chidren and stress management

  

Chapter 1

Often we don't even manage to eat breakfast in peace. At work, we catch up, answer phone calls and e-mails, solve problems, and try to complete as many tasks as possible that day.

In the afternoon, we are in a hurry again - for activities or errands, to the store, to pick up the children, to cook and clean, and at the same time to help with homework... During the day, we hardly take time for ourselves, but in the evening we are already thinking about the next day and all the tasks that follow. Do you know this scenario? Then you belong to those who experience stress all the time in modern times. There's a lot of them. And children are among them.

The body is perfectly equipped to deal with dangers

But not all stress is bad. We know that stress is the driver of progress - it is stressful situations that enable growth and development. In one of the studies, for example, they proved that children who are born naturally, due to the stress of childbirth, cope with problems later in life more easily than children born by caesarean section.

But we also know stress, which is increasingly being said to be harmful to us. So why and when is stress bad for us? The answer to this question lies in human biological data.

Humans, just like our animal relatives, have a built-in system responsible for dealing with danger. In case of danger, the nervous system automatically informs our brain that we are in danger, which at the same time sends the message to the body with increased secretion of stress hormones that it is time for action - to fight, flee or freeze. The body does all this automatically, without our knowledge!

When we are in real danger, this automatic response from our body is a great gift, increasing our chances of survival.

When we do not follow the instructions for use

Unlike animals, humans have the ability to think conceptually. This means that based on learned language, cultural norms and upbringing, we create thoughts, ideas and predictions about the world. That is why it constantly happens to us that we think about our environment and relationships without perceiving them (with feeling), which means that we sometimes perceive situations as dangerous, even though they are not actually a threat to us at all.

In other words, this means that we humans create situations with our thoughts in our heads, which we then actually experience as stressful and threatening.

Our body also reacts to this thinking. It does not differentiate between the actual danger and the stress that we create for ourselves by interpreting events.

Chapter 2

So how does stress harm our health?

There can be many "dangerous" situations in everyday life. Which means that, unlike animals that are exposed to danger only at a certain moment, we humans are flooded with stress hormones every day, every hour.

These hormones keep our body on constant alert, so it works at more speeds than usual: the heart beats faster, the vessels narrow to speed up the flow of oxygen and other substances through the blood, and stress hormones are also released at an accelerated rate , which shuts down everyone's functioning for action. unnecessary physical operations, ie those that are not "necessary" for survival during "danger". This slows down the functioning of the immune system, digestion, even fat burning (which is why we gain weight faster under stress)...

If we are under stress for a long time, this high readiness of the body begins to take its toll. They appear:

• fatigue

• insomnia,

• colds, viruses and other diseases caused by a weakened immune system,

• problems with excess weight,

• more serious diseases such as thyroid diseases and cardiovascular diseases, even cancer diseases, as some recent researches prove.

How to manage stress?

People experience stress subjectively. What is a completely normal situation for someone, someone else will experience as very threatening. Those who react poorly to stress create more pressure on themselves than people who have learned to deal with stress from a young age.

How we cope with stress depends mainly on our character, upbringing and the competencies we developed while growing up. We can learn to manage stress in several interconnected ways.

• The first step is to understand how stress affects our body. When we find ourselves in a stressful situation, it is important to understand what is happening to our body, because understanding is part of the way out of stress.

• The second step is to realize that the experience of stress is subjective and that we can reduce tension by changing our perspective on the situation. When we understand that we are under stress because we interpret the situation as stressful, we can handle the situation more easily, and we can also change our attitude towards the circumstances.

• The third step is planned management of stressful situations, which can be achieved through mindfulness, various calming techniques and other stress management strategies. Different techniques are closer to different people, but one of the best measures when experiencing stress is mindfulness, which emphasizes the need to be fully present in the given moment.

Let's calm down life!

Stress is most effectively managed by "returning" to the present moment. People create the most stress by thinking:

• about the past (about things we did or didn't do that burden us, about interpersonal conflicts, bad results...) or

• about the future (we assume that something will turn out badly, even though it hasn't even happened yet).

In such moments, it is important to focus on the moment in which we are. The easiest way to do this is to focus on your breathing and the sensations in your body. If we are tense, we try to mentally relax the body or individual parts. This is the fastest way to calm our thoughts and return to a state of calmness. This is how we practice mindfulness and control the body in stressful situations.

dr. also writes about stress and techniques for dealing with it. Arlene K. Unger. She collected exercises and recommendations for maintaining inner peace in a booklet entitled Peace , which I highly recommend.

Of course, other changes in life are just as important as relaxation techniques, mindfulness training and meditation. These are usually more difficult, as they require new, "healthy" habits from us. Namely, we must ensure a regular and wholesome diet, enough fluids and sleep, and regular physical exercise, and we must also make an effort to spend as much time as possible in nature and generally have more time for ourselves.

Chapter 3

Children are not immune to stress

Children are no exception when it comes to experiencing stress. Adults and the system we live in don't help them much in dealing with tensions. When we enroll them in school at the age of six, we tear them out of their carefree childhood and demand order and discipline from them.

