Managing Stress at Home
View(s):Stress is an issue that most people talk about in today’s context. Children and parents both have this problem of Stress and usually leads to arguments and fights in the household. Stress at home is not only limited to a particular age group or social level. It is a general phenomenon globally for most people irrespective of their age, job or social level. It is seen commonly that parents end up in blaming the children for increasing their stress levels without properly understanding what the children are going through everyday. What parents do not understand is that by always blaming children, they are doing no good for the behavior of the children. As adults, it is the responsibility of the parents to properly understand their children.
Problems really go out of hand when the children reach Teenage. Teen Lifestyle Management shows different critical areas of a teen that gives them stress.
According to the above figure, it shows that a teenage child deals with Himself / Herself, Spirit, Body, Home and School. As parents, this is something that the adults need to understand. The support has to be given for the child to manage everything accordingly. If not, their stress levels will reach levels that are uncontrollable. Results could be extremely harmful such as opting to go on dangerous paths searching for recognition and respect or even committing suicide. How to face this situation would be the problem that most parents have. Most importantly, parents have to identify what the children want. If the parents see that their child is anxious; below are 10 ways that parents can handle this.
- n Respect and validate child’s feelings. Anxiety is a real emotion and not pleasant.
- Teach the child deep, slow Belly breathing. This is an easy and portable skill for Self-Soothing and Calming.
- Listen to the child and ask “Tell me what you are thinking?”. This would help to reveal scary thoughts and scenes that build up in the child’s mind.
- Ask the child “How likely is that thing you are afraid of to happen?”. By doing that, the parents can help the child to challenge his / her anxious thinking.
- Prompt the child with “Tell me some things that you can do to handle this situation”. Then, help the child to Brainstorm rather than just giving solutions. In that way, the child will feel empowered.
- Give up the idea of “Mental Health Days” or “Sleep with Mother Nights” or any other ways of avoiding feared situations. This would make the anxiety to stick more firmly and leads to further avoidance in the child.
- Encourage the child’s attempts to be brave no matter how small they seem to parents. Even a small comment such as “I am so proud of you for sleeping on your own in the bed yesterday night” would make the child feel brave.
- Work with the child to outline small steps which leads to a bigger goal.
- Create opportunities for the child to practice being brave and coping, and then applaud their efforts.
- Recognise when the child is anxious and say aloud what the parent can do to calm down and solve the situation.
The next question is how the parents can cope up with stress and anxiety? First of all, parents must be in a clear state of mind to solve the stress situations of the child. In today’s challenging world, it is not easy as said. Therefore, parents can look at below 07 steps and take action to calm themselves down when stress hits them at large.
- Get comfortable. Sit down. Support the body. Breathe to support the mind.
- It is always okay to say “No”. Being polite yet assertive about one’s Space, Limits, and Moods is a good thing.
- Eat what is best and do exercises. Avoid Alcohol, Caffeine and too much Sugar whenever possible.
- Always try to Laugh, Love and Play. Pet a Dog or a Cat or at least try to hold someone’s Hand. These things have shown to increase Endorphin levels in the Brain which restore a sense of well-being.
- Take a break. Find at least 15 Minutes somewhere in the day or longer.
- Try to visualize yourself containing your anxiety. (Ex : If you have a friend who really stresses you out, try to imagine that both of you are under water and his / her words are just bubbles floating to the top.)
- Talk to the people who are close to your life. Sometimes, letting people in is the best thing possible. Communicate a bit more everyday.
Be it parents or children, how the stress comes out is through anger. This is seen everyday in many households. Early morning, all are getting ready to head to office or school to begin the busy day. In the evening, everybody is back home after a stressful day. For a parent; it could be the sheer work load, angry boss, bad office colleagues or errors made at work place which fulfills stress in mind. For a child; it could be not understanding lessons taught, angry teacher, punishment at school or tiring after sports practice which fulfills stress in mind. At home, both the parent and child collide and start to relieve stress through anger at each other. Concluding this short study, it is recommended as important that both these parties resort towards Anger Management.
- Get ready for a talk to calm down. Talking can relieve lot of burden in a mind. It will help to calm a self down. By doing this, both the parent and child will be able to look at the problem more calmly.
- Say what the problem is in a firm and respectful way. Problem has to be clearly identified to solve it. Therefore, if the parent can understand the problem which the child is facing, then it is easier to solve it. In doing so, the child has to tell the problem with respect to the parent.
- Listen to the other person. Nod. Do not interrupt. Repeat what you think the other person means. Ask questions if not understood. The reason is that to listen carefully, it is important that especially the parent does not interrupt the child when he or she conveys the message.
- Explain how you feel. The parent must tell the child what he or she feels about the situation as well as the child also must tell the parent what he or she fells on this. Then, both parties can reach common ground.
- Talk about ideas that can solve the problem. Parents must realise that the child may have great ideas to solve the problem that he or she is facing. At the same time, child must keep in mind that the parent is more matured so they are assured to have good suggestions to face and answer the problem.
- Choose an idea to try. Parents and children both must arrive at a conclusion. That conclusion has to be the single idea that they are going to try.
List of References :
How to Take the Grrr Out of Anger by Elizabeth Verdick and Majorie Lisovskis
Parenting Article by Dr. Maryann Rosenthal
The Four Styles of Parenting by Kendra Cherry
www.Kidlutions.com
www.HealthyPlace.com
www.SharonMartinCounseling.com
Author:
Dr. Dilhan Sampath Jayatilleke
PhD (USA), MBA (India), BA (Hons.) Mktg. Mgmt. (UK), GDipM(SL), FAIQ(CII)UK, FIPFM, FUKAP, FCPM, FCMI, MSLIM, MISM, Executive Member – DMASL, Professional Member – PRASL, Life Member – OPASL
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