My mom was in the hospital, I wasn’t sleeping, and the stress had nowhere to go. So I poured it onto my five-year-old son.
Every morning before preschool, I’d launch into lectures from the driver’s seat—how he should control his feelings, how he should handle surprises better, how he needed to “do better today.” He sat quietly in the back, light up sneakers kicking against the seat, eyes fixed out the window. Sometimes he nodded, sometimes he didn’t react at all. The more I talked, the less he seemed to hear. And while I was busy trying to coach him into self-control, I didn’t notice my own unraveling. His teacher had told me he struggled with disappointment and unexpected changes, but the truth was, so did I.
Stress made me brittle. With my mom in the hospital for weeks, I spent nights waiting for the phone to ring and mornings running on fumes. Exhaustion made me impatient; anxiety made me overbearing. Instead of softening for my son, I doubled down on discipline. His behavior improved slightly, but the tension between us never eased.
This year, though, life looks different.
My mom has mostly recovered and returned home. I’m finally sleeping again. And most importantly, I’ve come back to writing—an outlet I abandoned during the family crisis but now recognize I had been starving for. Writing allows me to pour out my tangled emotions in a healthier space, so I no longer flood my son with them. I’m lighter. Calmer. More myself.
And my son? He’s started 5K. A new school year, a fresh chance. Part of me still worries the old patterns will follow us, but another part of me knows I don’t have to repeat the same mistakes.
So, instead of lecturing him on the way to school this morning, I tried something new. “Want to hear a story?” I asked as we buckled in.
His head lifted immediately. His eyes lit up. He was paying attention in a way I had never been able to force with warnings and correction. And so, I began.
I told him about a clown who desperately wanted to make people laugh, but everything he did scared them instead. No matter what silly trick he tried, everyone screamed. But the clown refused to give up. Day after day, he reflected and made tiny changes. He adjusted his timing, brought out a joke book, experimented with new approaches. Slowly, he improved. Over ten years, he transformed from the “worst clown in the world” into one of the very best.
When I finished, the car was quiet. For a moment, I worried I’d lost him. Then he smiled softly. “That was a nice story,” he said. Before we parted, he leaned forward for a hug before heading off with his backpack bouncing against his shoulders.
And I just sat there.
Last year, I believed I could lecture him into resilience. What I see now is that children don’t learn resilience through pressure; they learn it through connection, imagination, and seeing us model patience. The clown’s gradual improvement mirrored my own—incremental, imperfect, but real.
I don’t know exactly how his kindergarten year will unfold—parenting never guarantees smooth roads. There will be meltdowns, and I’ll misstep plenty, too. But today, we entered the day differently: not with lectures, but with a story, a smile, and a hug.
For now, that feels like enough. And for the first time in a long time, I believe this will be a good year.
When you’re under stress, how do you stop it from spilling onto the people you love most? Share your experiences below, and subscribe to join a group of like-minded people.
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