Stop comparing your kids to other children. Here’s why
Comparison leads to shaming, and can encourage more resentment than motivation
With offices reopening, kids mostly back in school and social events in full swing as things return to a ‘new normal,’ other, less positive aspects of life are slithering back as well. One of the things I’ve become increasingly aware of, both as an educator and as a parent, is the negative toll of toxic comparisons.
I’m referring to the many ways that parents compare their children to others — everything from outright boasting, to the more subtle ‘humble brag’ about their child’s academic, athletic or personal accomplishments.
It might be a function of returning to the public sphere after nearly two years of isolation, but it feels as if toxic comparisons have become worse in the aftermath of the pandemic.
Ken Van Wyk, Director of the Toronto Centre for Psychotherapy and Counselling Education, shares that, according to current psychological theory, there are five basic emotions. “You can see them well illustrated in the Disney movie “Inside Out”: joy, fear, anger, sadness and then the last one, disgust or shame.”
Van Wyk, a therapist with over forty years’ experience, has seen the phenomena of toxic comparison often. “When a parent compares their child to another child, the emotion that they are tapping into is disgust or shame. Kids learn very young, if they are compared, that there is something wrong with them. And it’s toxic. What parents are doing is really envy. They are looking at other kids and … wishing they had a different child. So the child learns to be ashamed of themselves.”
More disturbingly, this will happen even if the comparison is a favourable one. “If the parent says, ‘Look at how brilliant you are, you’re not like this other kid,’ it still gets the feeling of disgust and shame engaged in thinking that they can feel superior to another child, which is the moral problem of pride,” he says.
I can relate to this. I was often the object of comparison in my family’s social circle. Well meaning parents would tell their own kids: ‘Why can’t you be more like Uzma?’ especially when they heard about my academic achievements. I know they meant well, but I hated being singled out in this way. It also encouraged more resentment than motivation among my peers. As a parent myself, I try not to do this to my own kids, but the instinct to ask or wonder how my sons are doing in relation to others runs deep.
Van Wyk continues: “Any way that comparison goes, it creates problems for the child, because it engages that primary emotion of disgust, and it shows up as either shaming themselves or, as we see it in broader society, shame against another group that is then deemed to be inferior.”
Kate Hilton, a Toronto parent and friend, can relate to this. “I was the straight ‘A’ student who got scholarships everywhere. I have three kids now with challenges. This is something I have had a personal journey with, and I get it wrong sometimes, and now feel like I’m getting it more right. There is a difference in messaging between: ‘You’re not meeting the standards set by somebody else,’ and ‘Let’s look at your gifts, your talents, your interests and how are we going to work together to maximize potential.’”
I’ve had many conversations with friends, and the parents of my students, who have shared similar struggles. We all fear that our children are falling short in some way, which then becomes internalized as a failure of our own parenting.
Hilton added that it is not the child’s responsibility to measure up to their parent’s dreams. “What does it mean to the parent, to have a child who isn’t successful in the normative way? That is their [the parent’s] stuff that they need to work out. That is not their kids’ stuff at all.”
Van Wyk cautioned this toxic comparison can damage not just a child’s self-esteem, but also the relationship they have with their parent, which is “connected to how well they do, as opposed to having unconditional love and acceptance. And when something doesn’t work out, which is inevitable, the child immediately feels their self-worth crumble, because it’s based on achievements.”
So how to build a child’s self esteem? Van Wyk suggests encouraging children to realize their own inner resources and help build on them. “If you force kids to see their disability, they are not going to see their ability. If they can set goals for themselves instead of measure against some parental standard, it helps the child be supported in getting there. When they experience being loved, they will grow.”
Hilton keeps returning to what really matters: an honest, accepting and loving relationship with her children. “What other parents or other kids are doing has nothing to do with the quality of relationship I’m trying to have with my kids. If you keep coming back to that, shame has no place in that relationship.”