One thing you quickly learn when you have a child is how much stuff you buy that the child doesn’t need or like and how much stuff you already have that the child needs and likes.
Hard as you might try, many new parents overcompensate when they can. Maybe that is a feature of love: the impulse to provide more than what we had, to fill every possible gap before it appears.
Then as time passes, and the child’s antics start becoming obvious, some pulling back is allowed to happen—not withholding what they need, but learning the difference between a child’s wants and their developmental needs. This isn’t about triggering struggle, but about discovering that love sometimes means letting them figure things out, sitting with their frustration over a puzzle piece rather than immediately solving it for them.
The expensive educational toys still gather dust while they’re endlessly fascinated by your old keychains. This lesson seems to repeat itself at every stage: what we think they need and what serves them rarely align, whether we’re working with abundance or scarcity.
– Osasu Oviawe