At Amudim, we believe education is prevention.
That’s why we’re in classrooms, at community events, and in shuls – building awareness, teaching skills, and helping create a safer world for all of us before a crisis ever begins.
And when someone is in crisis, our clinical case managers are there, too. A phone call, a plan, and someone walking alongside them through it – always 100% free.
That’s only possible because of our donors. If you want to help us keep showing up for Klal Yisroel, you can do that here.
We have spent a lot of time this past month talking about building skills in our children, and about the importance of modeling those skills ourselves first. But today, we want to say the quiet part out loud:
Sometimes, you can do everything “the right way,” and it still feels completely wrong.
Let’s sit with that for a moment.
Maybe you just dropped your child off at school after one of those mornings. You know the kind. Your child woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and even though you were exhausted yourself, you still tried to respond with empathy:
“I understand that you’re upset about going to school, especially while your best friend is away on vacation. That must feel really hard.”
We reminded them how incredible they are, regardless of their mistakes. We had the hard conversation that needed to happen and for once, it actually felt like we handled it well.
And yet, something still happened that left us thinking, “I must be doing this all wrong, because this is not how it’s supposed to feel.”
If this isn’t you, on behalf of all of us struggling parents: “GO AWAY!!” But also… hurry back and share your secrets.
Because the truth is, you can do everything “right,” and in the moment, it still might not feel like it is.
And honestly, that can feel really discouraging.
We are not in full control of the outcome.
Somewhere inside, many of us are hoping that if we do this well enough, the moment will click. Our child will look up at us with those beautiful eyes and say, “Wow, you really are the best parent ever. I know now that I can do it all on my own.”
Right?!?
If I say it the right way, they will calm down. If I validate before correcting, they will be more willing to listen. If I stay steady, they will meet me there.
And sometimes they do, and when it happens, it truly feels like such a gift to us parents.
But sometimes they don’t.
They might be tired, hungry, embarrassed, disappointed, overwhelmed, or simply too far into their feelings to come back right away.
And what we talked about earlier this week: how our children can take a single moment and internalize it as a truth about themselves, is something we, if we’re honest, often do ourselves as well.
But perhaps we need to learn that our worth is not dependent on how our child acts in a given moment, and that an undesired outcome is not proof that we are failing as parents.
We are responsible for our hishtadlus – the effort we bring, the words we choose, the repair we offer, and the way we keep showing up.
But we are not in full control of the outcome. We do not get to press the right button and guarantee the response we hope for.
And maybe that’s what makes this so hard because parenting is deeply personal. When our child is struggling, it can feel like a reflection of us. When they push back, it can feel like we missed something. When they make the wrong choice, it can start to feel like maybe all of this effort isn’t working.
But our job was never to raise children who never have hard experiences. Our job is to keep planting, keep guiding, keep modeling, keep coming back, and to trust that the work matters, even when we can’t see the results right away.
I am allowed to be human
We see this in our own day-to-day lives.
Sometimes someone hurts us, and even after a sincere apology, we’re still upset. Maybe a friend validates what we’re feeling, and the feeling still lingers. We know we shouldn’t blow up at our children, but they push the exact right buttons and the anger takes over anyway.
Here’s a truth worth holding onto: this doesn’t mean you are failing; it means you are human.
You are a full, complex human being, trying to raise other full, complex human beings, and that is not an easy thing to do.
Our children are still learning how to move through disappointment, frustration, embarrassment, anger, sadness, and all the uncomfortable feelings that come with being a person in the world.
So when we sit with them and they still act out, it doesn’t necessarily mean we did it wrong. When we approach them with love and understanding and they respond with chutzpah, it doesn’t mean we failed. When we compromise, see their side, and sit with their discomfort, and they still make choices we wouldn’t want – it can feel deeply discouraging.
But the truth is, that’s all part of this life Hashem gave us. And we absolutely get to love our children deeply while also feeling overwhelmed at times.
We’re about to move into the reframe, but it’s also completely okay if you want to sit with this for a bit and come back to it later.
I am not a failure.
That is the message we’ve been teaching our children this week, but sometimes we need to say it to ourselves too.
If you are reading this, if you’ve been following along, if you’ve been doing the work, and it still feels like it’s not working – you have not failed.
Our children’s hard moments are not their whole story, and they are not ours either. Their bad days do not mean they’re bad children, and our bad days do not mean we’re bad parents.
Of course, we want to reflect and notice patterns. We want to take responsibility where it’s needed and keep growing. But that reflection is not the same as blaming ourselves for every feeling our child has or every difficult thing they go through.
Their feelings are allowed to exist without becoming proof that we did something wrong. And at the same time, it’s okay that some days we genuinely feel like we’ve done everything wrong – just as it’s also okay to feel proud of how we showed up that day.
That is part of the work too.
Every time we stay steady through a hard moment, we are giving our children an experience their nervous system can remember later. When we validate without giving in, we are teaching them that feelings can be heard without running the house. And when we pick ourselves up and try again, even after difficult days, we are modeling the exact resilience we want them to build.
So maybe today we can give ourselves a little grace. We can lean into the truth that we are allowed to have hard parenting days and still be really good parents. That doesn’t mean this isn’t working; it just means growth is happening in real life, not on paper.
The Power of “Yet” - For Us
We also get to use the power of “yet” here.
This time, it’s not for our children…it’s for ourselves.
We can’t figure out how to get that closeness back… yet.
We haven’t been able to repair the relationship… yet.
The tools we’ve been practicing don’t feel natural… yet.
That word matters so much because it keeps the story open. It reminds us that one hard moment is not the full picture, and that the goal is not to make every feeling disappear. The goal is to keep helping our children learn what to do with their feelings when they show up.
The worksheets we are sharing today were built to help our children with their inner dialogue, but we know they won’t magically fix the tough stuff… yet.
They may start giving them language to practice in calmer times and tools to notice what is happening inside. The self-talk tools help them hear the voice in their head and begin shifting it toward something kinder and more helpful.
The ‘Power of Yet’ helps them remember that not being able to do something today does not mean they never will.
But truthfully, those tools are here for us as well, because sometimes we need that same support with our own inner dialogue.
TRY THIS AT HOME:
Before using one of the worksheets with your child, take one minute to try it on yourself.
Not because you need one more thing to do. You really don’t.
But if we are asking our children to notice their self-talk, it’s probably worth noticing ours too.
Think of one thought you had this week that felt heavy. Maybe it was:
“I did everything right and it still went wrong.”
“I can’t get through to my child.”
“I’m not patient enough for this.”
“I keep messing this up.”
“I have no idea what I’m doing.”
Now try adding the “yet”:
“I haven’t figured out how to get through to my child at this moment… yet.”
“I’m not as patient as I want to be… yet.”
“These tools don’t feel natural in my home… yet.”
“I don’t know how to fix this… yet.”
Then, when things are calm, pick one worksheet to do with your child. Just one.
If your child has a hard time naming what they are feeling, start with the Feelings Thermometer worksheet.
If they get stuck in thoughts like, “I’m bad at this,” or “I always mess up,” try the Self-Talk Shift.
If they want to quit the second something feels hard, try the Power of Yet.
If you want to go back and revisit any of our SEL Parenting resources – they are getting added daily here: