How to rebuild a broken bond with your child #parenting #love

When a child rejects a parent's values, automatically the parent becomes critical. Don't do that. Why are you doing that? That's not what we do. When a child drifts from a parent's values, it's because the child has already emotionally drifted away. They no longer identify with the parents and with the family as their safe place. They no longer think about the family as the people they run to when they're in trouble. They no longer think about the family as an emotional resource. They may even think of the family as an emotional liability. Once that happens, the child starts searching for other people or communities that the child thinks will provide that emotional safety. And then automatically, without even thinking about it, the child takes on the value systems of those people or those groups. When a parent is critical of the child's values, all that does is reinforce to the child the feeling of rejection. Well, I'm not wanted here. And then the child goes further aligns with those other people and becomes further estranged from the parent's values. As hard as it is, when a parent sees a child drifting from the family's values, that's not a time to reject the child and criticize the child and judge the child, but to double down on the unconditional love, which restores the bonding and the feeling of emotional attachment.