Part I — The Quiet Children We Once Were
Many of us who are now parents, clinicians, or educators grew up learning something very early: our emotions were not safe.
For some, emotional expression was met with ridicule. For others, with withdrawal. For many, with physical punishment. The nervous system learned quickly and efficiently: be quiet, be compliant, be invisible. Survival required emotional suppression.
Outwardly, we looked “fine.” We coped. We adapted.
Inwardly, something else was happening — feelings went underground, unmet needs hardened into self-reliance, and play quietly disappeared.
This was not a personal failure. It was a generational adaptation.
Children of that era often raised themselves emotionally. We learned not to ask, not to need, not to disturb. Our parents were not cruel caricatures — they were shaped by their own histories, cultural norms, and survival pressures. But the cost was real and cumulative.
What is important to name is this:
Emotional suppression did not mean emotional health — it meant delayed consequences.
Anxiety, depression, somatic symptoms, relational difficulties, and burnout often arrived later, once the body finally sensed enough safety to speak.
For the body to function well, it needs the correct microenvironment to do so. It includes good nutrition, water, flexibility in movement, unrestricted breathing, restorative sleep and a limited amount of stress.
Part II — Today’s Children: Expression Instead of Suppression
Many children today are growing up without the same overt threat of physical punishment. This matters profoundly.
When the nervous system does not need to hide to survive, emotion does not go underground. It comes out — loudly, physically, insistently. Distress is visible. Boundaries are tested. Regulation is externalised.
This is not automatically pathology. It is often developmentally coherent.
Children now push back where previous generations submitted. They express where others froze. They protest where others complied. In relational terms, this can look like defiance, inattention, impulsivity, or emotional volatility.
And here is where diagnosis enters the picture.
ADHD is real, and for many children it is an accurate and helpful framework. But it is also true that nervous system dysregulation, relational stress, and unmet emotional needs can look remarkably similar. Trauma responses can resemble attention difficulties. Emotional overwhelm can present as hyperactivity.
When systems — schools, families, institutions — have limited capacity to slow down and co-regulate, diagnosis can become a way of locating the difficulty inside the child, rather than within the relationship or environment.
A diagnosis can bring relief. It can also function, unconsciously, as protection:
“This is not about how I parent. This is not about our relationship. This is neurological.”
Sometimes that is true.
Sometimes it is incomplete.
Part III — Parenting Without a Template: The Work No One Prepared Us For
Perhaps the most overlooked reality of modern parenting is this:
Many parents are trying to invent ‘good enough parenting’ without having experienced it themselves.
Earlier generations inherited parenting roles through imitation and unquestioned authority. The structure was familiar, even when it was harmful. Today’s parents are asked to be emotionally present, patient, playful, attuned — often without having internalised models of how that feels.
To be with a child without impatience requires the ability to tolerate one’s own discomfort.
To play requires emotional availability.
To co-regulate requires having once been co-regulated.
These are not moral qualities. They are developmental capacities.
When a parent was never played with, never emotionally mirrored, never met in their inner world, a child’s intensity can stir old grief, irritation, or helplessness. In that context, a diagnosis can feel like rescue — not because the parent does not care, but because change demands resources they may not yet have.
This is where compassion and responsibility must coexist.
Parents deserve support, education, and spaces to grieve what they did not receive.
Children deserve relationships that grow, rather than labels that replace reflection.
Diagnosis should not be a way to avoid relational work — but neither should parents be shamed for struggling with something they were never taught.
A Closing Reflection
Perhaps the question is not “Why are so many children being diagnosed?”
But rather:
Who is being asked to carry the work of repair — the child, or the adult?
We may be living through a cultural transition:
from suppressed suffering
to visible dysregulation
without yet having built the relational containers to hold it.
Children are not failing us.
They may be expressing what previous generations were forced to silence.
And parents are not inadequate — but they cannot be expected to invent emotional attunement alone.
What is needed is not fewer diagnoses, but more relational support.
Not less compassion for parents, but greater honesty about the work parenting requires.
And not quieter children — but adults willing to grow alongside them.
A closing invitation to parents
If you are reading this with a knot in your stomach — wondering whether your child’s behaviour is “normal,” worrying that you are getting it wrong, or feeling torn between love, exhaustion, and confusion — you are not alone.
Concern about a child’s behaviour does not mean something is wrong with your child.
And it does not mean you are failing as a parent.
Often, it is simply a sign that something in the relationship is asking for support.
Parenting today asks us to do something many of us were never shown:
to stay present with big emotions, to regulate ourselves while our child is dysregulated, and to respond with curiosity rather than control — all while carrying our own unhealed experiences.
This is not easy work. And it is not meant to be done alone.
If you are feeling unsure about your child’s behaviour, overwhelmed by advice, or stuck between wanting to help and not knowing how, I offer a space to slow down and think together. In parent mentoring sessions, we explore what your child’s behaviour may be communicating, how your own nervous system and history are involved, and what small, relational shifts might bring more ease for both of you.
You do not need a diagnosis to seek support.
You do not need to be in crisis.
You only need a sense that something matters enough to be looked at carefully.
If this resonates, you are warmly invited to boo a parent support and mentoring session. Sometimes one thoughtful conversation can change how a whole family feels.
