by Jenna Payette
Overcorrecting in Parenting: Why Today’s Parents Are Exhausted — and Why the Answer Is Balance
Every generation of parents wants to do better than the one before it.
Today’s parents have more information than any generation in history. They can listen to parenting podcasts during the school pickup line, scroll through child psychologists on Instagram before bedtime, and find thousands of opinions on everything from tantrums to sleep schedules in a matter of seconds.
They’re reading the books. Saving the posts. Learning about attachment theory, emotional regulation, and gentle parenting. They’re choosing their words carefully, questioning old habits, and trying — often with remarkable intention — to raise children who feel seen, safe, and understood.
And yet, many still go to bed wondering if they’re getting it wrong.
According to postpartum specialist, nervous-system-informed parenting educator, and author of Parenting in the Middle: While the World Shouts in Extremes, Manu Brune, that’s because the problem isn’t that today’s parents aren’t trying hard enough.
It’s that they’re trying too hard.
“We’re deeply motivated to not repeat the patterns that hurt us,” Brune told host Lianne Castelino on the Where Parents Talk podcast. “And while this motivation is loving, it is sending us into overcorrection because we’re trying so hard to heal the wounds of our past… we start outsourcing our trust. We’re leading with our heads rather than our hearts and our bodies these days.”
Drawing from neuroscience, attachment theory, and years spent supporting families, Brune believes modern parenting isn’t suffering from a lack of information. It’s suffering from a lack of balance.
Why Parents Feel Like They’re Walking a Tightrope Between Extremes
For many parents, the desire to do things differently begins long before they ever have children.
Maybe they grew up in homes where emotions weren’t welcome. Maybe discipline relied more on fear than connection. Or perhaps boundaries barely existed at all.
When they become parents themselves, they make a quiet promise: My child won’t grow up the way I did. It’s a promise rooted in deep love and care.
But somewhere along the way, Brune says, that desire to break old patterns can become something heavier. Parents begin searching for the perfect approach — the one that guarantees they’ll never repeat the mistakes of previous generations.
Modern parenting culture doesn’t make that search any easier. Parents are told to be gentle, but firm. Present, but productive. Consistent, but flexible. Follow expert advice — but also trust themselves.
The result? Instead of experiencing parenting as a relationship, many begin experiencing it as something to perform.
“It really shifts parenting from a relationship into a performance,” Brune explains, “rather than a dance and a rhythm in relationship with yourself, your child and your spouse.”
Parenting Starts Long Before You Speak: The Role of Nervous System Regulation
Much of today’s parenting advice focuses on what parents should say.
Validate the emotion. Name the feeling. Stay calm. Say the right words.
But Brune believes something even more important happens before a single word is spoken.
Children don’t simply respond to language — they respond to the nervous systems of the adults caring for them. Long before children can regulate their own emotions, they mirror the way others regulate.
“If adults are not centered and adults are not calm and regulated… no matter what we do, no matter how we approach our children, no matter if we’re doing everything quote-unquote correctly, our children are not going to calm down,” Brune says. “Their nervous systems are going to stay in this heightened awareness.”
It’s an idea grounded in neuroscience: safety isn’t communicated only through words. It’s communicated through presence.
Why Co-Regulation Matters for Child Development
Co-regulation is the process by which a child “borrows” calm from a steady adult nervous system.
When a parent remains grounded — even amid a meltdown — a child’s own stress response has a model to follow. Without it, Brune says, no script or strategy will land, because the child’s body is still reading the room for safety before it reads the words being spoken.
The Goal Isn’t to Stay Calm All the Time — It’s Self-Awareness
Of course, no parent remains regulated every moment of every day.
Brune is quick to point out that emotional regulation isn’t a personality trait — it’s a skill. Which is why she isn’t asking parents to become perfectly calm during every tantrum or stressful bedtime. Instead, she asks something much smaller — just five minutes.
At the end of the day, think back. What moments felt connected? When did you become overwhelmed? What was happening inside you before you reacted?
“I’m not asking parents to do anything in the moment,” she says. “Take five minutes, think about your day. What went really well… what maybe did not go so well?”
The purpose isn’t self-criticism, rather self-awareness. Because awareness creates choice.
A Simple Nightly Practice for Overwhelmed Parents
Brune’s recommended reset doesn’t require a therapist’s office or a quiet morning routine most parents don’t have. It’s a five-minute nightly check-in: replay one hard moment from the day, notice where tension showed up in the body, and name what was happening underneath the reaction — no fixing required, just noticing.
Parenting in the Gray: Letting Go of All-or-Nothing Parenting Extremes
If modern parenting is full of extremes, Brune’s philosophy sits somewhere in the middle. She calls it parenting in the gray. It’s not permissive or authoritarian, and it does not follow a strict formula. “It’s letting go of rigid schedules, letting go of shoulds and expectations and living in the moment,” she says.
That doesn’t mean abandoning routines or boundaries. Children still need both. But consistency, Brune argues, isn’t about responding exactly the same way every single time. It’s about remaining consistent in what sits underneath every interaction.
“It’s being consistent with the underlying, I’m here, I’m safe, I understand you.”
Children don’t need perfectly scripted responses. They need to know that the relationship itself is dependable.
As Brune puts it, “You as a parent are the one who gets to be with them at 2 o’clock in the morning when they’re crying. It’s our job to observe our children and attune to their needs.”
The Moments That Matter Most Come After the Mistakes: Repair Over Perfection
Perhaps the most reassuring part of Brune’s message is that parenting isn’t about avoiding mistakes. It’s about what happens after them.
Every parent loses patience.
Every parent says something they wish they could take back.
Every parent is imperfect.
Those moments don’t define the relationship.
Acknowledging what happened. Reconnecting. Showing children that conflict doesn’t have to end in disconnection teaches them something far more valuable than perfection ever could: relationships can and will recover.
“You don’t need fixing,” Brune says. “You just need to understand what’s going on underneath the surface.”
In a culture that often makes parenting feel like a test with impossible standards, Brune offers something many parents rarely hear.
You’re not failing.
“You don’t need to be perfect,” she reminds parents. “You’re not failing your children. Parenting is a rhythm, it’s a dance with your child. It is a connection ritual. And you can do this.”
Related links
Understanding Child Behaviour: A Pediatrician Explains the Brain Science
Bystander Behaviour and Cultivating Inner Discipline in Your Child
