There are some common misunderstandings about what codependency is. It used to be that when one heard the term codependency, it was associated with being in a relationship with someone addicted to drugs or alcohol. The term codependency is now more commonly associated with being emotionally dependent on others in relationships. While we are all emotionally dependent on others to some degree, when we make decisions that go against our value system in order to avoid rejection and anger, we are creating a codependent dynamic within the family system.

As parents, we want to avoid family dynamics that perpetuate codependency. Research (1999) indicates that patterns within the family system can be passed down through generations. Parents need to be aware of codependent patterns within the family system so that they can recognize when it’s necessary to break the cycle. If the cycle continues and is passed down as codependency patterns within the family system, the children may be likely to enter into codependent relationships and pass codependency patterns down to their children as well. [fat_widget_right]

Some behaviors for parents to be aware of in order to recognize and avoid perpetuating codependency patterns include:

Being too rigid: When parents are so controlling of their children’s behavior that children don’t have the opportunity to explore their own choices, parents send a message to their children that they aren’t responsible for their choices and that someone else has all the power. Their children may then be more likely to choose relationships where they feel powerless.

Using your child to get your needs met: Parents need to ensure that they get their own needs met in other areas of their life such as hobbies, work, and relationships so that they don’t live vicariously through their children. Parents who live vicariously through their children risk sending their children the message that they must have their parents’ approval. While it is normal for children to go through a phase where they seek their parent’s approval, the need for parental approval could carry on into adulthood.

When parents come up with a plan of action instead of allowing their children to develop a plan of action, they are interfering with the opportunity to develop problem solving skills.Acting on the desire to solve their problems: When children talk about their problems, parents need to listen more without offering advice as opposed to becoming reactive and/or trying to rescue children from their problems. If given the opportunity through a safe place to explore their feelings and options, children may be more successful at learning how to solve their own problems. Parents can provide support to encourage their children to be creative in finding ways to solve their problems.

When parents come up with a plan of action instead of allowing their children to develop a plan of action, they are interfering with the opportunity to develop problem solving skills. Children then receive the message that they are not capable of solving their own problems and that someone else needs to solve their problems for them. As adults, they could potentially be more likely to enter into relationships where they are told what to do.

How Can Parents Avoid Perpetuating Codependency Patterns Within the Family System?

In order to avoid passing down codependency patterns within the family system, parents need to facilitate children in developing a strong sense of self. By implementing some of these practices, parents can be proactive in helping their children develop a solid and healthy sense of self-esteem:

• Be mindful of their safety, but give children the freedom and opportunity to solve their own problems.
• Don’t emotionally neglect children.
• Don’t be overly controlling or overly pampering. Doing so may result in some children creating a dependency on others and an inability to make independent decisions, while other children take on too much responsibility and are forced to give up their childhood.
• Be mindful of your own patterns of behaviors such as passive-aggressive comments, giving children the silent treatment, disrespecting children’s boundaries, or being dependent on children for emotional support.
• Encourage positive self-talk.
• Teach children that value doesn’t come from pleasing a parent.
• Parents need to practice self-care and ensure they are taking care of their own needs. This will help a parent avoid building resentment that often gets turned inward.

Reference:

Burris, C. T. (1999). Stand by your (exploitive) man: Codependency and responses to performance feedback. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 18(3), 277-298. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/224867940?accountid=1229

One of the most difficult issues I see today for parents is sexting—the sending of sexually explicit messages, pictures, or videos via text message. Texting in general has only existed for the past 15 to 20 years, and because it is still so new, parents usually don’t have a reference for it from their own childhoods.

Children are using devices more than ever to connect with one another. Some studies indicate that almost 80% of adolescents ages 12 to 17 own a cell phone, and almost 50% own a smartphone. Many of the apps that children use to communicate are rapidly changing and unfamiliar to adults. The lack of familiarity can create a sense of helplessness for many parents, which may make this issue a particularly difficult and scary one. To help with this, I’ve created a guide to hopefully make the issue of sexting less overwhelming for parents.

Understanding the Risks

To begin with, one should consider why children sext. Studies show most children say sexual messages are initially sent as a sign of love. For many teenagers, sexting can act as a courtship and even as a replacement for sex itself. These messages can be a way to express and gain admiration from a crush. Sometimes peer pressure plays a role, as children are pressured into sending a message they are not completely comfortable with.

The risk of sending a sexual message is that once it goes out, the sender has little to no control over who sees it. In 2009, there was a case in Pennsylvania in which a high school girl’s phone was confiscated by a teacher who found semi-nude photos stored in the phone and turned it over to authorities.

[fat_widget_right]Instances such as this teach us that even if a message is intended to be private, there is no guarantee it will stay that way. Children and teens should understand that anything they send into the digital world—a text, a message on social media, or even an email—might be seen by others. Teaching children about the risks also sends the message that the adults in their lives are available and willing to help.

Here are five steps parents can take when dealing with children or teens who are sexting.

1. Acknowledge Difficult Feelings

I think it is completely understandable and natural for parents to be deeply disturbed when their children send these types of messages, and acknowledging these feelings is often a good place to start. At times, the anxiety around this issue can become so overwhelming that it is difficult to see any ways to help. I encourage parents to discuss their children’s use of technology and the feelings surrounding it. Therapy can also provide an outlet to process some of the difficult reactions this issue brings up.

2. Recognize Core Issues Have Not Changed

Once parents have processed their initial reactions, I encourage them to try to see these messages as an expression of feelings that function similar to love letters from earlier times. As discussed earlier, the factors that generally cause adolescents to sext—teenagers in relationships, seeking approval from peers, and peer pressure—are hardly new. Most parents have vivid memories of grappling with these issues as adolescents, and recognizing those reference points can be empowering. This can help parents to relate more to their children and make the issue less foreign.

3. Realize What Will Not Solve the Problem

It is important to remember that children often get a lot of benefits from connecting with peers through their devices. These connections serve an important developmental purpose, and simply taking away a child’s phone or shutting down their social media accounts often does more harm than good. Children are surprisingly adept at getting around these types of limitations as well. Don’t assume the problem is fixed by trying to restrict their communication avenues.

4. Help Children Process Feelings

For many teenagers, sexting can act as a courtship and even as a replacement for sex itself. These messages can be a way to express and gain admiration from a crush.While children are well versed in technology, they often lack the emotional maturity to process the potentially negative things that can happen in the digital world. This is an area where parents can be enormously helpful. I encourage parents to make themselves available to process the difficult feelings and reactions their children have related to their online experience. The more children perceive their parents as available to talk about these feelings with them, the more resilient they will be when they are exposed to something negative.

5. Encourage Other Avenues of Self-Expression

The last step is to help children find other avenues to connect with their peers. Steering a child toward a club, activity, or sport enables them to connect with friends, and freeing up time in their schedule to spend with kids their age may make them less likely to seek connections online. The more children are allowed to connect to others face to face, the less likely they will be to try and fill a void in the digital world.