Of course, we must take into account that children need knowledge and work habits. This is partly why the stress is justified. But we must not forget that toddlers need a relaxed childhood and free play. We often forget this when we enroll them in a range of activities and ask them to do too many of the wrong things for their age. Therefore, children often find themselves under stress at an early age due to knowledge tests, competitions, assessments, overloaded with hobbies, demands from parents, school and the environment...

We live in an era in which children feel pressure from all sides: they have to be successful in school, in sports, they have to behave well and look good, dress according to the latest fashion, be interesting to their friends, and later to the opposite sex...

The requirements are set higher and higher - parents, schools and peers demand more. At the same time, they are under pressure from the media and social networks, which publish unrealistic ideas about what goals children should achieve.

6-year-old girls complain to their mothers that they are fat, boys tremble before a football game because they are afraid that they will not play well and they are afraid of the reaction of the coach and the father who will come to watch the game and leave the stands he snapped at the child, the coaches and the referees. Today we see children who have more obligations with school and "hobbies" than their parents at work. All too often, children fall into bed exhausted at night, and then cannot sleep because of worries and fears about the next day.

Chapter 4

When a child "overheats"

The situation is becoming worrisome and things seem to be getting out of hand. Stress is much more harmful for children than for adults. There are several reasons for this, but the most important is certainly that the child's body is still developing, and the connections in the brain are still forming. When a child is exposed to excessive negative stress, this inevitably affects his physical and psychological development.

If a child is under stress during a period when his brain and body do not yet know how to handle the pressure, this can lead to early traumatic experiences, which are proven to have consequences on the child, also related to psychological and physical problems in adulthood.

Once a child is "overheated", the consequences are reflected in the entire organism, so it can be less adaptable, which will deprive it of many possibilities in adulthood.

That is why it is so important that we as parents try to reduce "unhealthy" stress as much as possible and help children not to be overwhelmed by stress. With this, we give them the space to start dealing with pressure and stressful situations in a healthy and gradual way, and thus learn to actually manage tension.

Namely, without additional stress factors, such as high expectations from parents, school, society, peers and themselves, children experience stress in very everyday situations, such as knowledge tests... They encounter most problems or situations for the first time, which in itself is stressful. And it is true that only in the process of this learning can they also learn to manage stress, but they will not be able to do this if there is too much stress.

So the best thing we can do for our child is not to pressure him unnecessarily and teach him how to deal with stressful situations in the most effective way.

Chapter 5

How do we help a child overcome stress?

We can help a child overcome stress in several ways.

• We help him express his feelings. If we see that the child is in distress, we ask him what is happening to him and name the feelings we perceive. "I think you are angry. What made you angry?” Or: "You look scared. Are you afraid?'

• We take the child's feelings seriously and acknowledge them. When a child tells us that he is afraid of something or that something has hurt him, it is important to acknowledge and validate his feelings. We can do this by saying, “I understand that you are afraid. There is nothing wrong with that. I, too, was afraid to go to school in nature when I was your age." Or: "Oh, I see that you are really angry with your classmate. What she did hurt you, didn't it?'

• We help the child with visualizations. We tell him that there is nothing wrong with feeling afraid and emphasize how important it is to do things despite the fear. Let's explain to him that this is courage, and then we suggest that he imagines fear as a soft and cute monster, which in his mind he takes by the hand and says: "Come on, let's go, baby." He faces fear hand in hand and the situations he is afraid of.

• When the stressful situation passes, we remind the child of the negative feelings before it. Together, we evaluate whether these feelings were justified based on the outcome. We can do this by saying, "Remember how you were afraid you wouldn't like it at first, but you ended up enjoying it so much?"

• We help the child see another perspective. When a child comes home upset because he had a fight with a friend, after validating his feelings, we present him with another side of the conflict. "Maybe you also pissed him off with something to make him react like that. What do you think it was that made him angry?" With this, we help the child understand that conflicts are always a matter of two: that each participant contributes his share to the problem and also has his own perspective on the problem.

• We teach the child relaxation techniques. When the child cannot calm down, and even when he is calm, we can do some short relaxation exercises with him: focusing on the breath, directing attention to individual parts of the body... An excellent source of ideas for such activities is the previously mentioned book Peace . The author Dr. Arlene K. Unger suggests a series of exercises suitable for children. The exercises are simple and include visuals that will delight children (for example, imagining breathing as inflating and deflating a balloon). These exercises can be used by the child when he finds himself in a stressful situation.

The child internalizes the words and actions of the parents

Everything we tell a child about coping with stress, he eventually internalizes and knows how to use in situations that would otherwise be uncontrollable or scary for him. That's why it's important to take the time when we notice that a child is in some kind of distress and talk about the problem.

Over time, the child will be able to use these words for internal dialogue with himself and will thus better manage stressful situations and know how to calm down in them. It's also important to deal with stress the same way we teach our children. The best way to learn is still by example. And with our own example and behavior, we give children an indispensable guide for life.

Therefore, if you want to teach your child to effectively overcome stress, first find ways yourself that will help you maintain inner peace, and then share them with words and actions.