by Gerald Gonzales, Ph.D.
#childhoodstress #teenagestress #parenting #copingskills #resilience #stressmanagement #parentingtips
As parents, we share the heartache of witnessing our children struggle with stress. It's a natural part of life, but it doesn't make it any easier to see our little ones in distress.
In those moments, you want to blurt out, "You need to calm down!" But deep down, we know that statement will only make the situation worse.
As adults, we've come to accept that stress is inevitable because life is stressful. When I accepted this truth, I learned to navigate the stressors in my life better.
But our children don't have that perspective and understanding.
All they know is that they are feeling stressed because of the physical sensations—muscle tension, shaking hands, racing heart—they are experiencing. Their bodies are telling them that there is danger.
Despite our best efforts to impart whatever wisdom we have about stress, our children won't hear it. This frustrates us and makes them even more overwhelmed. It's a lose-lose situation.
But have no fear—there is a solution. It involves a metaphorical mirror of our actions. And we hold the key to how our children can better cope with their stress.
How Stress Works
When a triggering event sparks stress, our sympathetic nervous system (SNS) gets activated, sending signals to our bodies to be aware because there is a potential danger.
The SNS has helped us survive all these years, helping us move up the survival hierarchy. When the SNS gets activated, our bodies produce cortisol (the stress hormone), impacting various parts of our body (e.g., the heart pumping harder, muscles tensing up, sweaty palms, legs shaking, etc.).
Then, our cognition gets filled with lots of unhelpful automatic thoughts. I've heard children say out loud, "I can't do this," "There's no way I'm gonna finish," "This is so stupid," "I'm never going to learn X," etc.
You, as a parent, now have the heavy task of guiding your child back to more helpful thoughts.
How Stress Can Be Helpful
In her famous 2013 TED Talk (47.8M views on the TED and YouTube websites), Dr. Kelly McGonigal argued that how we think about stress can change how our bodies physiologically respond to stress. Oxytocin, known as the "love hormone," is released when feeling stressed.
As a result, we seek social support when we're stressed. Resilience literature shows that having social support is crucial because our network provides support, encouragement, and belonging.
The Mirror & Our Facial Reaction
I mentioned earlier that the key to helping our children cope with stress starts with a mirror.
It starts with a mirror because our children learn from us. Albert Bandura's Social Learning Theory posits that people learn by observing the behaviors of others, especially people who are important to them, e.g., role models. That means, at home, children learn directly from parents' (and other siblings') behaviors. How our children react to stress is likely the product of how we, as parents, respond to stress.
The problem is that we don't see our facial expressions when it comes to how we initially react to stress. None of us have a mirror and can see how our facial features respond to stress. But do you know who is looking right at us when we face stress? You guessed it, our children.
This realization lets us know we can significantly influence our children's stress-coping skills. It all starts with us, the parents.
Practice Using C.A.L.M.
To help our children cope with stress, we need to model how we respond when we face stress.
Consider C.A.L.M. as an acronym you can use to show and teach your children when they are stressed out.
Count to 5. This strategy is helpful because you're now extending that space between the stimulus (seeing your child struggle with stress) and your reaction (solving their problem to protect them and make them feel better). Allowing yourself to sit in that space allows your child to express themselves. For example, if your child feels stressed about a test, you can count to 5 before jumping in to help them study, allowing them to express their feelings and thoughts first. This can lead to a more productive conversation about their stress and how to manage it, followed by the next three steps. Imagine your child is struggling with a complex math problem. Instead of immediately providing the solution, count to 5 and let them explain their thought process, helping them develop problem-solving skills and feel more confident in their abilities.
Analyze the situation/problem that you're facing. This is the next step to helping you and your child regulate emotions. By analyzing the situation like a scientist, you're naturally activating the Thinking Brain (i.e., prefrontal cortex) and regulating those unpleasant emotions. For example, if your child feels stressed about a school project, you can help them analyze the situation by asking questions like 'What's the project about?' or 'What do you need to do to finish it?' These questions can help them see the project as a series of manageable tasks rather than a daunting challenge.
Lay out all your options. Once you've analyzed the situation, please come up with 3-5 choices. Tony Robbins famously said, "One choice is no choice, two choices is a dilemma; until you have three choices, you don't have a choice." I prefer to come up with five because it forces me to develop solutions creatively. By coming up with that many options, you start to go beyond your paradigm. You begin to think outside the box and really examine all possible options. I've found more creative solutions when I've forced myself to come up with at least five options.
Make the best decision. This is the last step: decide how to model response to stress and track its effectiveness. Rest assured, tracking your effectiveness in responding to stress is vital because you can start to learn from it, continue to tweak it, and refine it more based on the situation, your child's temper, etc. This approach gives you the confidence that you're on the right path to helping your child cope with stress.
This C.A.L.M. approach assures you that you're on the right path to helping your child cope with stress. It's a journey; now, you're equipped with the right tools.
Closing Thoughts
Stress is an inevitable part of life.
If we can model healthy ways for our children to relate to stress, they will be able to navigate better the current and future stressors that they face and will face respectively.
It starts with you practicing C.A.L.M. And your children will follow.
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