Why Parenting Feels So Hard (And Why You're Not Failing)
Counsellor / Parenting Coach / Career Coach
Why Parenting Feels So Hard (And Why You're Not Failing)
Becoming a parent is often described as one of life’s most joyful experiences—but for many, it also brings unexpected stress, self-doubt, and emotional overwhelm. If you’ve ever wondered, “Why does this feel so hard?” or “Am I doing this right?”, you’re not alone. Counsellor & Parenting Coach, Paula Brunning, shares that parenting rarely matches the expectations we carry into it, and understanding this gap is the first step toward finding balance, confidence, and support.
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Yes. Feeling overwhelmed, anxious, or unsure is extremely common, especially in the early stages of parenting. The transition into parenthood brings major changes in identity, routine, sleep, and emotional demands. Many parents silently struggle with these adjustments, even if others appear to be coping well. Feeling this way does not mean you are failing—it means you are adapting.
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This feeling often comes from unrealistic expectations and constant comparison. Social media, advice from others, and internal “shoulds” can create a standard that no parent can realistically meet. When your lived experience doesn’t match those expectations, it can lead to guilt and self-doubt. In reality, “good enough” parenting—being present, responsive, and caring—is what truly supports a child’s development.
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Managing parenting stress starts with adjusting expectations and reducing pressure on yourself. Helpful strategies include:
Shifting from “I must” or “I should” to more flexible thinking
Limiting information overload from conflicting advice
Focusing on small, realistic wins rather than perfection
Seeking support from trusted people or professionals
If stress feels persistent or overwhelming, speaking to a psychologist, counsellor, or psychotherapist can provide practical tools and emotional support.
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Yes. Parenting includes a wide range of emotions—not just joy, but also frustration, exhaustion, and even resentment at times. These feelings are a natural response to the demands of caregiving and do not reflect your love or commitment to your child. Accepting this emotional range can reduce guilt and help you respond more compassionately to yourself.
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It may be helpful to seek counselling support if you experience:
Ongoing anxiety, irritability, or low mood
Persistent feelings of guilt or inadequacy
Difficulty bonding with your child
Strain in your relationship with your partner
Feeling emotionally exhausted or burned out
Early support can make a significant difference in both your wellbeing and your family dynamics.
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Parental wellbeing plays an important role in a child’s emotional and psychological development. When parents are highly stressed or overwhelmed, it can affect how they respond to their child. However, seeking support and making small changes can positively impact both you and your child. Supporting your own mental health is one of the most valuable things you can do as a parent.
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Many expat parents face additional challenges such as limited family support, cultural differences, and adjusting to a new environment. This can intensify feelings of isolation and stress. Building a support network—through community groups, schools, or professional counselling—can help you feel more grounded and supported in your parenting journey.
The Reality of Parenting vs Expectations
Becoming a new parent is a transformational event that happens on a such a regular basis that we sometimes believe it’s an easy one. Yet oftentimes the expectations we hold of how our life will be is in stark contrast to our reality. In these moments we may find ourselves questioning our ability, our capacity, even our goodness as a parent. We might be asking, Can I manage this? Do I have what it takes? Am I being a good parent?
Having the opportunity to speak frankly about our experience can be invaluable. Sharing concerns we might feel guilty or uncomfortable about more often than not offers a relief, and can lead to support where needed as well as identifying areas where our expectations may not be healthy. One thing is for certain, parental mental health supports the wellbeing of our children, so taking steps to actively support our mental health as parents is a terrific way to bolster family health and wellbeing right from the start of our parenting journey.
Common Challenges New Parents Face
So what are the challenges around parenting expectations?
It starts with trying to satisfy all the perceived tasks and people who seem to be watching us. Generally, new parents I have spoken to find there is Information overload and frequently much unsolicited (though well-meaning) advice coming from family, friends and colleagues that can breed unease. And that is even before accounting for the messages we consume through social media and society at large.
If we are struggling (which is most of us at least some of the time!) then managing our expectations and filtering information are companions on our journey to figuring this out.
Among the possible challenges new parents face are a changing identity, a roller coaster of emotions, body concept, keeping up with what we see others doing, and monitoring how our child fits the ‘normal’ curve of development. That’s a lot! As you read this, you may note other challenges not listed here that you are facing.
Everyone’s experience can be so unique, yet feeling seen, understood and supported is so important in this life phase. These challenges need not pile up and seem unmanageable. Let’s unpack a few of these challenges briefly.
Identity Changes
Having a brand new identity. Being a parent is a shift in who we are and comes with a sense of responsibility and an image of what we might think of as a competent parent - that includes how a parent feels, looks, behaves, and presents to the world. For some, being the image of the competent parent may fall short and become a hurdle for their own wellbeing.
