DISCLAIMER: The following post outlines the writer’s personal tips for worrying about developmental milestones. It is not intended to act as medical advice. As always, please consult your doctor with any questions about your child’s development.
Do you have a parenting hurdle you’re working through? If so, “The Parenting Post” is for you! One of our writers, Albiona, has been answering all of YOUR parenting questions over on IG, and we’ve turned her series into blog posts on our website as well. We just can’t get enough of her helpful advice, and we thought you’d appreciate it, too!
Her videos cover a wide variety of parenting questions–honestly, anything and everything! If it’s something you’re wondering, there’s a really good chance that another parent in our community is struggling with it, too. And Albiona is here to help!
This week, she’s focusing on developmental milestones and the worry that can come with them. As parents, we often worry about whether or not our child will meet developmental milestones, or if they’re delayed, or if they’re doing what they should be doing. Albiona offers some really encouraging advice for how to handle this! Read on to see what see recommends.
As we watch our children grow and develop, how do we keep ourselves from constantly worrying about whether or not they’ll meet developmental milestones?
Worrying doesn’t go away. You can never not worry–so let’s put that idea to rest. Worrying is natural, and innate. Once you become a parent, the real question you want to ask is: how do I not become consumed with worry?
We will always have something to think about, worry about, or be afraid of. It’s about the recognition of it, and of how much that worry is impacting your parenting, your energy, and your ability to navigate your day. Try to think about how much it is interfering with your behavior as a parent.
If I can give just one piece of advice when it comes to worrying about developmental milestones? Let your children be. Trust their development. Trust the developmental process. For every child, it’s going to look different. Some children will have certain diagnoses, or disorders, or be neurodivergent learners. Your job is going to be to meet them exactly where they are at, and to see them for who they are.
Meet their needs in that moment.
Your worrying isn’t going to change anything. However they are going to present in this world, is how they are going to present in this world. It doesn’t matter what kind of a grip you think you have on it. So, can we help with this? We certainly can! If we see delays or different things like that, we can utilize different therapies or speak to our child’s pediatrician.
I’m not saying to not be resourceful, but don’t let that worrying take over. What is already happening, is already in progress. You’re not going to change it by worrying.
The other piece of advice goes back to what I mentioned in the beginning: we allow worrying to consume us.
That’s when it’s problematic. If we sat and thought about every little thing that could go wrong in a day, we probably would never leave our homes. We would never get in a car. There are so many activities we would likely never engage in, and it would be terribly paralyzing.
Some people do get to the point where worrying can really take over in that way. So the way that I combat worrying–as a parent who has kind of been through a lot of the scope of it, as my oldest is now an adult–is that I just turn to gratitude.
I think about what I am thankful for in certain moments. What do I have in this very moment? What is presently in my life that I can say “thank you” to, right now? Remind yourself of all that is there, and don’t think about all of the things that might not be.
Worrying is always the result of pushing fast forward and thinking about what might not work out.
And the truth is, we just don’t know. We try so hard to hold on to certainty, and that’s not really a real thing. Nothing is really certain. So do your best to really relinquish. Let go and look at worrying as an opportunity to practice gratitude.
But even more than that, practice letting go of things that aren’t working for you in that moment, and recognize there’s very little that you actually have true control over. Worrying is never really going to go away. You just want to make sure it doesn’t rule the roost.
Do you have more parenting questions for Albiona? Leave them below so she can possibly answer them for you. To learn more, you can follow Albiona on Instagram. Or, subscribe to her weekly newsletter and download her free guide for teaching parents how to get their kids to listen.
