Forget perfect. After a lifetime spent with children and the parents who love them, I have found that the five things every new parent should know have very little to do with doing everything right, and a great deal to do with how you show up when things get hard.
If you're a new parent or soon-to-be new parent, chances are you're receiving a lot of advice. Everyone seems to have an opinion about what you should and shouldn't do, what your child needs, and what you absolutely must get right.
After more than 35 years working with children and families, raising three of my own, and writing my book, You Are the Parent, I've come to believe that some of the most important things new parents need to hear aren't about sleep schedules, feeding methods, or hitting milestones.
They're about the kind of parent you're becoming.
So, if I could sit down with every new parent, these are the five things I would want them to know.
The five things, at a glance
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Trust yourself. You already know more than you think, and reaching out for help is part of that trust, not a failure of it.
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Get comfortable with your child being uncomfortable. Your role is to support your child through hard feelings, not to erase them.
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Validation and boundaries go together. You can understand why your child is upset and still hold the limit.
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Do less. Giving your child room to struggle is often exactly how they learn to step up.
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Think long-term. Ask what you are teaching over time, not only how to end this particular moment.
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1. Trust yourself. You are the parent.
You are an adult with life experience, perspective, and foresight. Don't forget that. Even in the moments when you feel completely lost, you know more than you think you do simply because you have lived, learned, made decisions, made mistakes, and figured things out before. Lean into that.
And I know that sometimes being told to "trust yourself" can actually feel unhelpful, or even a little condescending. Because you may be thinking, But I don't know what to do!
Here's the thing: Self-trust doesn't mean always knowing the answer. It takes many different forms. Sometimes trusting yourself means making a decision even when you're not 100 percent certain. Sometimes it means changing your mind when something isn't working. And sometimes it means trusting yourself enough to recognize, I don't know what to do here. I need help.
Seeking advice, asking questions, or reaching out to someone isn't a failure of self-trust. It IS self-trust.
You don't need to know everything, and you certainly don't need to get everything right. But remind yourself when you need to: I am the parent. I can do this.
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2. Get comfortable with your child being uncomfortable.
From the very beginning, we hear our child cry and every instinct in us says: Make it better. And yes, babies need us to respond to them. Absolutely. But as your child grows, an important shift needs to happen: from always trying to remove discomfort to learning how to support your child through it.
As your child grows into a toddler and beyond, they will feel frustration, disappointment, anger, boredom, jealousy, sadness. They will lose games, hear no, struggle to do things, and experience moments when life simply doesn't go the way they hoped. These aren't failures, they're part of being human.
That's why your job is not to keep your child happy all the time, that's not possible or healthy. Your job is to help them discover that they can experience uncomfortable feelings and move through them.
You can sit beside a disappointed child without changing your answer. You can empathize with frustration without fixing the problem. You can support struggle without automatically rescuing. Over time, your child begins to learn something incredibly important: Hard feelings are uncomfortable, but I can handle them.
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3. Validation and boundaries go hand in hand.
One of the biggest misconceptions I see in parenting today is the idea that validating your child's feelings somehow means accommodating what they want. It doesn't.
You don't have to choose between empathy and authority. You can understand why your child is upset and still say no. You can make room for their disappointment and still follow through. You can acknowledge their anger and still stop a behavior that isn't okay.
In fact, these two things are meant to happen together.
“You really wanted another cookie. I know. We're all done for now.”
“You're so angry with your brother. You can be angry. You cannot hit him.”
“You don't want to leave. I know it’s so much fun here. Still, it's time to go.”
Validation is about the feeling. The boundary is about what happens next.
Your child's feelings don't need to change in order for you to hold a limit. Your job isn't to convince them that your boundary is wonderful. Your job is to stay grounded enough to understand their experience while still leading.
This is one of the most important "ANDs" in parenting: I can understand how you feel AND still be in charge. Your feelings are safe with me AND you can rely on me to confidently lead.
4. Do less, seriously: Why doing less helps your child do more
Modern parenting can feel like a full-time optimization project. We're supposed to say the perfect thing, explain every decision, prevent every struggle, create enriching experiences, anticipate every need, and turn every difficult moment into a beautiful teaching opportunity.
You don't have to.
Children need room to participate in their own lives and when we over-accommodate, over-explain, over-fix, and over-manage, we can inadvertently under-prepare our children.
So before jumping in, try asking yourself: Does my child actually need me to do something here? Or can I give them a little space to figure this out?
Doing less isn't disengaged parenting. Sometimes doing less is exactly how we give our children the opportunity to step up and do more.
5. Think long-term, not just about this moment.
Parenting happens in moments: the tantrum in the grocery store, the bedtime battle, the child refusing to put on their shoes when you're already late. And in those moments, it's so tempting to ask, What will make this stop?
But I want you to practice asking a different question: What am I teaching over time?
You can put their shoes on faster. Solve the disagreement for them. Give them the thing they're demanding. Offer a reward so they'll cooperate. And sometimes you will! Parenting doesn't require perfection or rigid rules.
But when possible, slow down and zoom out.
We're not just trying to raise children who are happy and cooperative in this particular moment. We're raising people who can tolerate disappointment, solve problems, communicate, take responsibility, recover from mistakes, and trust themselves. Sometimes building those skills means allowing today's moment to be a little harder.
There will be thousands of moments when you won't know exactly what to do. That's not a sign you're doing parenting wrong. That IS parenting.
Your child doesn't need a perfect parent with the perfect response every time. They need someone who loves them, sees them, supports them, and is willing to grow alongside them and confidently lead.
This is exactly why I called my book You Are the Parent. Because underneath all the strategies, scripts, and advice, I want parents to come back to something we've lost a little bit along the way: You can figure out the next step. You are the parent.
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A note from WeNatal on things every new parent should know
When I became a parent for the first time, I did not feel ready for any of it. When I first had Dalia, I was so scared, lost, and confused, and I truly did not know much of anything about how to do this well. Dr. Siggie changed that for me.
As Dalia grew, every stage brought a new set of questions. I wondered whether things were normal, how we should be talking to her, and how we should coach her through the hard moments. Dr. Siggie was my first phone call in every single stage. With decades of experience, she has genuinely seen it all, and she breaks everything down in such a loving and nonjudgmental way. I would make appointments with her, and she would guide Shawn and me on how to be the best parents we could be and how to support Dalia through her challenges. I am so grateful for everything she has taught us.
Now, with two children, the learning never stops, from navigating sibling dynamics to coaching our own parents on how to be the best grandparents. That is the heart of what we believe at WeNatal. Parenting was never meant to be done perfectly, or alone. It is a shared journey, held up by both partners and by the mentors and people who walk beside you. From preconception through pregnancy, postpartum, and every stage that follows, our hope is simply that you feel a little more supported, a little more confident, and a lot less alone. Because the goal was never perfection. The goal is support, together.
With love,
Vida Delrahim
Co-Founder, WeNatal
This article is for educational purposes and reflects the perspective of a contributing expert. It is not a substitute for personalized medical or mental health advice. Please talk with your healthcare provider or a qualified professional for guidance specific to you and your family.