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Because technology has changed so dramatically in the past several years, parents and children are at risk of becoming disconnected. If parents are able to reflect on this issue, understand the reasons their children use devices, and come to see how children may be struggling with many of the issues their parents dealt with in childhood, they may be able to help their children find healthier and more productive ways of meeting their emotional needs.

References:

1. A common sense research study. (2011).  Zero to eight: Children’s media use in America. Retrieved from https://www.commonsensemedia.org/research/zero-to-eight-childrens-media-use-in-america
2. Guzzardo, J. (2010). School violated student’s privacy in ‘sexting’ case, lawsuit says. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/05/21/pennsylvania.racy.photos
3. Rosin, H. (2014). Why kids sext. Fresh Air Podcast.  Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2014/10/15/356393531/why-kids-sext-describes-nude-photos-as-social-currency-among-teens
4. Teens and technology. (2013, March 13). Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media/Files/Reports/2013/PIP_TeensandTechnology2013.pdf

This is a picture of a child experiencing selective mutism—children who speak to certain people in certain situations (most commonly immediate family members inside the home) but are otherwise silent.

For parents of children with selective mutism, life can be frustrating. They are often led down a path of incorrect diagnoses, including autism, language disorders, or oppositional defiant disorder. Some are given no diagnosis at all and are reassured by well-meaning doctors, teachers, family members, and friends that their child is “just shy” and “will grow out of it.”

The reality is that children with selective mutism do not grow out of the anxiety that prevents them from speaking. They are typically diagnosed between the ages of 3 and 6 and, without treatment, spend their childhood and adolescence struggling to answer teachers’ questions, talk to peers, and get help when they are hurt. This can sometimes result in academic underachievement, social isolation, and low self-esteem.

[fat_widget_right]The good news is that effective treatments for selective mutism exist. The first step is an assessment by a qualified psychologist or mental health practitioner. Learning more about the condition can also help improve the quality of life for both the child and parents. To help facilitate that important step, here are 10 dos and don’ts for parents of children with selective mutism:

1. DO Understand That Selective Mutism Is Not a ‘Choice’

When children do not speak despite having language skills at home, it can seem like an act of defiance. Children might act silly, become aggressive, growl, freeze, or appear to simply ignore whoever is speaking to them. It is important for parents to recognize that these behaviors are based in anxiety, not oppositionality.

2. DO Lay off the Questioning

For children with selective mutism, speaking is hard. When you see your child clamming up, lay off the questions. Pushing them to speak will only increase their anxiety and reduce the likelihood that they will be able to talk.

3. DO Describe and Praise Their Behaviors

When you see your child becoming anxious in a speaking situation, you can take the pressure off by simply describing what you see your child doing and praising their efforts to participate in activities, whether verbally or nonverbally.

4. DO Give Your Child Time to Speak

Often, adults ask children questions in a rapid-fire format with little breathing room in between. Children experiencing selective mutism often have a delay before speech, so always wait at least five seconds after you ask a child with selective mutism a question to give them a chance to answer.

5. DO Notice Your Own Reaction to Your Child’s Silence

When a parent sees their child freeze or hide when asked a question, it will likely be that parent’s natural, caring response to speak for the child. This may reduce both a parent and child’s anxiety, but it can also prevent the child from overcoming mutism.

6. DON’T Offer Rewards for Something Your Child Can’t Do

Since mutism is not a choice, but rather an inability to speak driven by anxiety, asking your child to speak in exchange for a reward is like offering your artistic spouse a million dollars to complete a calculus question. It comes from a place of kindness, but is rarely helpful.

7. DON’T Try to Understand the ‘Rules’ of a Child with Selective Mutism

Children with selective mutism may speak to one teacher but not the other, their grandmother but not their grandfather, one of four aunts, and so on. Children with selective mutism divide the world into those people, places, and activities in which they speak and those in which they do not. These boundaries are rigid, and trying to understand the why behind your child’s rules may only cause frustration.

8. DON’T Expect ‘Please’ and ‘Thank You’

I applaud those parents who are unwilling to accept that their child should suffer in silence and encourage all parents to persevere in their search for treatment in the face of being repeatedly told, “Your child is just shy.”Courtesies such as please, thank you, hello, and goodbye may be some of the most difficult words a child with selective mutism will learn to say. Unfortunately, they are also the words parents often push for the hardest because they don’t want their child to be perceived as being rude. The reality is that these children are anxious, not rude, and most will grow up to be thoughtful, polite adults.

9. DON’T Criticize Your Child

This one seems obvious, but criticism can hide in seemingly innocuous phrases. “You spoke so well last week. What’s going on this week?” or “Look how your brother is talking, can you try to be like him?” may not sound overtly critical to parents, but are often experienced as critical by children.

10. DON’T Give Up

Many children with selective mutism never receive appropriate treatment. Many parents who seek help for their children report their own struggles with selective mutism throughout their lives. I applaud those parents who are unwilling to accept that their child should suffer in silence and encourage all parents to persevere in their search for treatment in the face of being repeatedly told, “Your child is just shy.”

Acknowledgement: Adapted from the work of Dr. Steven Kurtz.

References:

1. American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Selective mutism. Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (pp. 195-197) (5^th). Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Publishing.
2. Stanley, C. (n.d.). The top ten myths about selective mutism. Selective Mutism Group. Retrieved from http://www.selectivemutism.org/resources/library/SM%20General%20Information/Top%20Ten%20Myths%20about%20SM.pdf

As a family therapist, I have helped families work with benign issues, such as a teens refusing to clean their rooms, as well as extreme ones, such as revelations of sexual abuse. One of the more frequent issues brought to my attention is a parent’s lack of ability to “control” a child and the consequent use of spanking to garner this control.

Spanking as a Matter of Culture

Having been forced to respond to this issue time and again, I have done a lot of research and thought a lot about it. Aside from the obvious ethical issue—namely my role as a mandated reporter—I have had to struggle with a practice steeped in the history of American culture. Corporal punishment, or the deliberate infliction of physical pain, has been part of our culture since our early days as a nation, even being used today in some school systems in America (19 states allow it).

[fat_widget_right]Does spanking work? Should we all be hitting our kids to develop a society of rule followers who respect authority? Well, think about it: Does being afraid of authority necessarily mean you respect it?

Fear vs. Respect

What I have seen throughout my time as a therapist is that fear doesn’t usually tend to lead to respect. In my work, often one or both parents believe they were kept in line as a child only through beating. When we examine this more closely, the parents openly recognize corporal punishment did not always promote adherence to the rules when they were kids; they simply became better at not being caught breaking the rules.

In my experience, corporal punishment (or spanking, whooping, hitting, beating, etc.) often promotes more aggressive behavior in the child at home and in school. The child who is punished with spanking is often left with few skills to cope when difficult situations and emotions arise, and they tend to repeat the modeled behavior of the parent by turning to physical aggression to solve problems.

