Your children are, quite obviously, the main thing in your life. You never really feel a sense of such love until you become a parent. It’s difficult to describe because it only ever reaches you when you meet your child – or, in many cases, when the pregnancy is confirmed, and you’re fully aware that there’s a bun in the oven. 

If you’re already a parent, then you’ll know that it’s a pretty difficult job – one that requires constant work and effort. When you picture having kids as a teenager or young adult, you only ever think about the cute stuff like holding them in your arms and showing them off to anyone that’ll want to look. You never think about the tough days where they’re a real pain in the backside! With that said, they still need to be loved and cherished during those tedious and terrible times! 

That kind of goes without saying, but there are many parents out there that scrape to do the bare minimum in terms of being a responsible caregiver. Sometimes it’s due to conscious neglect and laziness, and sometimes it’s down to straight-up incompetence and is, thus, not entirely a case of them being evil. You’ll absolutely want to avoid both of these instances, though, as bringing up a child that isn’t used to being given all the love in the world is not a great thing at all. Again, this goes without saying, but you’d be shocked at how many parents miss out on a few things. 

As we mentioned before, parenting isn’t an easy job as there are so many areas that you must cover. One very important aspect of raising a child is making sure that they’re comfortable with where they are in life – and that they know that they’re wanted. Kids that are neglected tend to grow up with somewhat of a chip on their shoulder, meaning they carry somewhat of an issue into their adult life and beyond. It’s so important to love and cherish your kid(s) during their impressionable years as these years shape their mentality and their overall being. 

Thankfully, there are ways to make sure they’re acknowledged and comfy in their existence. Not every kid feels the same way, so you’ll have to try many different methods in order to get the right mixture. Here are some ideas for you if you feel as though you need a little prompting:

Let Them Know Regularly 

Kids are pretty needy. This innocence they have can come across as rude, but they, of course, do not know any better! One thing you say will go in one ear and out the other – you probably know this by now, though! Make sure you’re constantly letting them know how you feel about them. This doesn’t mean you should spoil them with praise and nice things all of the time as they’ll get conditioned into thinking they’re more special than others. 

Work Hard For Them 

While they may not appreciate your work when they’re a very young child, they’ll definitely get to appreciate things when they’ve grown up a little. When they start to realize just how tedious some of the chores are, they’ll realize that this is what you guys do day-in-day-out. They’ll appreciate your work even more as they turn into teenagers – and then into young adults. It’ll dawn on them just how much work you put in for them while they weren’t competent or cognitive enough. You’ll get to benefit from this going forward as it will instill the right mentality into their heads, and you might even get some elder care from them when it’s your turn to receive it!

Look Out For Their Diet 

You obviously need to feed them enough, but it’s also a case of feeding them the right stuff. You can give them the required amount of calories to sustain energy for the day, but you’ll want to make sure they have all the nutrients necessary. Give them a balanced diet, and be sure to feed them what they’ll enjoy! Many kids grow up to be fussy eaters due to the way parents forced diet on their kids – don’t do that! 

Fortunately, while nutrition may seem like a minefield, it’s actually pretty simple – it just takes a little learning and some effort. Many parents lazily give their kids easy foods because they can’t be bothered to do ten minutes of research a day. Make sure you’re not neglecting their diet. You’ll also pick up a few things that will help you, too, so this is something you should definitely focus on.

Positive Reinforcement!

As we mentioned slightly before, too much positivity and spoiling will turn your child into a spoiled little brat, so you’ll want to make sure you have the right balance. Positive reinforcement is absolutely essential, though, as they’ll need to know that they are valued. They need to know that what they’re doing (or what they’ve done) is absolutely fantastic. We all liked to be praised for our work, but especially as young kids who need the validation. Those who are starved of that kind of praise and validation at a young age then go looking for it when they’re older – make sure they’re assured of themselves when they’re wee little kids!

Actually Care About Their Likes And Hobbies

Don’t just give them what they want and let them play with it. They’ll look to you to enjoy playtime with them. If you’re reluctantly looking at them while they have free time to enjoy themselves, then they’ll sense it. Recreational time isn’t all about material goods; it’s about the quality of time spent together, too. If you actually care about their hobbies and what they love to do for fun, then that’ll compound their strong, positive feelings. 

Be Consistent With Them  

Many parents either take little interest in what they do with their kids and, thus, can’t remember what they taught them. That, or they look to actively tell them they’re wrong a lot in order to teach them some discipline. Do your best not to play with their fragile, primitive, little minds. They’ll develop trust issues as they grow, and that’s not great in terms of your relationship with them. Work with your partner, and be sure to remain consistent. Sometimes a mother will say one thing, and a father will say the other – it’s not great for a child who is looking to learn something.

Be Careful With Your Strictness

You need to be able to have some discipline as they’ll run amuck without it. You need to set rules and make sure they do as they’re told – whenever they’re told. There’s the right way to go about this and the wrong way, however. Strict parents may feel that they’ll raise a child that has manners ingrained in them over years of training – it may backfire, though, as there may be an underlying resentment regarding the cold-natured way they were treated. Be sure to balance out your strictness with a lot of tender, loving care!

Work With Them 

Whether it’s their school work or something they have a passion for, like a sport or a technical project, be sure to work with them when they need help. They’re kids, so they’re not going to be amazing at what they’ll do, but they’ll appreciate their parent(s) wanting the best for them. When they have nobody backing them, their confidence in their own ability won’t exactly be very high. Do your best to help out whenever you can and speed up their learning.

This is a contributed post.