Leanne Lewis meets many parents experiencing the same parenting struggle she used to face — trying to care for a distressed teen.
When Lewis tried to enroll her child in therapy, a mental health centre told her she could not do so without the child’s consent. But the centre encouraged Lewis to enroll herself in a parents support group instead.
Lewis credits that group, Helping Other Parents Everywhere (HOPE), with giving her the skills to mend her relationship with her child.
“For parents that are dealing with adolescents and younger adults, it [is] very stressful,” said Lewis, who today serves as board chair of HOPE. “It’s a different game out there now.”
Parenting today is different from past eras — so much so that some say it is harming parents’ health.
In a recent advisory, the United States’ top health official warned parenting is a serious health issue. The financial, time and social pressures parents face can dramatically affect their health and well-being, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said.
“Financial worries are a major stressor among parents compared to other adults,” the advisory states. It notes 66 per cent of parents report feeling consumed by worries about money, compared to 39 per cent of other adults.
And nearly half of American parents report experiencing “completely overwhelming” stress most days, compared to 26 per cent of other adults.
“The job of parenting has become exponentially harder,” says Dillon Browne, a child and family psychologist and principal investigator for the Whole Family Lab, a research facility at the University of Waterloo.
“Parenting is the new smoking,” said Browne, who as principal investigator leads research groups focused on childhood development and family support.
“It’s a public health phenomenon of concern that people are not talking about in a public health way.”
Social expectations
Higher costs of living are one factor contributing to parents’ increased stress, says Browne.
The post-World World II period is remembered as a time where fathers could sustain a family on a single salary while mothers managed the home and did most of the child rearing, says Browne, who is also an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Waterloo.
“It’s kind of viewed as a family’s pinnacle achievement: to buy the home and live in the residence as a family unit.”
But high costs of living and home prices have put these goals out of reach for many, he says.
Meanwhile, social expectations of what parents should do for their children have also increased, says Margo Hilbrecht, executive director at the Vanier Institute of the Family, a think tank.
Parents are expected to pay for extracurricular activities to help prepare their kids for future success, she says. In many cases, both parents must work to pay for housing, everyday expenses and extracurriculars.
Working moms still frequently manage the majority of child-rearing and household responsibilities. A 2019 Statistics Canada report found women spent twice as many hours with children under 15 than men, and women aged 25 to 54 took on the largest share of the unpaid housework.
“The dominant model in Canada right now is one of intensive motherhood and involved fatherhood,” said Hilbrecht.
These economic and social pressures can affect parents’ mental health, Browne says. This in turn can affect their ability to parent and their children’s health.
All that pressure accumulates to create a constant level of stress which negatively impacts people’s health, he said.
‘Do less’
While the U.S. Surgeon General’s advisory received significant attention in Canadian media, Hilbrecht notes there are some important differences between Canada and the US that can make parenting easier here.
Firearm-related injuries — which are the leading cause of death among US children — are not nearly as common in Canada.
Canadian parents also have access to paid maternity of up to 15 weeks, and parental leaves totalling up to 69 weeks. By contrast, US federal laws allow American parents who meet certain criteria to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave.
But even with these advantages, some Canadian families are seeking ways to reduce their costs and stress.
For some families, intergenerational living can ease the burden of housing and child-care costs, Canadian Affairs previously reported.
“[Intergenerational living] is an extremely advantageous arrangement … from an economics point of view,” said Browne. “Increasingly, I think that has to be the way forward.”
Seeking out other like-minded families can also help reduce stress, says Browne. “Do less, but with others,” he said.
Parent support groups can be another way to connect with others who are facing similar struggles, says Lewis. Often, parents who participate in support groups feel embarrassed, she says, because they are comparing themselves with other parents. The U.S. Surgeon General’s advisory identified social media as one of the factors contributing to parents’ health issues.
“Parents are faced with the social media idea of perfection,” said Lewis. “Fundamentally, a lot of parents really are questioning themselves, and they have lost their confidence.”
But learning from — rather than comparing with — other parents can actually be life-changing, Lewis says. She credits the new skills she developed in her support group with helping her improve her relationship with her child.
She says parents need to know that it is “absolutely normal” for there to be times in their life where parenting is joyful, but that there are also going to be times where it is overwhelming and difficult.
“That’s a normal part of the parenting journey.”
I have been advocating for Smartphone Free Childhood for quite a while now. I do see the addiction to the social media/smartphone amongst adults and children.
I view that as probably the best brainwashing tool invented by mankind, with the exception of Generative AI now, which time will tell.
WAKE UP
Help stop the addiction. https://www.smartphonefreechildhood.ca
Well I believe that financial and emotional stress on parents have always been a part of our lives. Yes in the past the normal was the father goes to work and the mother stay at home raising the children. Over time both parents needed to go to work as 1 working parent couldn’t keep up with the costs to provide to the family. Also, divorce increased in consequence mothers had to work also.
In my opinion this article failed to bring up the stress caused to parents because of the changes that happened at schools giving the children to much of power to make serious decisions without consulting their parents. The system is taking away from parents their right to be a parent by interfering on the relationship between parent and children. I personally find way more stressful to know that my boy child shows up at home believing he is a girl or even taking hormones or whatever they take to “switch” their gender/sex. Even more stressful that as a parent you can’t do anything about it and if the parent try to interfere they most likely will be treated like an abuser, racist, etc where it opens the doors to principals and teachers to make a call to the Ministry of Children and Family (not sure the correct name) and report the parent and possible the child/children might be removed from the family home. I am sorry to say but there is way deeper and more serious issues happening this day that most of professionals aren’t speaking about it and avoiding to bring the subject to make others to be aware of the present “rules & policies”. Let children to be children and those that decided to be a parent be a parent.