An article in Monitor on Psychology, a publication of the American Psychological Association, examined spanking research conducted over the years. Several recent peer-reviewed studies indicate children who had been disciplined with corporal punishment were more likely to exhibit aggressive behavior toward friends and siblings. One study, published in 2011 in the journal Child Abuse and Neglect, looked at 100 families with children ages 3 to 7 and found in households where children were spanked, the kids were more likely to use violence to resolve conflicts with their siblings and friends. The article in Monitor also shared evidence that physical punishment may increase the risk for mental health issues for kids, including anxiety and depression.

Perhaps the worst consequence I have seen from physically aggressive punishment is the damage it does to the parent-child relationship. Many children and teens I have worked with who have been parented with corporal punishment often express a desire to “grow up and get out.” These kids want to escape the relationship because they see the punishment as abuse.

How Can We Parent Our Kids Without Spanking?

The use of rewards and consequences can be one of the best ways to gain respect and control over children and teens’ behavior. Many caregivers try this and fail. In many cases, one parent didn’t maintain the rewards or consequences, or a partner undermined efforts. I often see parents who haven’t completely committed to the use of rewards and consequences, and instead of working on becoming more consistent, blame is put on the child.

To effectively administer a plan to discipline and encourage your children, there are a few steps to follow:

1. Make two separate lists: one of behaviors you want to promote and one of behaviors you want to work on decreasing. Examples of behaviors to increase include taking out the trash, cleaning the bedroom, and completing homework. Behaviors to decrease could include being impolite, hitting, and fighting. Each child is different, and a plan has to be tailored to the needs of your family.
2. Think about appropriate rewards and consequences for each behavior. Parents can come up with many rewards that don’t cost a thing and may improve relationships in the family. Examples of rewards are: playing a game with your child, taking your child to the park, and/or letting your child spend time with friends. Consequences can include taking away privileges (use of video games, phone, etc.) and grounding or time-out, depending on the age of your child.
3. Share the plan with your child. Children must be aware of the possible consequences and rewards in order to give them the chance to make the appropriate choices. Parents can use this plan as a tool by reminding the child of the consequences of their choices before they make them.

If your child is not used to facing consequences, they will likely resist, and it may require some effort on your part to remain firm and maintain the consequence. Persevering through the first month or so will be necessary to see positive, long-term results in your parenting style and your relationship with your child.

Perhaps the worst consequence I have seen from physically aggressive punishment is the damage it does to the parent-child relationship. Many children and teens I have worked with who have been parented with corporal punishment often express a desire to “grow up and get out.”Some factors make maintaining a plan for rewards and consequences difficult. Guilt is probably the No. 1 reason I hear for a parent not being able to us this system to improve a child’s behavior. Lack of support is the second most common, and when there is support, often spouses and co-caregivers can’t agree on how to parent, and thus “splitting” occurs. In this scenario, the child gets away with whatever they want, and the parents end up angry at each other. For these three reasons, among others, many parents struggle with creating and maintaining boundaries and expectations for their kids.

A careful mix of executive authority and a nurturing stance is needed to earn respect from your kids. If you are struggling to implement such a plan, don’t resort to hitting. Working with a therapist can help you cope with feelings of guilt and can also help you and your spouse or co-caregiver work as a team and eliminate splitting. As this article suggests, you are not alone, and seeking help from a therapist in no way means you are a failure, but instead represents that you are a proactive parent.

References:

1. Rochman, B. (2012, July 02). Hitting your kids increases their risk of mental illness. Time. Retrieved from http://healthland.time.com/2012/07/02/physical-punishment-increases-your-kids-risk-of-mental-illness
2. Smith, B.L. (2012, April). The case against spanking. Monitor on Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/04/spanking.aspx
3. Strauss, V. (2014, September 18). 19 states still allow corporal punishment in school. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/09/18/19-states-still-allow-corporal-punishment-in-school/

Many years ago, before I had children, I worked with a parent who confided that she would sometimes get so frustrated with her baby that she fantasized about throwing him out the window. I was horrified to hear this, and thought there was something really troubled about this parent—that is, until I had my own (colicky) baby and began to have similar fantasies.

Just to be clear, neither this parent nor I was going to hurt anyone. There is a world of difference between fantasizing and acting. But our feelings of frustration and hate were very real and powerful. And we are not alone. Having had the pleasure of both participating in and leading several parenting support groups over the years, I can tell you that many parents have feelings of hate or other strongly negative feelings toward their kids at one time or another.

So, if hating our children is so ubiquitous, why isn’t it more openly acknowledged?

We have all heard (ad nauseam) about the positive feelings we are supposed to cultivate in ourselves and express toward our children, feelings such as patience, acceptance, unconditional love, pride, etc. Rarely, though, do we hear about the validity of feeling hate or other strongly negative feelings toward our children.

Fortunately, this has shifted somewhat in the past decade or so. The proliferation of parent support groups where the expression of negative feelings is accepted and supported, and the publication of books such as the satirical parenting guides Sh*tty Mom: The Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us by Laurie Kilmartin, et al., Toddlers Are A**holes: It’s not Your Fault by Bunmi Laditan, and the faux children’s book Go the F**k to Sleep by Adam Mansbach and Ricardo Cortes, have helped normalize parents’ negative feelings. Despite these advances, however, a culture of secrecy and shame around hating our kids persists.

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In order to understand why this is, it might be helpful to first look at the question of why we hate our kids.

To some extent, it’s just common sense: spending hours upon hours, days upon days, years upon years taking care of someone who is dependent on you, but often demanding and resentful of you, naturally breeds some negative feelings.

For a more in-depth look at parental hate, Donald Winnicott (a psychoanalyst and coiner of the phrase “the good enough mother”) explained it best when he gave the following reasons (among others) as to why a mother might hate her baby (1975; p. 201).

• The baby is a danger to her in pregnancy and in birth.
• The baby is an interference with her private life.
• The baby hurts her nipples even by suckling, bites her, and tries to hurt her in other ways.
• The baby can be ruthless, treats her like scum, an unpaid servant, a slave.
• The baby at first must dominate, life must unfold at the baby’s rate, and all this needs the mother’s continuous and detailed study.
• After an awful morning with her baby, when the mother goes out with him/her, s/he smiles at a stranger who says: “Isn’t s/he sweet?”

And yet, Winnicott goes on, for all the hate the mother may feel toward her baby, she must learn to tolerate this feeling without acting on it or expressing it in its raw, rageful form (p. 202). In short, mothers—and I would add fathers, too—must contain their feelings of rage. Perhaps it is this need for containment and the challenges this task poses that explains why parental hate is still somewhat taboo.

But what does it even mean to contain one’s negative feelings toward one’s child? And why is it so important?

