Breaking Cycles

How many times growing up have you said to yourself “If I become a parent I’ll never do that/make my child feel this way?” We all have. Growing up was tough for me. I moved around a lot because my mom was a single mom doing everything on her own for me and my sister. Both of our fathers weren’t around much at all so she was pretty much all we had. My mother is the strongest, hard-working woman that I know. I love that she taught us how to be independent and make it on our own. My mom and my sister are what you call “hard-up” and I was the complete opposite. I was very emotional, they weren’t. So I struggled to understand why I was this way. I felt misunderstood growing up and I knew that if I had kids I would not want them to feel that way.

When I had my daughter I knew that their were things I wanted to show her that my mom taught me, but there were also things I wanted to do differently than my parents. How do you unlearn unhealthy patterns that have been subconsciously embedded for generations? It sounds impossible. I thought about it and realized that reflecting and responding was what I had to do to take a step in the right direction. When I really began to reflect, I realized that it also helped me heal. How can you expect to heal from old wounds if you never address them? For me, I knew that I wanted to allow my daughter to show emotion without feeling like it makes her weak because in my family I felt like being emotional or dealing with your feelings was a sign of weakness. I was conditioned to think this way throughout my life, and I had to be open to unlearning this way of thinking so that I didn't pass this down onto my daughter and that's how you begin to break cycles. Not only to improve the 

quality of life for your child but also for yourself! You got this! 

Xoxo, Keinan