Kids and Stress: How to Help
April is National Stress Awareness Month! We might think stress is a grown-up problem, but children feel stress as well. Let’s break it all down.
What does stress look like in our young children?
Moodiness: Stress can cause children to feel big emotions, and it may not always seem to make sense from the outside.
Trouble sleeping: Are they staying up late worrying? Are they afraid of things that make falling asleep hard? Are they waking up at all hours and not able to get back to sleep? Thanks, stress.
Struggling in school: Can you imagine how tough it must be to focus on school when you’re stressed out? It’s no wonder their grades would suffer.
Headache or stomachache: Physical manifestations of stress can take a lot of forms. Headaches and stomachaches tend to be the most common.
Withdrawing or being defiant: Stress can sometimes trigger a fight or flight instinct in children. Being defiant falls within the “fight” response and withdrawing is “flight.”
Knowing is half the battle! But there’s still more. The other half is helping our children when they’re stressed. So what can we do to support them? Here are a few different ways.
Provide two positive choices they can have control over: Let’s pretend you want them to put their shoes on but they’re stressed because they couldn’t find their favorite shirt. You can say “I know it’s disappointing that you can’t find your favorite shirt. We don’t have time to look for it now, but we will look for it again when we get home so you can wear it tomorrow. Right now we’re putting your shoes on. Do you want to put your left shoe on first or your right shoe on first?” They get to choose the shoe and you get what you wanted anyway — their shoes on.
Encourage a healthy diet and good sleep habits: Believe it or not, food is strongly linked to healthy sleep. The more healthily they eat, the better they sleep. But still stress can disrupt that. Giving them comforting items, a calm sleep environment, or soothing music at a consistent bedtime can make a big difference.
Establish and maintain familiar routines: Stress throws our children’s brain out of whack (a very scientific term to be sure). Things that help regulate it are structure and familiar routines. When they know what to expect, it takes some of the anxiety out of the equation. It’s a stabilizing and grounding force in their lives.
Manage your own mental health: Easier said than done, right! But it is so important for our children to have positive role models to look to, and modeling mental health is no exception. You also might find that you can handle their stress and stress responses much better when you’re not in your own survival mode all the time.
Find times to talk and connect: You know what else can combat stress? Connection with other people. Knowing they’re not alone. Having a safe person to talk to. We can be that for our children!
Nothing is one-size-fits-all, but making an effort will help us figure out what will work best for our children as they navigate stress and their mental health. To find more tools for children’s mental health, check out the Ohio Center of Excellence’s resource library!
(This is a more in-depth version of our Facebook post from earlier this month found here.)