I would argue that containment is achieved when parents are able to accept and integrate into their emotional landscape, at least to some extent, their negative feelings toward their children. Generally, when we fail to accept our negative feelings toward our children, we act in one of two ways: we become rageful or we withdraw emotionally, either of which can be problematic.

When we rage at our children, we give them the message that we are not in control of our negative feelings, that negative feelings are scary and bad, and that any such feelings they have should be expressed in a similar way, or hidden away because they are too scary.

Alternatively, when we cut ourselves off from our negative feelings or hide them away such that we don’t have access to and don’t express them to our children, our children get the message that negative feelings are unacceptable and wrong and that when they feel and/or express negative feelings, they are bad for doing so. Having negative feelings becomes a scary, lonely, and powerless experience.

So, if we aren’t supposed to act on or hide our hateful feelings toward our kids, what the heck do we do with them?

As I suggested above, the first step is to accept them, to not feel ashamed of them, to understand that they are valid. In this way, we come to integrate these feelings into the rest of who we are and what we feel. In practice, this might mean sharing our feelings with other parents, complaining about or talking trash about our kids to others, or maybe speaking with a counselor or therapist—release! Often, this is enough for us to feel sane and in control and to contain our negative feelings in a way our child needs.

Sometimes, though, it is not enough for us to calmly hold our negative feelings without expressing them. Sometimes our children need to feel our hate or negative feelings toward them—not necessarily in their raw form, but in a controlled way.

Why is this? Why do our children ever need to experience our hate toward them?

How Psychoanalysis Can Inform Parenting

Once again, I believe Winnicott explained it best when he stated (1975): “It seems doubtful whether a human child as he develops is capable of tolerating the full extent of his own hate in a sentimental environment. He needs hate to hate.” (p. 202)

Hyman Spotnitz, founder of modern psychoanalysis, a branch of psychoanalysis, elaborated on Winnicott’s thesis when he wrote about the relationship between the therapist and the person in therapy. In psychoanalysis, it is believed that the relationship between the person in therapy and the therapist inherently evokes feelings from the former’s past (and sometimes the therapist’s, too), particularly with regards to the relationship to his or her parents. When evoked in the context of the psychoanalytic relationship, certain powerful feelings can arise in the person toward the therapist and the therapist towards the person in therapy, including feelings of hate.

Although he cautioned against expressing all of one’s feelings toward the people one works with in therapy, Spotnitz warned against the therapist always hiding his negative feelings (2004). He wrote, “To allot too little hate to a patient who needs to learn to experience and sustain it comfortably is unjust. To give him too little feeling because the analyst has too much of it is a technical error. The patient is entitled to whatever feeling—positive or negative—he needs …” (p. 159)

Spotnitz further writes (2004) that the therapist needs to express his hatred in order to help the person in therapy experience and sustain his or her own negative feelings. In this way, the therapist helps the person feel less alone with his or her hate, feel that the therapist is more like him/her, with a more equitable balance of goodness and badness (that is, the person is not all bad for his or her negative feelings, and the therapist not all good for not expressing his/hers).

Spotnitz also suggests (2004) that the sharing of the therapist’s hate can reassure the person in therapy of his or her impact on the therapist, giving the person a sense of control and power. Furthermore, when the therapist expresses negative feelings to the person, the person can see that the therapist’s verbal expression does not necessarily lead to action, the therapist thereby modeling for the person the importance of putting feelings into words rather than acting out.

While I do not advocate being therapists to our children (in fact, I strongly caution against it), I would argue that many of the beliefs of psychoanalysis more generally, and modern psychoanalysis specifically, very much apply to parenting. We need to try to accept and integrate our feelings of hate and other negative feelings toward our children so that we can contain them and, when appropriate, choose to express them to our children in a controlled fashion. In this way, our children can see that we have powerful, negative feelings, too, and that they are not alone with their scary, hateful feelings and are not bad for having them. We let our children know that despite how powerless they feel at times, they do have some power in being able to affect us and stir up powerful feelings in us. We help our children accept and integrate their own hate, so that it becomes one of many feelings they can experience and express, not one that is split off and acted out because of fear or shame.

In short, sometimes our hate can be helpful to our kids.

So, what does “helpful hate” look like in practice?

How Hate Can Be Helpful

To illustrate, I recount a situation with a parent, whom I shall call Angela, who was a member of one of my parenting groups.

Angela was a parent of two—a 6-year-old girl, whom I will call Josephine, and a 3-year-old boy whom I will call Sam. Josephine had been a very easy baby and toddler; she had a calm temperament and was well-behaved. Angela felt confident and competent in her parenting of Josephine.

It was therefore a bit of a surprise and disappointment to Angela when Sam was born and turned out to be a very difficult baby and toddler. Much more physically developed than verbal, Sam would get frustrated when he didn’t get his way and couldn’t express himself, and would often hit Angela, quite hard, to express his frustration. Angela would become enraged and scream at Sam when he hit her. Sam, in turn, became very scared and would start sobbing inconsolably, at which point Angela would feel so guilty that she would apologize profusely and try to comfort Sam, to no avail. Unfortunately, this became a cycle, with Angela and Sam clearly both very upset about what was happening between them, but with the hitting and screaming continuing.

As parents, when we learn how to do these things, we become more comfortable with who we are and what we feel, and can therefore be more in control and more deliberate in our parenting choices. And all this helps us be the best parents we can be, no matter what we are feeling toward our children.

When Angela spoke in the parenting group about this dynamic, she expressed deep shame about her rage and her screaming and the cycle in which she and Sam were engaged. She so desperately wanted to be in control and to figure out a way to break the cycle.

After several weeks of discussing her predicament, one of the other members of the group blurted out, “Sam’s a terror! Of course you want to scream at him! It’s a miracle you don’t hit him back!” Angela looked stunned, but then burst out laughing, as did the rest of the group.

It seemed that something had been liberated in Angela. She had finally been given permission to accept her strongly negative feelings toward Sam. Little by little, Angela was able to discuss and accept her more negative feelings—her disappointment that Sam wasn’t easier like his sister, her anger at Sam for leading her to feel like an inadequate parent, and much more.

Over time, these feelings stopped being so scary and shameful to Angela. As Angela became more accepting of her negative feelings, her rage began to dissipate, and when Sam hit her, she often felt “simply” angry rather than enraged. Angela began to feel more in control of her feelings and more able to focus on what to do with Sam in a less reactive, guilty way.

Over time, Angela’s yelling at Sam began to decrease. Rather, when Sam hit her, Angela would firmly and somewhat angrily tell Sam to stop, that she knew he was mad but that hitting was not OK, that if he was mad, he could yell “No!” or “I’m mad!” She would then send Sam to his room for a time-out.

It seemed to have the desired effect. Over time, Sam’s hitting greatly decreased and his use of the words “no!” and “mad!” greatly increased. It would seem that, for both Sam and Angela, negative feelings had become more acceptable, more integrated parts of who they were and how they interacted with each other.

