6 Signs You're Being Too Hard On Your Kid

Parents often feel like they’re not doing enough. There’s always another activity to enroll our kids in, another skill they could be learning. We should encourage them to study harder and help more around the house. Comparing our own families to others — or to some imaginary gold standard — can leave us feeling like we never quite measure up.

There are lots of ways to pass this fear of inadequacy along to our children: nagging, cajoling, bribing or even just expressing disappointment. And though it’s good to hold high standards, we don’t want them to mar the message that we love our children fully and unconditionally for who they are, not what they do.

In a previous interview, author Jennifer Wallace told HuffPost: “Too many kids today perceive their value and worth to be contingent on their achievements — their GPAs, the number of likes they get on a post — not for who they are as people, deep at their core.”

She recommended that parents look carefully at the areas of their children’s lives where they devote the most attention, time and resources. Parents may not value their child’s grades above all, but if they bring up academics during every conversation, this could be the message kids receive.

“Many parents think they’re not overemphasizing achievement,” Wallace said. But when they pause to examine their interactions, “they can see how their behavior is telling their kids a different story.”

HuffPost spoke with mental health professionals about the signs that a parent is being too hard on their kid. Here’s what they said:

Your child feels bad in a way that’s unnecessary.

As their parent, you frequently have to deliver news that kids don’t want to hear. Eran Magan, a psychologist and the creator of the website