Parenting can bring many challenges and when you are stressed these challenges can seem even more difficult to face. Stress is a part of everyday life and can’t be eliminated, but you can build resilience and coping mechanisms to deal with it. Dealing with stress as a parent also provides an opportunity for you to teach your children how to deal with stress and set an example for them. 

Stress can be unpleasant, but by developing emotional strength, you can develop family resilience to cope with life’s challenges.

• Plan for stress: Stress is going to happen, it’s unavoidable. It is vital that parents learn to manage their stress and to develop strategies for dealing with difficult life and relationship issues.
• Lean on support: Learning the importance of support and the strength inherent in being able to ask for help is a skill that will take parents a long way. Everybody needs help and support and there’s nothing wrong in asking for it. Each of us needs a support system and this can come in many forms. Family members or even just one close friend can make all the difference to our emotional well being.
• Connect with other parents: Parents with children of similar ages can provide excellent support for each other through the mutual sharing of experiences, particularly those who are parenting alone or sharing parenting. One Family run a number of online and in-person courses which can be a good starting point in meeting other parents. 
• Parent yourself: Along with parenting your child, you need to parent yourself. Are your needs being met? Are you eating, sleeping, resting, playing? Are you in touch with what your needs are and how to have them met? In order to parent well you need to be a good parent to yourself. Minding yourself is the key to keeping your stress levels down and this often begins with becoming more aware of your basic needs and ensuring that they’re met. 
• Practice gratitude: Try to find one or two things to be grateful for eveyday. They can be really small, such as good weather, a restful night’s sleep, a moment of fun with your child. Building awareness of the positive things in our life and acknowledging gratitude for them can have a positive effect on your own stress levels.

Further Support

We provide limited direct support to both parents and children of one-parent families. This support can be requested directly by parents, for themselves or their child, and by professionals who work with one-parent families. You can find out more about this support here.

Helpline

Our askonefamily helpline is open 10am – 3pm, Monday – Friday. We provide detailed, confidential information on social-welfare entitlements and finances, family law, housing, education, childcare and parenting.

We also offer a listening-support service for people who need help parenting alone, sharing parenting or separating. You can call the askonefamily helpline on 0818 662 212 or 01 662 9212, or email your query to
helpline@onefamily.ie.