Parenting Kids + Learning to Apologize

As a father, it is my responsibility to nurture, support, and protect my kids for the remainder of my amazing days. I am truly grateful for this gift and do my best to hold up my end of the relationship. None-the-less, I am occasionally so weighed down with Baggage that I cannot show up as the best “da-ba” I can be. To think that I’ve learned all my lessons about being a good Dad previously is a known joke in our house. Parenting is definitely about learning on the fly and remembering what might have kinda worked in the past. Talk about trial by error. I’ve learned to bring extra snacks everywhere, how they like to be tucked in, how they like their spaghetti made, and how they like to be comforted when their day is rough. My job as a parent is to be an empathetic observer of their needs while bringing as much of me to the relationship.

Assuming parental responsibility in times of mental and emotional exhaustion (Baggage) is tough. Sometimes my patience is short, words are stronger, and expectations are Olympic. I can be a tough human to live with AND I can also be a deeply loving and caring person to have around. I want to practice the deep love and caring side more than the tough guy. My son G wrote once in his description of me that is am, “strick-ktic-ktic”. Ouch. 

When I am low on patience and inevitably say or do the wrong thing, it’s my role as a parent to recognize my actions, acknowledge how they are feeling, and apologize. As they’ve matured and become more in touch with their feelings and emotions, I’ve had to evolve the structure of my apologies so that I could meet them at their level as well as teach them how to both apologize and how to accept an apology. We are a work in progress, always. The structure I’ve cobbled together from many books, YouTube videos, and personal experiences have served me decently well. Included in my tool belt for both kids and clients is the work of Dr. Harriet Lerner from her book, Why Won’t You Apologize.

Here are some tools that Dr. Lerner shared in a 2020 interview with Brené Brown on Unlocking Us.

Gifts of an apology:

1. Gift to the person we hurt

2. Gift to yourself.

3. Gift to the relationship.

Nine ingredients to a good apology (assuming you are giving the apology)

1. Don’t use the word “but”

2. Focus on your action, not how they responded

3. Offer reparation that fits the situation

4. Don’t over talk it

5. Don’t get caught up in who is more at fault

6. Do your best to never repeat what was done to create the situation in the first place

7. Don’t apologize to silence the situation

8. Shouldn’t be offered it if makes the hurt party worse and you feel better

9. Don’t ask the hurt party for anything, not even forgiveness

These tools were discussed and shared in a recent Wednesday Empathy Standup. Together as a group we talked through each of these tools and then shared good and bad ways of accepting an apology. Here is what we got from the discussion about accepting an apology. 

How to accept an apology:

• Thank you for your apology, I appreciate it.

• Thank you for your vulnerability.

• I hear your words, thank you.

• Thank you, I need some time (to process).

• Thank you. I don’t know if I accept this right now.

• Thank you, I believe you.

How NOT to accept an apology:

• It’s okay.

• I still don’t understand why you did it.

• No worries, I am strong.

• Don’t want you to apologize, just don’t want you to do it again.

Now, apologies are deeply emotional and vulnerable because we lack practice in them AND we don’t want to feel guilty for our actions. The good news is, we are not our singular actions. As humans in a very noisy world, everyone gets bogged down in Baggage that overrides our better decision making skills. We hurt each other, this won’t stop. Accidents happen. This doesn’t mean we are a bully, unless hurting people is your jam. If so, I suggest you see a coach/counselor/therapist. We are not bullies, yet sometimes out of frustration, we raise our voices, flick off people, or make singular bad decisions. Apologizing isn’t our way out, immediate forgiveness, or repentance. Apologizing is an act of maturity. Apologizing is a mature person’s way of owning the fact that we hurt someone and that we acknowledge our action in this.

Apologizing is a very important leadership skill. 

Apologizing is very important parenting skill.

Apologizing is a very important fathering skill.

w.e.,

sD

p.s. J and G - I’ll get off my computer now and make our salmon croquettes.