try being on your own and staying with your own feelings instead of immersing yourself in the feelings of others.

Enjoy your relationship as it is.

Catch yourself thinking about receiving your teenager’s gratitude and attention for helping them.

Observe yourself being over-generous, wanting to give someone your last shirt or enduring pain for the sake of being seen as helpful.

Notice how your preoccupation with other people's needs makes you unavailable for genuine personal connection.

Journaling Prompts

Find a comfortable spot on the grass to write in your journal or go for a walk in the woods and talk to the trees. Choose one of these questions/ statements or work your way through them all. And please, be self-compassionate.

· How do you know that you don’t have to meet the needs of others to be included, taken care of and loved?

· If belonging and safety don’t require over-involvement or tampering, what do they require of you?

· What do you appreciate about yourself – things that you are, not what you give?

· The reactions of others are not a referendum on your value. What supports you to look for love and appreciation within instead of without?

· I can rest and I am still worthy of love.

Love is all around us. It is the air we breathe, the water we drink, the stars we watch and the land we live upon. There’s nothing we need to give or get from anyone to be worthy of love; it’s already right here.

With you on the journey,

Lori

Subscribe to Peace in My Parenting