Although it is impossible to know what Sam’s subjective experience of all this was or even to be sure what aspect of Angela’s approach was effective, I would speculate that because of the changes in Angela’s feelings and actions, she was able to accomplish at least some of the following:

• Help Sam feel that his negative feelings had an impact on Angela but were not bad or overwhelming.
• Set the limit, “Hitting is not OK; you need to go to your room,” so that Sam felt his anger was being contained, which helped him feel safe.
• Give Sam alternative forms of expression, i.e. words, to teach Sam how to express his strong feelings rather than act out on them.

Of course, there are times when this type of approach doesn’t work for a variety of reasons. Hey, nothing works all the time in parenting. We are human; we lose control; our kids lose control. And certainly, many parents are perfectly capable of handling their hatred and other negative feelings without the help of psychoanalysis.

Nonetheless, what I think is unique about psychoanalysis and what it can contribute to parenting is its ability to help people learn about and accept all their feelings, both positive and negative, and to show people what to do with their feelings (contain, express, etc.), particularly the more difficult ones such as hate.

As parents, when we learn how to do these things, we become more comfortable with who we are and what we feel, and can therefore be more in control and more deliberate in our parenting choices. And all this helps us be the best parents we can be, no matter what we are feeling toward our children.

References:

1. Kilmartin, L., Moline, K., Ybarbo, A., & Zoellner, Mary Ann. (2012). Sh*tty Mom: The Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us. Harry Abrams.
2. Latidan, B. (2015). Toddlers Are A**holes: It’s not Your Fault. Workman Publishing Company.
3. Mansbach, A., & Cortes, R. (2011). Go the F**k to Sleep. Akashic Books.
4. Spotnitz, H. (2004). Modern Psychoanalysis of the Schizophrenic Patient. YBK Publishers.
5. Winnicott, D.W. (1975). Hate in the Countertransference. Through Pediatrics to Psychoanalysis, pp. 194-203. New York: Basic Books.

If you are a mother, you have probably experienced at least one day (if not many) when you wondered if you were cut out for the job of parenting. Mothering is hard work. Even on our best days parenting our kids, there are difficult moments. Many days, it is the occasional joyful moment that makes it all worthwhile. Other times, it may not feel like the good justifies the bad.

You can find some blogs these days that describe parenthood more authentically and accurately than in the past, including the good, the bad, and the ugly. Moms are increasingly owning up to the fact being a mom is tough and sometimes thankless. But almost universally, these stories end with a phrase such as “It’s all worth it,” “I still wouldn’t trade being a mother for anything,” or even, “Being a mother is the best job in the world.”

But what if your experience of motherhood doesn’t include that last sentence? What if your true feeling is that, while you love your child/children, motherhood itself is not what you thought it would be and you just don’t enjoy it much?

For some mothers, these feelings arise out of depression, and once the depression lifts, joy enters into the parenting experience and all regrets about becoming a mom dissipate. But for others, even after recovery from depression, and despite loving their child and enjoying many moments with them, the bottom line is that motherhood is not a job they enjoy overall or would choose again.

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If it were any other job, it would be acceptable to acknowledge that it’s hard and maybe you’re not totally suited to it, but when you’re talking about motherhood, admitting you don’t love it is a huge taboo.

A recent study published in the journal Demography found that, on average, happiness decreased more in the two years following becoming a parent than following a job loss, divorce, or even the death of a spouse. Clearly, not every mother is happy with her new life, and yet those feelings are typically buried, not talked about, and the women who feel that way often experience shame and guilt.

So few mothers admit to having these feelings, but that doesn’t make them go away. Parenting is difficult, and of course it makes sense that not everyone is equally suited to it temperamentally. But the stigma of admitting that one doesn’t really enjoy being a parent is enormous, and the necessity of hiding those feelings can be a huge burden—which in itself is a contributor to depression and anxiety.

Acknowledging our ambivalence—the fact not every moment, nor even every stage, of motherhood is fun—allows mothers to accept themselves for who they are and what they feel, and be freer to find ways to make motherhood more authentically enjoyable.

There are those who would point out that enabling women to acknowledge their negative feelings about motherhood might adversely impact our children. How can our children feel loved and wanted if they knew the way Mom really feels about her job? But I would argue the opposite: By stuffing those negative feelings, by shaming mothers for their normal responses, normal emotions are more likely to be acted out in negative ways.

Acknowledging our ambivalence—the fact not every moment, nor even every stage, of motherhood is fun—allows mothers to accept themselves for who they are and what they feel, and be freer to find ways to make motherhood more authentically enjoyable. Being honest within ourselves and accepting all our feelings gives us permission to do motherhood differently—and perhaps allow more acceptance in our children of their own inevitable negative feelings as well.

Don’t look to social media for validation of your motherhood experience. Don’t compare your insides to other people’s outsides. If you don’t feel heard, understood, and validated by your partner, friends, or family, therapy can be an outlet to explore and accept your complicated and ever-changing emotions regarding parenthood and life.

Reference:

Myrskyla, M., & Margolis, R. (2014). Happiness: Before and after the kids. Demography, 1843-1866.

Being a good parent can be difficult. We are never really taught how to raise children effectively, and generally tend to repeat behaviors we have learned from our own parents. If we grew up in a dysfunctional environment, this can lead to our replicating the same mistakes we witnessed and experienced as children when our turn to become parents comes around.

Many parents who come to see me ask how they can learn better parenting skills. They often feel ineffectual when trying to discipline their children, but do not know what they can do differently. The following are some effective tools to use in order to bring about a little more order in your household:

1. Praise Your Children

Any time you catch your child being good, make sure you let him or her know how appreciative you are of his or her good behavior. Everyone responds in positive ways to praise, children included, so this will encourage your child to behave in desirable ways.

2. Use Behavioral Incentives

In order to inspire your kids to do their chores, put a chart or calendar up on the wall listing, day by day, the tasks you want them to complete. This could include things such as taking out the trash or setting the table for dinner, but you can also include behaviors such as doing their homework, brushing their teeth, or being nice to siblings.

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When the child performs the desired behaviors, he or she gets to put a sticker on the chart for the day. As your child accumulates a certain number of stickers, he or she can earn special incentives that are known ahead of time. These could be anything from choosing a favorite dinner, going on a special outing, watching a movie that your child has been looking forward to, or anything else he or she would enjoy.

For very young children, it can be helpful to break down the day into shorter periods in order to reward desired behaviors more quickly. You may want to have them be able to earn three stickers a day, for example—for the morning, afternoon, and evening. Even if they are not successful for the entire day, they can at least be rewarded for shorter time periods and will gradually want to earn more and more stickers and rewards.

3. Use Consistent Discipline Techniques

When your children misbehave, they need to understand the specific behaviors you do not want them to do. Let them know what they are doing wrong, then provide a warning. Your explanations should be very clear and simple, so that they understand exactly which were the problem behaviors.

