Feeling It All: A Parent's Guide to Processing Emotions

Can I be completely honest with you? Life’s been hard lately. One of my beloved cats is very sick, and between daily vet visits that can sometimes take hours out of my day, it feels like my time is slipping away. Add in the precious family time, work, and household tasks, and I often find myself running on empty - constantly alert, always shifting from one thing to the next. It’s overwhelming, and yet, I keep at it.

What keeps me going is that everything I do matters. My love for my family is deep, unwavering. And my work is my passion - it brings me joy and purpose, even on the hardest days.

And then, there’s my brave little cat, showing me gratitude for every smallest thing I do for him. Gratitude fills me too: every time he eats, every time he curls up next to me and purrs, I’m reminded that I am making a difference and not everything is lost. There’s beauty and hope in even the tiniest moments. When I see him muster the strength to bat his toys around the room, making me laugh out loud, it’s a reminder that life moves in cycles - up and down, good and bad, joy and sorrow, all intertwined.

I feel all these emotions - hope, despair, joy, grief, anger - multiple times every day. And, if I’m being honest, it can be exhausting to constantly ride this emotional rollercoaster. But here’s the thing: it’s OK. It’s normal to feel all of it. In fact, it’s essential to let ourselves feel it all.

As parents, we often think we’re expected to hold it all together - to be the calm, steady force for our families. That can lead us to suppress our feelings, get stuck in them, and then experience overwhelming emotional reactions when we least expect them, and often in our interactions with our children. As Carl Jung said, “What we resist, persists”, so the more we ignore an emotion, the stronger it may become. 

But the truth is, we’re human. We have moments of doubt, frustration, and exhaustion - and that’s completely valid. It’s like being a surfer, riding the waves of our emotions. Some moments feel like we’re gliding effortlessly on the crest of the wave, full of joy and connection. Other moments, we’re fighting to stay afloat, pulled under by sadness or frustration. But just like a surfer learns to balance and ride the waves, we can learn to find our footing amidst the emotional highs and lows.

What matters is how we process those emotions and move through them without letting them define who we are. It’s about allowing them to come, feeling them fully, and then allow them to pass.

Mindfulness is one of the simplest yet most powerful tools we have to navigate our emotional ups and downs. The key is to notice and name what we’re feeling in the moment. Try this: when you’re feeling overwhelmed or stressed, take a deep breath, pause, and ask yourself, “What am I feeling right now?” Name the emotion, whether it's anxiety, sadness, joy, or frustration - just name it. Acknowledge it. Then take it a step further - where do your feel it in your body? Is there tension in your chest, a knot in your stomach, or a heaviness in your shoulders? Maybe tingling in your feet? Tune into that sensation. Breathe into it.

(It does get easier with practice, I promise!)

By giving our emotions a name, we create space for them to exist without letting them control us. By feeling them in our bodies, we listen to their message and allow them to pass through us. When we accept that our emotions - both pleasant and unpleasant - are simply part of the human experience, visitors who deliver a message on something that is important to us, we open ourselves to a deeper sense of peace. Emotions will still come and go, but we can learn to ride the waves with more presence, grace, and resilience.

In my life right now, I’m practising to feel it all every day. And that’s what I want to offer you, too. As a parent, you don’t have to hide your emotions, and you don’t have to carry them alone. You can name them. You can feel them. You can let them pass. You’ve got this.