Children's Mental Health Week 2021 - Children are like sponges!
Children are like sponges!
Absorbing everything from the environment around them, from the people they spend time with and from their experiences. All of these can create positive vibes or negative vibes that can affect mental health. Sadly in today's world, the stresses and pressures can understandably increase the likelihood of negative vibes, and feel much more emotionally intense for us all, especially for our younger generation.
The impact of these stresses on mental health
As each child is unique, the impact of stress will be different for every child. It may be visible through behaviour, as an emotional response such as anxiety, anger, frustration, tears, or as a physical response, as a tummy ache, feeling sick, tired or being withdrawn.
Or, the stresses may also be hidden and not visible.
Many children, especially those under 7, who are super “absorbers”, may not even be aware of these stuck emotions, may not understand what they are feeling, or know how to express them.
Feeling safe
It is SO important for every child to feel safe and know how to express and release anxieties and stuck emotions. Any stress or unreleased emotion, for example, fear, anxiety or worry, can cause disruption to both physical health and mental health, as the two are fully interconnected. As adults, we want to do all we can to help children, and they really need our guidance, especially as our emotional brain is not fully developed until the age of around 25!
Releasing stuck emotions
The good news is that children can release stuck emotions much quicker than adults, as they don’t have as much emotional baggage as adults do! By showing empathy, remembering that what may seem small and irrelevant to you as an adult, probably means the world to them for whatever reason, and by sharing some simple tools, you can help them to feel better.
The other key thing is to work on your own mental health as a parent, to reduce your own stresses, anxieties and fears, as you are a key energy in their environment. It’s like putting your own oxygen mask on first before a child’s when you are on an aeroplane. It enables you to best support them and achieve the optimal outcome for you and the child.
Children’s Mental Health Week
During this year’s Children’s Mental Health week, I would like to share 5 of the top tips that I shared when I was a speaker at the online EFT Masterclass Sweden Summit last year, to help you to encourage children to feel safe, and to express themselves, using their own innate superpowers. To me, a superpower is a boost of an empowering energy that can be used anytime, anywhere, to creates positive wellness changes for ourselves, which ripples out and can also positively impacts others around us.
Tip 1. Tell children it’s ok to not be ok and that feelings are their friends.
These are hugely empowering and important messages. Help them to understand that all feelings allow us to learn and grow, even if they feel uncomfortable. Sharing your feelings is a positive, courageous thing to do and there are many ways you can manage them and change the way you feel. Model this, by sharing times when you felt anxious or worried, explain what helped you and how it turned out to be ok in the end.
Tip 2. Encourage children to use their breath
Which will help them to relax - breathe in a superpower (of their favourite superhero or how they want to feel) and breathe out any tension they may be experiencing in a gentle, longer exhale, which will help calm them and bring in more clarity and logic.
Tip 3. Show children how to release uncomfortable feelings and change the way they feel
To feel good in the long term, I believe you need to let go of the uncomfortable feeling first, otherwise the stress or fear gets pushed back in and stays stuck in our body and mind, so is likely to pop up again. Children can do this by using superpowers in their fingers to press on magic buttons on the inside of their wrists (where the watch strap would go).
Take two or three fingers of one hand and tap on the inside of the wrist of the other hand. Do number 2 at the same time and encourage them to tap for as long as they need (normally only one or two minutes). Let them know that they can use their superpowers on these magic wrist buttons anytime to feel calmer or more confident. You can do this technique under the table or desk when online, and no-one will ever know!
Tip 4. Encourage children to drink water
Rather than soft drinks or milk to maximise the superpowers within their amazing superpower vehicle that is the human body. Up to 60% of our body is water and our brain and heart are over 70% water! You can encourage them to imagine the tension being washed away as the water goes down. If needed, you can also do the breathing technique in tip number 2 or ask them to let out a big sigh.
Tip 5. Try to get children to smile and laugh!
A smile, whether a sincere one or a fake one, changes your energy, elevates your mood, creates oxytocin and creates a sense of pleasure and well-being. It’s like giving your brain a feel good party. Have something on your child’s workspace that makes them smile or feel lighter that they can easily access when they need a boost. Watch a short funny clip during break times or watch a comedy together to lighten the mood in the evening. Smiling and laughter is contagious, and lift the spirits of everyone who sees and hears it.
Please be aware that Mental Health issues build up and get worse over time, which means being aware of the early signs, having a trusted, empathetic communication channel in place and using preventative, stress releasing tools is a key requirement for every household.
If you are looking for extra expert mental health or wellness support for you or your family, please do get in touch for a free 15 minute connection, no obligation call, where I can fully understand your needs and share the variety of effective, empowering mental health services I offer.
I’ve worked in wellness for over 10 years, supporting adults and children to optimise their wellness, and enabling families to further strengthen their bond, communication and enjoyment of family life. I’ve combined this vast experience to create my new personal wellness and family wellness offerings, which will be launched on my new look website later this month, so look out for that!
Warmest wellness wishes,
Lou x
Photo by Rosenfeld.it