When your children misbehave, they need to understand the specific behaviors you do not want them to do.

If a child continues to misbehave, put him or her in a designated area away from the rest of the family that has been chosen for time-outs. Make sure that the child remains in the designated spot for the entire time-out period. The time-out should not last more than several minutes, but the child should not be allowed to talk or play during this time.

At the end of the time-out period, reiterate to your child the reason that he or she was put in time-out and ask for an apology. Consistency is very important when it comes to teaching children appropriate behavior, so the time-out strategy should be used every time your child misbehaves after having been given an initial, unheeded warning.

4. Communicate with Your Child

If your child is acting uncharacteristically poorly, attempt to find out what may be going on. Children have a tendency to act out when they are being picked on at school or sense tension within the family. Try talking with them to find out if they are upset about something you are unaware of so you can address any potential problems.

5. Maintain a Structured Routine

Children respond well to structure, so try to have meals and bedtime at the same time every day. When kids become overly tired, they may be more prone to acting out, so make sure they are getting enough rest.

Using the techniques above can help to make for a more peaceful home environment. If you are still having problems managing your child’s behavior or your child has recently become more fearful, angry, or aggressive, meeting with a psychotherapist may be helpful in order to explore the underlying reasons for the behaviors and to get your child back on track.

It never fails: When August rolls around, parents begin calling the office. They are calling about their child, who made so much progress toward the end of the previous spring that we reduced or eliminated sessions. But as soon as the back-to-school supplies show up in stores, sleep patterns are disrupted, instances of acting out increase, and general chaos begins.

The children I see in my office often don’t realize why they are feeling so dysregulated. They blame situations with friends, their siblings, and their parents to externalize the cause for their behavior. Sometimes parents don’t even recognize the cause of increased anxiety. As I start asking questions to try to dig toward the cause of the change, I’ll hear tell-tale signals that school anxiety is building beneath the surface. “She’s crossing off the days on the calendar until school begins,” or “He asked if he could send an email to last year’s teacher.”

[fat_widget_right]Other children are very aware that their anxiety is related to school, and they process it outwardly. Every day, they express concerns about not knowing their new teacher, dread the amount of homework they are going to have, or worry that they might miss the bus on the first day of school. The caretakers of these children may quickly become overwhelmed because usually they can give no answer other than, “We’ll find out when school begins.”

What can parents do to help their anxious children transition to the new school year? How can children who don’t recognize how much a new beginning worries them begin to accept and embrace the new adventures that each school year brings?

1. A change in behavior prior to or following a major transition could be related to anxiety.

When a child begins to fight more frequently with a sibling or talk back to parents, take a step back and ask what may be going on in that child’s life. Beginning a new school year is a major unknown for a child, even if the child has attended that school previously. Getting used to new teachers, new classmates, and new routines can be daunting, even for a child who doesn’t experience anxiety. Imagine starting a new job. Your worries about a new boss, different coworkers, and changing responsibilities are likely to be very similar to your child’s concerns about the coming school year.

2. Recognize psychosomatic symptoms as possible signs of anxiety.

If your child begins complaining about stomachaches, headaches, or any other maladies, realize that this may be a signal they are experiencing anxiety. If a child is anxious, they may truly have a headache, but consider finding ways to relieve the anxiety instead of only treating the headache medically, as this is likely to have more long-term benefit. Mindful breathing or guided visualization can be great tools to help alleviate this type of stress.

3. Confront the conversation directly.

Parents often want to keep the peace in the days leading up to the first day of a new school year. However, prepping your child for the upcoming change and talking about the transition can be beneficial. Ask what types of school supplies your child wants, have the child visualize an ideal classroom, and encourage the child to discuss ways to react in case things don’t go exactly as planned. By bringing up the conversation gently, parents have the opportunity to encourage verbalization and reassure their child of their ability to handle the situation.

4. Try not to allow avoidance.

Ask what types of school supplies she or she wants, what a perfect classroom would be like, and what their plan is if things don’t go exactly as they would like. By bringing up the conversation gently, parents have the opportunity to encourage verbalization and reassure their child that they can handle the situation.The primary thing anxiety drives a person to do is avoid the anxiety-provoking situation. When your child says, “I don’t want to go shopping for school supplies,” break it into smaller segments, such as only going to pick out a backpack. Leave the rest for another day. By encouraging your child to push through anxiety, you help build the belief they can succeed during this transition.

5. Ask the school for help.

Talk to the teacher. Talk to the counselor. Give them a heads-up about what your child is experiencing. They may have a plan in place or ideas to try to help acclimate your child to the new school year before it begins. If your school hosts a “meet the teacher” or “back-to-school night,” you may choose to request a separate time that your child can drop off supplies and meet the new instructor.

6. Use guided visualization.

Take the time to write out a script with your child about how the first day will go, from the time the child wakes up to the return home. Focus only on the positive aspects of the day. At bedtime each night, either read the script to your child or have the child read the script, imagining every portion of the day in detail. When your child arrives at the situations in the script that tend to trigger anxiety, encourage mindful breathing for self-regulation and help the child visualize how to handle those obstacles while at school.

Generally, students settle into a routine within the first few weeks of school, and their anxiety subsides. However, if you notice that your child is still experiencing trouble after the first part of the school year, reach out to your school or to a professional counselor who can help you and your child learn more in-depth coping skills to handle these intense experiences.

Allison, 14, comes home from school and busts through the door. She slams her backpack against the wall in the family room and throws herself onto the sofa, only to ignore your demands to get her shoes off the furniture and put her backpack on the hook where she knows it is supposed to go.

Is this a familiar scene in your household?

As parents, our reactions to Allison’s behavior will mostly reflect an immediate request for correction. In response to Allison, many of us would be quick to say, “Get your shoes off the couch and go pick up that backpack!” With this reaction, however, we are ignoring the symptoms behind the disrespectful behavior.

But what if, instead of making demands for better behavior or offering reminders of family rules, you simply take a step back and notice the behavior? Moreover, what if you look for the emotions behind the behavior and place your request for compliance on the back burner for a bit? How might the interaction occur differently? These are some of the principles of a type of listening identified in the work of Carl Rogers, a 1950s psychologist known for his emphasis on helping people become self-aware through reflective listening.

[fat_widget_right]The acronym DEAR is a helpful way to remember the important components of reflectively listening to your child. If you follow this path, you may find that you are connecting with your child in a more meaningful way. DEAR works like this:

Detect

The first step in reflective listening is to become a detective of sorts. First, you must tamp down your own reactive, subjective emotions in order to focus on your child. This is hard to do because our role in parenting naturally consists of advising and telling our children based on our own judgments. Instead, try to observe your child’s demeanor, behaviors, tone, and words. In our example with Allison, we see anger and frustration, as well as defiance of the rules. If we practice our detection skills even more, we will likely discover some hurt underlying those emotions.

