Identifying Stress in Kids

 

Adopting the right attitude can convert a negative stress into a positive one  ~ Hans Selye

 

Imagine yourself as a child. Barely able to run, just walk. There was nothing to really walk to, but you wanted to get somewhere out of curiosity. The carefree time, the laughter. The time when you were not expected to do anything, just be a child. Eat your meals, do your potty and sleep. Then slowly as you grew up, you were told there are things you can do and some that you can’t. Those things you could do and couldn’t do slowly built up over a period of time and started affecting you internally. And this is the beginning of stress. The expectation of doing something that someone else wants us to do, pulls us down very often. Can you recall your laughter? Have you laughed recently with total gay abandon and felt pure joy? What is this pure joy?

 

As adults today, we are busy people, have a lot of stress of our own, many responsibilities to take care of. Sometimes we experience burn out. We also go through feelings of resentment at no one being able to understand us. No one could identify the things that were stressing us. If we can get severe burn out due to pressures of life, what makes us think otherwise regarding kids? As I mentioned earlier, the very fact that we are expected to do certain things the way others want us to do, eventually leads to some commencement of internal stress. Keeping that very point in mind, I wanted to bring to your notice the very things that stress our kids/ children that we may not be seeing due to our preoccupation. Children go through a myriad of feelings, uncertainties, insecurities which may seem silly to us but to them they are very valid. Very often the “I’m feeling sick” is due to some underlying tension. Below are some typical stress giveaways that we can catch in children.

 

1) Children are not familiar with this word “stress”, so unable to correctly verbalize it. They express their feelings through words like confused, annoyed, angry, irritated, worried. So you have to listen carefully and translate correctly.

2) They may start behaving hostile towards some members of the family. Things that may have given them pleasure earlier may now irritate them. Any sort of moody behaviour, signs of withdrawal are signs of something deeper than what you can see.

3) Stress is tricky too often inducing feelings of low self worth thereby lowering our self esteem tremendously. Sentences like “No one likes me”, “no one cares for me” , “I don’t do anything right” , “no one understands what I feel or say”, “oh, I am dumb!” etc. Look out for the self deprecating sentences.

4) Most often “I’m not feeling well or I’m sick” is related to some tension. Headaches or stomach aches are some things that are related directly to stress.

5) Complaints about their activities and reluctance to attend them. Its a direct indication that they are unhappy inside. Talk to them and sort it out.

6) Disturbing news in the house or world news can also cause stress. Disturbing images take time to erase themselves from our memory. Talk in the house about problems, divorce, illness or mishaps, anxieties in the house are picked up easily by kids.

7) Smaller children may take to thumb sucking, nose picking, hair twirling, nail biting, clenching their fist, pinching, bed wetting, throwing tantrums, being a bully, defying authority. They may difficulty leaving you alone; get nightmares or have difficulty with sleep, over- react to minor problems.

8) If you see your teenager behaving strange, give them some space but at the same time let them know you are there for them. Remind them that they are loved unconditionally; irrelevant of marks etc. (especially when they have exams going on).

 

Remember, it’s ok to have some levels of stress. Be there for your child. Understand that you can give something to your child which was lacking in your own childhood. The deep understanding and need for someone to even understand the things that were not being said. We all have knots to loosen. Just know that there ARE knots to loosen. Please feel free to add any comments about this topic that you may have.