{"id":6452,"date":"2022-11-16T10:57:20","date_gmt":"2022-11-16T15:57:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mlparentcoach.com\/?p=6452"},"modified":"2022-11-16T10:57:20","modified_gmt":"2022-11-16T15:57:20","slug":"our-toddler-shouldnt-have-to-hug-relatives-how-do-we-hold-boundaries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mlparentcoach.com\/new\/washington-post\/our-toddler-shouldnt-have-to-hug-relatives-how-do-we-hold-boundaries\/","title":{"rendered":"Our toddler shouldn\u2019t have to hug relatives. How do we hold boundaries?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"large-12 columns entry-content__output non-vc-entry\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><i><b>Q:&nbsp;<\/b><\/i><i>Do you have suggestions for inevitable holiday-related conversations about boundaries with family members, specifically around telling relatives that our toddler does not have to hug them or eat anything he doesn\u2019t want to? I have some very opinionated people who will be spending time around my child at Thanksgiving, and I\u2019m mentally preparing myself for these tough conversations.<\/i><\/p>\n<p><b>A:&nbsp;<\/b>Thanks for writing in! There\u2019s no doubt that many of us are not raising our children the way that we were raised; many of us were brought up to hug, kiss, sit on laps, eat what was on our plate and talk to adults, whether we were comfortable or not. We were taught, fairly early, that our bodies didn\u2019t quite belong to us; they were the property of our caregivers. Our misgivings, hesitancy and fear were inconvenient, and many of us are still living with those trespassed boundaries today. And because there have been dramatic shifts in boundaries and children in the past 50 years, it is not uncommon to have widely varying norms under one roof during the holidays.<\/p>\n<p>The first thing you must do is not take the behavior of other family members personally. This means that you are assuming that your family members aren\u2019t consciously making you or your toddler feel uncomfortable, and that their behavior isn\u2019t really about you. When you decide that their behavior isn\u2019t personal, you will be free to create and uphold the boundaries that feel right for you and your child.<\/p>\n<p>Second, if you decide that your child will hug if he wants to and eat what he wants to, how can you smoothly handle this so that you aren\u2019t purposely shaming your family members? If you open the holiday season with lectures about boundaries and bodily autonomy, I can almost guarantee a miserable dinner. Instead, [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"fasc-button fasc-size-medium fasc-type-glossy fasc-rounded-medium\" style=\"background-color: #599b9e; color: #ffffff;\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/parenting\/2022\/11\/16\/toddler-hug-family-boundaries-thanksgiving\/\">View the full article on the Washington Post<\/a><\/p>\n<p data-qa=\"drop-cap-letter\" data-el=\"text\">Looking for more parenting support? Click&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/meghanleahyparentcoach.vipmembervault.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p data-qa=\"drop-cap-letter\" data-el=\"text\">Sign up for my<a href=\"https:\/\/mlparentcoach.com\/new\/new\/new\/newsletter-signup\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">&nbsp;Newsletter here<\/a>&nbsp;to get this in your inbox every week!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Q:&nbsp;Do you have suggestions for inevitable holiday-related conversations about boundaries with family members, specifically around telling relatives that our toddler does not have to hug them or eat anything he doesn\u2019t want to? I have some very opinionated people who will be spending time around my child at Thanksgiving, and I\u2019m mentally preparing myself for these tough conversations. A:&nbsp;Thanks [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":6454,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[883,27,301],"tags":[163,270,1290,628,588,886,242,892,584,585,13,8,592,934,591,748,918,566,10,593],"class_list":["post-6452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-holiday","category-parenting","category-washington-post","tag-boundaries","tag-children","tag-creating-boundaries","tag-family","tag-hold-boundaries","tag-holiday","tag-holidays","tag-holidays-and-parenting","tag-meghan-leahy","tag-on-parenting","tag-parent-coach","tag-parenting","tag-parenting-advice","tag-parenting-and-boundaries","tag-parenting-tips","tag-parenting-toddlers","tag-raising-a-toddler","tag-toddler","tag-washington-post","tag-washington-post-parenting"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Toddler shouldn\u2019t have to hug relatives. 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