Empathize

By listening to your child reflectively, you are helping him or her define emotions and minimize acting out. This teaches your child that he or she can choose to control and manage emotions. Try to empathize with your child’s feelings without making it about you. What is their perspective? Though your child may have broken a house rule or even hurt your feelings by lashing out at you, try to be nonjudgmental for a moment. Connect with your child’s feelings. We can easily empathize with anger and frustration because we have all been in situations where we have those feelings. You might say, “Wow, Allison. You seem really angry,” or, “I can see your frustration.” These statements are more disarming in nature and send a signal to your child that you see him or her, not just the behavior.

Ask

Ask questions out of compassion. Keep the conversation focused more on your child’s emotions and story before moving forward to address the undesirable behavior or a solution. Paraphrase what you hear. Your questions shouldn’t be “why” they behaved in such a manner; your questions should come from a place of wanting more information. Again, using our example of Allison, ask her “Can I help?” or “Can you tell me what happened?” These types of questions may deactivate the power of her emotions and keep her from acting out further. It will also assure her that you want to listen.

Reflect

Reflecting on or summarizing what you hear from your child can help dampen the powerful emotions your child is feeling. When you restate or paraphrase what has been said, your child has an opportunity to step back and reevaluate their statements and feelings. With this practice, you are teaching your child how to regulate emotions through conversation and process feelings rather than behave as a result of the emotions.

Allison, for example, may share that she was being teased on the way home from school about her new hairstyle. She may tell you that even some of her friends joined in. In response to her story, reflection might sound like this: “What I am hearing is that you are hurt because you were made fun of.” Similarly, summarizing sounds like: “What a terrible end to your school day. It sounds like you’ve been hurt by people you thought were your friends.”

By listening to your child reflectively, you are helping them define emotions and minimize acting out. This teaches your child they can choose to control and manage emotions. At this point, you can move back into the role of advising and telling. You might end the fictional example with Allison by saying something along the lines of, “OK, well, why don’t you go put that backpack on its hook and let’s go find a movie for tonight?”

Some points to remember when using DEAR:

• Take a step back from your own emotions before reacting.
• Look underneath the behavior.
• Don’t use “why” when asking questions.
• Paraphrase and summarize what you hear.

Often, I meet a mom who is on the verge of tears describing how her teen hates her. She can’t understand it, and she wants her baby back. The teen looks on sullenly, once again exasperated by a parent who just doesn’t understand.

As a nonparent but a therapist for many kids, teens, and families, I can easily understand what this teen is going through. I remember it well. I hated my mom, too, and she was a sobbing mess due to my abrupt withdrawal. All I wanted was independence and for her to get off my back. Looking back, I want to kiss my mom for being so annoying. She saved me from so many negative experiences by having rules and expectations, but she also pushed me away by being emotional and reactive to my teen antics.

The preteen and teen years are filled with intense emotions and conflict. Historically, this change has been attributed to hormones, which is certainly a large part of it. Through our entire adult lives, we wrestle with hormones surging in our bodies, but after our teenage years we have developed enough to manage most of the residual emotions. Teens, on the other hand, have not. They feel so many different and new things, and they don’t always have the ability to slow down their reactions.

Educate Yourself

[fat_widget_right]Learn more about what your teen is going through and try to develop an objective lens through which to look. This may help you make meaning of some of the wilder behavior your teenager exhibits. It won’t buffer the sting of hateful comments, but understanding where they come from may help you think rationally about it all and not question every parenting move you make. Read books, articles, and websites about teen development. An informative, easy-to-read book I recommend is The Teenage Brain: A Neuroscientist’s Survival Guide to Raising Adolescents and Young Adults by Dr. Frances E. Jensen.

Remain Calm

When the situation is tense, take three deep breaths before responding to your teen. Don’t respond impulsively, as doing so may fuel the fire and create a bigger rift in your relationship. Attempt to process your emotions with another adult if you need to, and present yourself as calm, cool, and collected when approaching your teen. When this is not possible, try your best not to engage in an argument and instead walk away. If you are losing your cool or crying, your message may not be as effective and may further contribute to your teen’s negative perception of you.

See It from Their Perspective

It may not be sensible to you, but there is usually some merit to your teen’s argument. Validate it. Let them know that you get it, and you want them to be happy.

Guide Them

Looking back, I want to kiss my mom for being so annoying. She saved me from so many negative experiences by having rules and expectations, but she also pushed me away by being emotional and reactive to my teen antics.Almost all teens need some major guidance. Many lack the ability to think far ahead and weigh all the consequences of their choices. Part of your job as a parent is to control impulses. Your teen may rail against you, but don’t give up! Letting your teen run wild will help neither you nor your teen. Teens can be harsh, hurtful, and even intimidating to their parents, but you are the adult in the relationship and it’s your job—not your teen’s—to stand strong and maintain boundaries.

Stay Strong

Forget the messy rooms, don’t worry so much about the heavy eyeliner, and simply focus on safety and love. You love your teen because they were once your baby, and even though they can seem cold, moody, and sometimes downright mean, your teen loves you underneath it all and they do NEED you.

Yes, middle school may be a time full of awkwardness and self-doubt, but it is also a time of incredible transformation and movement toward independence. With regard to its impact on human development, this period of life is second only to the period from infancy to age three.

Think about that for a minute.

Remember how much your child changed from birth to age three? That’s how much change, growth, and development will happen over these next three years as your teen navigates middle school! Get ready for a wild ride!

Many of the parents I work with feel lost, unsure of how much support to offer their middle school student. How much independence is enough? How much is too much? How do you support a child without being a helicopter parent?

I like to compare the situation to teaching a child to swim. Think about the stages we go through with swimming. When our kids are toddlers, we go in the pool with them and we never let go. Later, we let them swim farther and farther away from us, but we stay in the pool so we can rescue them at any moment. Eventually, when we are comfortable with their skills, we let them swim while we watch from our lounge chair. I think of parenting during middle school as that last stage. We are on the sidelines offering guidance and support. We are right there if they get into trouble, but, mostly, we let them do their thing.

In the spirit of parenting from the sidelines, here are some tips to help make your child’s transition to middle school successful:

1. Encourage self-advocacy.

[fat_widget_right]Self-advocacy is one of the most important skills your teen will learn over the next few years. Speaking up for himself or herself and knowing how to ask for what they need is a critical, lifelong skill. Your teen can only learn it if you make an intentional effort to back away and let him or her step up to the plate.

• When your teen has a question about homework, make sure he or she contacts the teacher, not you. Help your teen brainstorm what to say, and maybe even craft the email or conversation together. But let the message come from your teen.
• When your kid forgets to do homework, let him or her approach the teacher to work it out. Maybe your child will need to stay in for lunch. Maybe the assignment can’t be made up and your teen will have to deal with the zero. Either way, let the student work it out with the teacher.
• When your teen feels like another student wronged him or her, teach them to use the office as a resource. Help your teen report the incident to a counselor or dean, but let him or her take the lead.

