Eva Mendes shared the parenting advice she tries to live by with her lucky Instagram followers on Tuesday, and it’s something we all want to work toward, no matter how frustrating the process might be. The actor has two daughters — Esmeralda, 8 and Amada, 2, who she shares with Ryan Gosling (her possible husband!) — and she wants to make sure they always know they can turn to her.
“When they get into trouble later on in life, I want them to be like, ‘I gotta call Mom’ versus ‘I can’t tell Mom about this.’”
She wants them to know they can come to her with anything. What might that mean? Drunken mistakes? Cringey tattoos? Going back on their word and deciding it’s actually cool that their dad is playing Ken in the live-action Barbie movie?
“Anything,” she reinforced in the video.
Jo Frost, of Super Nanny fame, applauded Mendes in the comment section.
“You make that happen with how open you are in your response to the little situations they come to you with now and also how you emotionally regulate yourself when you hear what you do,” she wrote. “It is the foundation for when they are teens.”
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“However, when they are teens it’s good to ask, ‘Do you need me just to sound board or for advice?’ Sometimes it’s about giving them the space to resolve while knowing we are supportive. Eva got Parenting Goals!! 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🙌🙌🙌🙌❤️❤️❤️”
Wait! We want Super Nanny to think we are #parentinggoals too!
A post shared by Eva Mendes (@evamendes)
So what do those “little situations” and “emotional regulations” look like? Mendes succinctly explained that in her Instagram story. She said that no matter how much she feels she has overreacted to a situation, she knows she can always turn around, apologize, and “use that as a point of connection” with her daughters. Her parenting style doesn’t rely on lectures. It relies on a whole lot of humility.
“[I can] be like, ‘Ah, remember when you spilled milk in the car and I was driving. I kind of overreacted.’” she said. “And sometimes they’ll be like ‘No Mama, you did say to be careful. It’s okay’” or [they will agree], and I’m like ‘I’m really sorry. I’m gonna work on that.’”
By going through that simple act of self reflection (Ok, maybe not-so-simple. I’m not-so-silently stressing out about her kids spilling milk in the car.), and by coming back to her girls in a calm, composed, and loving fashion, Mendes is teaching them that she will have that same reaction down the line.
“I’m always trying to connect to them,” she captioned her post. “Especially during the hardest times when I don’t want to and I’d rather be mad. 💙”
This is far from the only message that is at the top of Mendes’ mind. In a July 2022 interview with Byrdie, Mendes said she focuses on modeling self-confidence at home.
“I think everything starts in the home — everything,” she said, speaking just as confidently as she did when saying her daughters should be able to come to her with anything.
“So hopefully Ryan and I are doing the work by just loving them, completely loving them, and doing most of that work for them so that they grow up feeling like they’re enough. That’s the one thing that’s really important to me. Because once they feel like they’re enough, no matter what they do, no matter what they end up doing, that will feed into every area of their life.”
These iconic TV moms always had the best parenting advice.
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