How to Support your child through tough times
Last week I talked about when to seek therapy for your child, and a big part of that was recognizing that all kids will go through rough patches from time to time. Maybe they woke up on the wrong side of the bed today and nothing is right. Or maybe they are going through difficult changes in some part of their lives. Most of the time parents can support their children through these difficulties with a few simple skills.
While these skills are simple, they are not always easy, and they do take practice especially if they are new to you. I’m going to go through 5 basic steps for communicating with and supporting your child through difficult times.
1. Regulate yourself
As caring parents, when our children are hurting, we also hurt for them. There’s nothing wrong with having strong feelings about what our kids are going through, but it is almost never helpful to show these emotions to our children while they are in the midst of their struggle. Our job as parents is to be an anchor for our kids when they feel unmoored. When we don’t fulfill this role, it can make the original issue so much worse because now our child is also reacting to our feelings. This can take the form of lashing out at us, feeling guilty for upsetting us, or losing confidence that we can weather their stormy emotions.
So, do whatever it takes to get yourself calm and grounded before you engage with your child and keep an eye on your level of emotion throughout the discussion. If you know ahead of time that an issue needs to be addressed, maybe you want to vent to your partner or a friend, write about it in your journal, or engage in some calming activity to get yourself in a good head space to support your child.
Sometimes these tough interactions are sprung on us without warning whether it’s a toddler tantrum or a teenager in crisis. Remember when I talked about the importance of regular self-care a few weeks ago? Well, here’s another example of the importance of this for parents. When we have a good self-care routine, we are better able to be mindful of our emotions and know ways to center ourselves in difficult moments.
2. Listen with an open mind
Once we’ve got ourselves centered and calm, now it’s time to engage with our child. Depending on the situation this can be as simple as asking an open-ended question like “You look upset. Do you want to talk about it?” Or if you know what the issue is, you can identify it and express interest in hearing your child’s perspective. Something like, “Can we talk about what happened earlier when you lost your temper?”
And then your job is to Be Quiet and Listen. Did you hear me??? I know we want to jump in with solutions or defend our own actions or confront our kid’s negative choices. But now is not the time. If we want our kids to continue to come to us with their problems and feel that they can talk to us about anything, we have to really listen to them and do our best to get where they are coming from.
You’re allowed to participate in the conversation in a few, very limited, ways at this point. You can say things like “uh-huh” “oh, ok” “what happened next?” You can reflect back to your child what you heard (the way us therapists are often lampooned for doing in session). This sounds like, “So you wanted more time in the bath and got angry when I said it was time to get out.”
Other than this kind of minimal interaction to keep the conversation rolling, I really want you to feel what it’s like to hush and let your child do most of the talking. You and your child can both learn a lot through these conversations if you are their anchor and allow them to fully express and explore their point of view.
3. Validate emotions
Now that you’ve heard their perspective on things, it is again very tempting to jump into solution mode or, depending on the situation, to brush it off as not a big deal. Maybe you’ve been on the receiving end of this when you’ve vented about a problem to a friend, partner, or your own parents. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard my clients say that when they talk to someone in their life about a problem, they aren’t looking for solutions, they want to be heard and understood. Our kids need this from us too!
Before moving into action steps, we need to take time to let our kids know that their emotions are understandable, or valid, given the situation. Even if we, with our years of life experience, think our child is overreacting, it is important to work on accepting their feelings. Providing validation for our child’s emotions says to them that we see them, we understand them, and we love and accept them exactly as they are.
This can be as simple as looking our kid in the eyes and sincerely saying, “That sounds really hard. I can see why you feel so upset. I would too if I were in your shoes.” If it’s hard to feel sincere, get in touch with your own past self who also went through challenges. Remember how hard those times felt to you. If you had a trusted adult to listen and support you, remember how awesome that was. And if you didn’t, now is your opportunity to give your child the support you needed when you were young. This, in and of itself, can be incredibly healing for parents who experienced difficult childhoods.
4. Ask how you can support
When it comes to taking action, it’s best to take your child’s lead as much as possible. It’s easy to think that we know what’s best, but when we step in too quickly it robs our child of opportunities to learn and grow. Asking our child how we can best support them also communicates that we have confidence in their ability to navigate this situation themselves with the backing of you and other trusted people in their lives.
Depending on the situation, parental support can look like doing steps 1, 2, and 3 and that’s it. It can look like offering a hug, asking if they want to hear about a similar experience you had, or asking if they want help brainstorming solutions or next steps. Do your best not to be offended if your child rejects offers of help. You are 100% doing your job as a parent by being available to listen. See the point made in step 4 about most people just wanting a listening ear rather than a problem-solving machine.
The younger the child, the less they are going to be able to generate their own ideas of how to move forward with your support. In these situations, offer 2-3 suggestions of ways you can help them get back on track which could be offering to snuggle, get them a snack or drink, or put them to bed.
5. Check in regularly
The last step is doing regular check-ins for issues that are ongoing like struggles in school, issues with peers, divorce, or the death of a loved one. Periodic, casual check-ins communicate to our child that we remember and care about what is going on in their lives. Checking in is also important if we have done something to directly assist our child in the situation like speaking to a teacher about it. This doesn’t have to be elaborate. It can sound like, “How’s the situation with Angela going? Any new developments you want to talk about? Has anything changed since I mentioned it to Ms. Garcia?”
Remember time and place can be everything
A bonus tip is to choose your time and place carefully. This is especially true for older kids and teens. Most parents will tell you that their children are more likely to open up when they are involved in something else, not sitting across the table just talking. The best talks often happen on a drive or walk, when you are side-by-side with your child, and I think there’s a nice metaphor in that. When we can be side-by-side, accompanying our child through the ups and downs of life, they feel supported, loved, and anchored. And this frees them up to grow into the adults we want them to be!
Until next time, take good care of yourself!
Meghan
PS: If you want to work on this stuff or other parenting conundrums, I offer parent coaching either in-person or online to anyone residing in the state of Tennessee. Give me a call or shoot me an email if you want to learn more!