Side note: With all of these examples, I encourage parents to follow up with teachers to make sure your child really did follow through and advocate for themselves. I have written many emails that simply say “I’m just checking to make sure my daughter talked to you about … ” This is very different from taking the lead and contacting teachers to solve it yourself.

2. Allow your teen to struggle.

This one is always hard for parents, and for good reasons. We don’t like to see our children struggle. Our instinct is to jump in and rescue. However, we all know that the greatest lessons in life come from learning from our mistakes, and if our goal is to raise children to become strong, independent adults, we need to learn to let them stumble.

• Our kids take their lead from our energy as parents. The attitude you project will be the attitude they absorb. These next three years will be an unbelievable transformation! Allow your child to suffer the “natural consequences” of being unprepared for class. Maybe he or she will serve a detention. Maybe your teen will receive a zero. It will sting and your child will be upset, but hopefully habits will start to change.
• Stop rescuing! Don’t bring the missing work to school for your teen. Don’t write the teacher a note about how busy your family was and why homework didn’t get finished. Let your teen learn to deal with the consequences.
• Focus on growth instead of grades. Your child won’t earn an A on every single assignment, and that’s okay. Focus your conversations on how hard he or she is working, what is being learned, what support is needed, and how skills are growing, rather than just what your teen’s grades are.

The most important thing parents can do at this age is learn to ask, “How can I help? What kind of support to do you need?” instead of “How can I fix this for you?”

3. Encourage positive risk-taking.

Middle school is the perfect time to try new things, and becoming comfortable with taking positive risks is another critical skill in teen development. Some ideas for middle school risk-taking include:

• Try a new sport.
• Join a club or start a new one.
• Volunteer or start a new charity drive at school.
• Expand your circle of friends.
• Try a music class.

There are so many ways your teen can learn to take a positive risk. The important part as a parent is to always acknowledge and praise the effort and courage it takes to try something new.

4. Keep your communication and connection strong.

Even with all of this new independence, your teen still needs you. In fact, I would argue that he or she needs a strong connection with you now more than ever. Your teen will most certainly start pushing you away, but rest assured he or she is craving connection. Some new twists on connecting at this age:

• Find some new, creative ways to ask how your teen’s day was. Encourage him or her to tell you fun stories from the day, not just list the details about homework and grades.
• Become involved in your teen’s social media. If you allow your teen to have social media accounts, use the apps as one more opportunity to engage with him or her. Send funny quotes you found, “like” pictures and videos, ask about celebrities your child is following. Engaging via social media gives you the double bonus of connecting and monitoring activity all at once.
• Let your bedtime routine evolve, but not disappear. Maybe he or she is too old for bedtime stories and songs, but you’re still needed. Ask how things are going with friends. Let you teen share a new favorite song with you (even if you hate it).
• Carve out time to spend together. Coffee dates, movie nights, watching your favorite show together—make one-on-one time a priority. Your teen is never, ever too old for that. I promise.

Middle school is hard. There’s no doubt about that, but it doesn’t have to be miserable. Be thoughtful about the messages you are sending your kids about this new adventure. Are you allowing your own biases to fill their heads with the idea that middle school is terrible and you just have to suffer through it and try to survive? Or are you letting your kids know that it’s going to be exciting, energizing, challenging, and new?

Our kids take their lead from our energy as parents. The attitude you project will be the attitude they absorb. These next three years will be an unbelievable transformation! Prepare for it, brace yourself for it, but most of all, enjoy it!

A WebMD study of stress in parents and children suggests many parents may not notice signs of stress in their children. When parents do recognize their children’s stress, they often misattribute the stress to schoolwork challenges, even when the cause of the stress is closer to home.

Do Parents Recognize Their Children’s Stress?

WebMD’s 2015 Stress in Children Consumer Survey collected data from June 1 to July 31, surveying a total of 432 parents of children aged 5 to 13. The survey showed high levels of stress among parents, who rated their stress on a scale of 1 to 10. Fifty-seven percent reported their stress at a 7 or higher, and almost 1 in 5 parents said their stress was a 10.

Even though these parents reported high levels of stress, most did not think their kids were stressed. In fact, 60% percent of parents ranked their children’s stress at a 4 or lower.

To analyze children’s stress levels, the survey asked about behaviors associated with stress, such as arguing, crying, anxiety, and headaches. Seventy-two percent of parents reported their children had at least one symptom associated with stress during the last 12 months. Forty-four percent of children complained of headaches or stomachaches, and 38% said they experienced frequent nightmares or insomnia. Forty-three percent of parents said their children argued more than usual, and 37% reported an increase in crying or whining. These findings suggest that parents notice symptoms of stress in their children but may not attribute these symptoms to stress.

Why Are Kids So Stressed?

The array of stress-related symptoms reported by most children in the study indicate that kids often struggle with stress, even if their parents do not correctly identify their symptoms.

[fat_widget_right]When asked about the sources of their children’s stress, most parents (53%) said schoolwork and homework were key factors, and 51% said their children’s friends caused stress. Yet 60% of survey respondents reported a stressful family event—such as a divorce, job loss, or death in the family—in the last year. This suggests much of children’s stress may stem from difficulties at home.

Bullying may also play a role in children’s stress levels. Thirty-eight percent of parents reported that their children experienced bullying, with 51% of those parents placing their children’s stress levels between 8 and 10.

The American Psychological Association’s Stress in America survey may help illuminate some causes of stress among older youth. During the school year, teens often report higher stress levels than adults, though 54% of teens say stress has little or no impact on their physical health, compared to 39% of adults.

Helping Stressed Youth

Therapy can help kids better manage their stress, and some of those coping with conditions such as anxiety or depression may also obtain benefit from medication or extensive lifestyle changes. Overload can affect a child’s overall well-being, so the American Academy of Pediatrics advises parents to intervene if they observe one or more of the following in their children:

• Frequent physical symptoms, such as stomach pain or headaches
• Fatigue, restlessness, or agitation
• A depressed or low mood, irritability, or negativity
• A loss of interest in previously enjoyed activities
• Difficulty communicating about negative feelings
• Changes in grades
• Behavior problems such as stealing, lying, or neglecting family responsibilities
• Changes in a child’s level of dependency; some stressed kids regress, becoming more dependent on their parents

References:

1. American Psychological Association survey shows teen stress rivals that of adults. (2014, February 11). Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2014/02/teen-stress.aspx
2. Shaw, G. (2015, August 17). WebMD survey: Parents don’t see kids’ stress signs. Retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/children/news/20150817/stress-survey
3. Signs of overload. (2015, August 20). Retrieved from https://www.healthychildren.org/English/healthy-living/emotional-wellness/Pages/Signs-of-Overload.aspx