IOW blogger

BY JENNY DALTON

I’ve come to the conclusion that the worst thing about having children is that everyone else has got them too.

You try to stop yourself but you can’t help comparing your child with everyone else’s. It starts when they’re babies, you see a six-month old sitting up unaided and think ‘why can’t my six-month old do that?’ A one year old is running around while your child hasn’t even begun to crawl.

When your child starts school, you are so proud that he can tie his own shoe laces and read a few words. But within days you discover that three of his class mates can already read whole books and have been tying their laces since they were three!

By secondary school it is thankfully harder to see the geniuses sitting alongside your child. But test results and homework grades make comparing your child all too easy.
Of course it is natural to compare your child with others their age. We often look over our shoulder to see how we measure up against our adult peers. Humans are competitive; it is understandable that we want to see our child stand out from the crowd.

But the bottom line is, there is always going to be someone out there who out smarts our little brain box or out plays our budding footballer or talented musician.

Our children will always be unique and special to us, no matter how they fare outside the home. Constantly comparing them to others will only undermine their confidence and self-belief.

We should tell him we are proud of them no matter what; tell them that just being them is good enough for us.

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