SubscriberWrites: Parenting at 2 AM

Balancing ambition and empathy, parenting Gen Z means tuning into their emotions, easing pressure, and growing together through hope, anxiety, and imperfection.

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I often catch myself wondering: how much pressure on children is too much? My daughter, now in Class XII, is at a critical crossroads where the future feels both full of promise and shadowed by anxiety. Honestly, this anxiety is more mine than hers. But this wasn’t how it was scripted in my head. For years, I was the textbook example of a relaxed, supportive parent, determined not to burden her with unnecessary stress. Yet recently, that calm has begun to fray. Sleepless nights have become frequent, anxiety creeping in, a relentless whisper asking: Will she achieve what she dreams of? And if not, what will become of her — and of me, navigating this alone?

The pressure I try so hard to avoid has stealthily seeped in. One evening, she looked at me and said simply: “Mumma, I’m not used to this kind of pressure from you. You should have prepared me for this.” Her words cut through me. Was I wrong all these years for shielding her from pressure? Or am I now overcompensating with demands she is unprepared for?

I wasn’t prepared for this backlash. I have always know that this our children, particularly those in Generation Z, carry an emotional intelligence and awareness about mental health that was rare in our own upbringing. They articulate their feelings (sometimes go overboard too), their limits, with a clarity and logic that can unsettle us. Sometimes, it is quite overbearing too. For example, the children today are never just sad, they are ‘depressed’. It is never just nervousness minutes before the results are out but a proven round of ‘panic attack’ and words like ‘gas lighting’ and ‘trauma’ honestly is part of their everyday parlance. So how then do we strike the balance between nurturing ambition and honouring their emotional well-being?

Pressure itself is neither inherently good nor bad. When appropriately calibrated, it fosters resilience, motivation, and growth. But when it becomes overwhelming, it can cause harm — triggering anxiety, diminishing self-worth, and stifling creativity.

Psychological research shows that children perform best when challenged just enough to stretch their abilities without tipping into distress. The key factor is a sense of control and emotional safety. When pressure feels imposed, relentless, or tied to conditional love (“you’re only worthy if you succeed”), it becomes toxic.

In my experience, what began as careful encouragement can spiral, as parental fears and hopes intensify. The unintended consequence is often a silent burden on the child: one they may mask, until a moment like my daughter’s sudden outburst.

Parental pressure often masks deeper anxieties — fears about the future, economic security, social comparisons. These anxieties may be unconscious but influence how much and what kind of expectations we place on our children. 

For a single parent, these pressures can feel magnified. The responsibility to “get it right” can create a cycle of heightened vigilance, which children can sense and absorb. This creates an emotional feedback loop, where parent and child anxieties amplify each other.

The challenge is to become aware of this dynamic — to interrupt the cycle, and replace it with intentional emotional attunement and presence.

Generation Z’s fluency with mental health, emotional boundaries, and self-advocacy demands that parents evolve. They resist being passive recipients of parental expectations and instead seek dialogue, understanding, and respect for their emotional landscape.

This shift calls for a parenting style rooted in empathy and partnership, rather than control and command. Create safe spaces for children to express fears, doubts, and exhaustion without fear of judgment or immediate correction. Listening deeply is often more powerful than offering solutions. When my daughter called me out, I went quiet and then I talked to her. I apologized to her but also shared my fears and anxieties that were leading to this pressure. She understood. We both realized and found a midpath without me losing my marbles or she losing the track. 

I am not the perfect parent. No one can be. But I have been the perfect parent to my daughter so far, and she has been the perfect daughter to me. In this journey, we have both embraced each other’s imperfections with intentions and have learned to hold hope and anxiety simultaneously.

There are still days when I get up in the middle of the night anxious and sweaty because future looks unclear. But now instead of rushing to her room to check if she is studying, I go and fetch myself a glass of cold water. So far, this seems to be working for both of us.

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