Emotional AWARENESS
THE CONVERSATIONS THAT COULD CHANGE YOUR FAMILY
Helpful Reminders
- Don’t overwhelm your kids with information. In our desire to be transparent, sometimes we tell our kids too much. Take into consideration their age and level of understanding before sharing.
- Spend time outdoors. Spending time in nature has a grounding, calming effect and often makes kids feel safer. Make sure to spend time together outdoors and initiate conversations
- Empower your kids. Try not to fight every battle for your kids, but instead embolden them to fight their battles themselves. Help them come to their own conclusions on how to solve the situation.
- Help your kids identify who their biggest fans are. Our children need support and need to know they are loved despite any circumstances they may be facing. Remind them who are in their support system and remind them they are not alone.
- Help your kids face the pain of a first failure or rejection. First heartbreaks take root in us. However, if left unconfronted, that rejection starts to alter how we view ourselves. So take the opportunity of your child’s failure or rejection to teach them the importance of acknowledging these challenges instead of leaning away from them. Dealing with them in a healthy way promotes healthy self worth.
Things to Do
- Take your kid’s shift in mood seriously. Our experiences are all different and it’s easy for parents to dismiss their kids’ feelings because whatever they’re upset about seems trivial in the scheme of life. Don’t do this. Your kid’s feelings are very real to them. Talk to them and seek help if the change in behavior persists.
- Keep following up and be consistent. Continue to check in with your teen regularly and keep the lines of communication open in good times and in bad times. Your teen should know they can come to you at all times.
- Seek support. Having a child struggling with a tough time or mental health issues is difficult to bear for a parent. Find people you trust to confide in who will encourage you and give you sound advice. There is a long road ahead and you’ll need all the support you can get.
- Write down this reminder on a card or sticky note: I’m going to parent with our future relationship in mind.
- Set up regular family time. Time spent together as a family tends to nurture open communication. Whether it’s a weekly family game night or going hiking together, use that time to ask your children about what they’ve been feeling and experiencing lately.
Signs to Look For
- Listen to the behaviors of your kids. Sometimes your children are feeling things they don’t have the words to explain and it’s our jobs to explore those feelings and support them. Stay in tune with your kids behaviors and emotions and start a conversation with them whenever something seems amiss
- Look for multiple symptoms over the course of two weeks. Be aware of your child’s behavior — is he or she withdrawing from social activities, letting their otherwise clean room fall into disarray, and not eating? And have these behaviors lasted longer than usual? These might be signs there’s a bigger issue going.
- Take your kid’s shift in mood seriously. Our experiences are all different and it’s easy for parents to dismiss their kids’ feelings because whatever they’re upset about seems trivial in the scheme of life. Don’t do this. Your kid’s feelings are very real to them. Talk to them and seek help if the change in behavior persists.
- Take your kid’s shift in mood seriously. Our experiences are all different and it’s easy for parents to dismiss their kids’ feelings because whatever they’re upset about seems trivial in the scheme of life. Don’t do this. Your kid’s feelings are very real to them. Talk to them and seek help if the change in behavior persists.
- Therapy doesn’t have to be expensive. The cost might often deter you from seeking counseling. Many companies offer different types of employee assistance programs where the first few counseling sessions are free. Also, do your research — many counselors do pro bono work, making it that much easier to talk to someone.
Conversation Guides
- I encourage you to literally say to an adolescent, “I am creating a safe space for you, and giving you permission to talk about _______.” This kind of permission can be a key to unlocking a lot of the negative assumptions and fears teenagers hold around their feelings.
- Questions to ask: Is their anything I or the family things that increases stress for you? Is their anything that I or the family can do that would be helpful to you? Whats one thought that makes you feel overwhelmed? Whats one thing that makes you feel loved?
- Create a visible chart of highs and lows that the family can write on. This helps bring unity as a family and help the child realize everyone struggles and they are not the only one.
- Start with: Sometimes teenagers need help finding the right words to articulate what they are experiencing. Use a handout of feeling words that you can give an adolescent to look through and see if they can name more clearly what they feel. This identification helps them understand themselves better, as well as helping you understand their experience, which increases a sense of safety and trust in the relationship.
- Advanced tactics: Take a stack of 3x5 cards and write down one feeling word on each card. You will want about 20-30 cards. Lay the cards down on the ground, spread out from each other at a good distance (ideally a foot or more). Invite the adolescent to walk around and through the cards and pick up which ones they resonate with the most (i.e., which ones create the feeling of anxiety in them as they look at or walk by the word). Then use those words to help open up a conversation. The physical movement and tactile nature of this exercise can be very helpful.
- Drawing four columns on a piece of paper. Label them from left to right: Physical, Emotional, Mental, Spiritual. One column at a time, help the adolescent identify as many things they could be doing to foster each area of their life. Look at the list together and narrow it down to just one activity or practice in each column that they feel the most excitement or energy to focus on. Meet weekly to help keep them accountable and inspired to work on self-care and soul care.