Emotional Overload
Parenting is emotional! Yet our emotional experience may not be as expected. For some, there is a lack of feeling, for others feelings are intense and negative feelings can feel shocking. Sometimes an unexpected cycle of emotions arise, particularly for the birthing partner. Making sense of our emotions can be a cue to understanding our physical and mental health, or examining our support systems. Being able and willing to share and voice our emotional experience can ensure we feel understood, and possibly help us get appropriate care.
Body concept
Body concepts can be an area of concern, more often for the birthing parent. For some new parents, the physical changes they experience carry a contrast in pride and disappointment if expectations include a quick rebound in energy, fitness or shape. This can bring up a host of communication, relationship and self-esteem issues.
Comparison & Social Pressure
Comparisons can be a huge challenge. Comparison of our parenting, usually as sub-par to what we see others doing, falsely believing others are mastering it all effortlessly while we just can’t get it right, is an indication that we could use some support in managing our thinking and expectations so we bring a more positive and attuned perspective to our parenting.
Judgement & Development Anxiety
Judgement is another challenge. Judging our child’s development by books or charts that showcase ‘normal’ development can lead to an excessive focus on measuring milestones rather than developing a nuanced approach to parenting the child we have. These judgemental concerns may leave us feeling like we are somehow failing to nurture our child enough, and we are somehow failing.
Lack of Support (Especially for Expats in Singapore)
An additional challenge may also exist for for those living away from their support network, possibly having moved overseas as an expat before having kids. In these circumstances, there may be additional compounding factors of managing cultural differences, not having family help or even perhaps having different parental leave than in a home country scenario, adding additional concerns and stressors.
Why “I Should Be Doing Better” Makes Things Worse
Being a new parent is tough! There are so many changes coming at us all at once. Despite the joys, there are possible losses to independence or freedoms. If there are any health concerns that come with the birth, these add another layer of things to manage and adjust to.
Shift from “Should” to “Preference”
So how can managing our expectations make a difference?
Expectations often come with a mis-assigned ‘should’ or ‘must’. I should be happier.
My child should be sleeping more. My body should be (insert expectation).
In fact the ‘shoulds’ make us more distressed than necessary. In Cognitive Behavior Therapy there is a concept of cognitive distortions. Cognitive describes our thinking, so cognitive distortions means that we are thinking that things ‘should’ be a certain way while they are not, so we are in a sense fighting psychologically with irrational thoughts. Cognitive distortions come in a variety of flavors which could include all or nothing thinking, mind reading or discounting the positives. Each of these cognitive distortions has it’s own reframing to be more adaptive and helpful. When we want to help ourselves minimize the ‘shoulds’ we need to be aware how these might be showing up as demands in the form of self-talk that says things like, ‘I have to…’, ‘I must…’, ‘I should…’, ‘I need to…’ or ‘My partner must…’ or ‘My baby should…’
Since what we are focusing on is not at all a necessity of life, it is therefore not a requirement that things be just so. It is optional. And we can cope more healthily when we feel it is a choice. ‘Shoulds’ create an unhealthy emotional response that can include distress, depression, anxiety, anger and jealousy among others. This makes sense since the expected emotional response that you have when you don’t get something you irrationally and illogically believe that you need, must have or have got to have is such distress.
A psychologically healthy reframing is to use preference language. Preference language admits that we prefer, want or desire something to be a certain way, but we certainly recognise that we do not NEED it to be so. This shift to preference language provides a compassion, an understanding, a knowing that we don’t always get what we want and we can still manage and figure things out. The appropriate emotional response when you don’t get something you strongly desire might be sadness, concern, frustration, irritation, disappointment, grief, regret, or displeasure.
The goal is not to be happy all of the time. That would be unrealistic. The goal is to minimize both your experience of unhealthy negative emotions and the intensity of the healthy negative emotions. This makes it easier to move from the negative into the positive emotional range and to experience substantially more positive. As a parent, this positive reframing supports the care of our child. Preference language includes such phrases such as, ‘I want…’, ‘I prefer…’, ‘I like…’, ‘I desire…’, ‘I wish…’, ‘I hope…’ as well as looking for being ‘good enough’.
When to Seek Professional Counselling Help
Buffering your mental health as a new parent is important so the focus of your energy can be on the true priority of being present and caring for your child. Using preference language can support more flexible, adaptable thinking when things are not turning out as we had hoped or planned. For personalised support on your journey, please reach out. Don’t hesitate to seek coaching or counseling support to empower yourself and gain the guidance you deserve to support yourself and your child. Parenting doesn’t have to feel this overwhelming. At The Counselling Place, we support parents navigating stress, identity shifts, and emotional challenges. Book in a session with me today!