Why Have We Started Expecting So Much More of Parents?

by Suzie Booth, Counsellor/Psychotherapist, MSc. MBACP (Accred).

"We should do something fun today."

It's a sentence I hear from parents all the time during the school holidays. Their children aren't even necessarily asking for it. But the parents feel they should.

Another day at home somehow feels like it isn't enough, a trip to the park feels ordinary, an afternoon in the garden feels like wasted time.

So many parents now carry this pressure that every day of the holidays should be filled with memories, adventures and meaningful experiences.

But where did that expectation actually come from? Because if we look back a generation or two, childhood looked very different...

Childhood hasn't changed as much as parenting has.

Many of us remember long summer days spent riding bikes, playing in the garden, knocking on friends' doors or simply saying, "I'm bored" and being told to make our own fun.

Parents definitely cared about their children, but they weren't expected to become full-time entertainers.

Today, many parents feel responsible not just for their children's safety and wellbeing, but also for their happiness, emotional development, confidence, education, social lives and lifelong memories.

It's a huge shift.

Somewhere along the way, parenting became much more than raising children; it became managing every aspect of childhood.

Social media changed the rules.

For the first time in history, we have constant access to everyone else's 'best day.'

One family is strawberry picking

Another is building magical dens in the woods

Someone else is baking from scratch

Another family is on holiday abroad

Of course we know these are snapshots. But our brains don't always compare reality with reality. They compare our ordinary Tuesday with someone else's highlight reel. Before long, staying home can start to feel like we're somehow letting our children down.

We began confusing 'good parenting' with 'constant enrichment'.

There's nothing wrong with creating wonderful experiences.

Children remember trips to the beach.

Days out.

Special adventures.

But somewhere along the way, many parents started believing these moments weren't the bonus... They were the requirement.

Suddenly every day seemed to need an activity.

Every weekend needed a plan

Every holiday needed to be memorable

The problem is that children don't usually remember their childhood in the way adults imagine they will

They remember how home felt. Whether they laughed, felt safe, someone listened to them, whether they could simply be.

Children don't need us to perform childhood for them.

One of the biggest misconceptions I see is that good parents create magical childhoods.

I don't think they do.

I think good parents create emotionally safe relationships. And those aren't always the same thing. A child can have expensive days out every weekend but still feel emotionally alone. Another child can spend a rainy afternoon making toast, playing cards and chatting with a parent who is emotionally present.

Guess which one is more likely to become a lasting memory?

It's often not the activity.

It's the connection.

The pressure is exhausting parents.

The irony is that the harder we try to create the 'perfect' childhood, the less able we become to enjoy the one we're actually living.

We spend so much energy organising, planning and making memories that we forget to experience them ourselves.

Many parents reach the end of the holidays feeling disappointed.

Not because they didn't do enough.

But because their expectations were impossible to meet.

Maybe it's time to redefine what successful holidays look like.

Success isn't measured by how many places you visited.

Or how many activities you squeezed in

Or how many photos you posted

Success looks more like this:

Did your children feel loved?

Did they have moments of laughter?

Did they know they mattered?

Did you have opportunities (even small ones) to connect?

Because years from now, your children are unlikely to remember every day trip.

But they are much more likely to remember how it felt to be with you.

And that's a gentler definition of a childhood well lived. One that allows parents to put down the impossible expectation of creating magic every single day (whilst bankrupting themselves) and instead simply be present for the ordinary moments that often become the most meaningful of all.

If you'd like ongoing support rather than just reading articles, you can find out more about how I work with parents on my Parent Therapist page.