How To Talk To A Child About Mental Illness (by Cindy Price)

How To Talk To A Child About Mental Illness

Explaining mental illness to a child can be a bit challenging. Young children don’t understand depression or anxiety as adults do and it can be difficult to find the words to explain it to them. As a result, many parents opt not to bring up the issue reasoning that it’s better not to confuse or stress their kids.

What many parents don’t realize is that kids are actually very observant and they will notice if anything is out of the ordinary. So if you, your spouse or anyone in your family is struggling with mental illness, your children are bound to have noticed. They may be confused and even frightened by the changes in the person’s behavior, especially if that adult holds an important place in their lives.

One of the most important things you can do to support your children in this instance is to help them understand mental illness. Taking time to address their questions and concerns will help them understand the illness. This will make it less frightening and mysterious, and give them the tools they need to cope.

Having an open, honest discussion will help your child trust you and will clear up some of the misconceptions they might have about the situation. It will also help to decrease the anxiety that comes from uncertainty. Being informed also lessens the anger, confusion and surprise they might feel if they are left to discover the illness on their own, or if someone else confronts them with negative comments about their ill parent.

Ideas to get the conversation going.

Starting the conversation on mental health early can give your children a better idea of what mental illness is all about. It is a powerful way to reduce the stigma surrounding it.

Here are some tips to help you get the conversation going:

1.  Start with yourself.

Before talking to your child, try to get as much information as you can about the illness your important person is struggling with. The more you know, the more confident you’ll feel and the better placed you’ll be to answer your child’s questions.

It’s also important to be mindful of your own attitudes towards mental illness, and how this might filter through to your child. If you feel that mental illness is shameful or someone’s fault, your child will pick up on this regardless of what else you tell them. This will only add to any confusion, fear or anxiety they have about what they see happening to their loved person.

2.  Pick an opportune time to talk.

In order to improve communication with your child and get them to open up to you, you need to be flexible about where and when this conversation takes place. Some kids feel more comfortable talking and asking questions when playing or doing something else while others prefer a face-to-face sit-down talk.

A news story, series or movie where a character has mental health challenges can be the perfect conversation starter to delve deeper into the issue. You can ask questions, find out how your kid feels and let the conversation flow from there.

3. Make the conversation age-appropriate.

When talking with your child about mental illness, it’s important to tailor the conversation to their age and developmental stage. To enhance their understanding, use language, explanations, and examples that they can relate to.

For instance, you might say this to a 5-year old, “Remember when you had that sore throat and you were all angry and grumpy with us? You were like that because you were unwell. Well, mommy isn’t feeling well right now, that’s why she’s acting grouchy and crying a lot. She still loves us, but she just can’t show it right now.”

Kids usually have their own interpretation of what’s happening so it’s a good idea to ask how they explain their parent’s behavior, listen empathetically then build on what they say while correcting any misconceptions they have.

4. Allay your child’s fears.

Children who live with ill parents often experience anger and even guilt. They may feel that life is unfair to them, then feel guilty for having those emotions. Some may even feel somehow responsible for their parent’s illness.

Dealing with such feelings is crucial in order to help them live happier lives. They need to understand that their mommy’s or daddy’s illness isn’t caused by anyone’s actions. Sometimes life just happens that way and it wasn’t because they were bad kids. Emphasize that it’s normal and ok to feel sad, angry, embarrassed or frustrated and encourage them to find healthy ways to express those feelings.

Remember your kids will take their cue from you so the more you share your feelings, the more comfortable they’ll be talking about theirs.

5. Help them come up with coping strategies.

Keeping your routine consistent, especially when living with someone with a mental illness, will help your children feel safe. Older children will feel better and more confident if they have a plan of action in case something happens. So make sure your children have a list of people to call or know where to go to get help if need be. You can also help them identify a trusted adult they can confide in whenever they want to talk.

Additionally, take time to help them come up with appropriate responses should other kids or adults ask them about their loved one’s illness. Children can be especially cruel to each other so it’s better to prepare your child for teasing from other kids. Practicing how to explain the illness and what they can say will be of great help. For example, your child can say, “My dad has an illness that makes him do that. I wouldn’t make fun of your dad if he was sick so please don’t make fun of mine.”

Finally …

Finally, if you’re living with someone struggling with mental challenges, ask for help. You can join a support group, ask the child’s grandparents or other relatives to talk to your child or even get pointers from a mental health specialist.

While you might not get the words exactly right the first time, having an ongoing conversation about mental illness with your child will help them cope better and live a more positive life.


   

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Hello Adelaide! I’ll be in Adelaide on Friday 27 June to present a full-day workshop on anxiety. 

This is not just another anxiety workshop, and is for anyone who lives or works with young people - therapists, educators, parents, OTs - anyone. 

Tickets are still available. Search Hey Sigmund workshops for a full list of events, dates, and to buy tickets or see here https://www.heysigmund.com/public-events/
First we decide, ‘Is this discomfort from something unsafe or is it from something growthful?’

Then ask, ‘Is this a time to lift them out of the brave space, or support them through it?’

To help, look at how they’ll feel when they (eventually) get through it. If they could do this bravely thing easily tomorrow, would they feel proud? Happy? Excited? Grateful they did it? 

‘Brave’ isn’t about outcome. It’s about handling the discomfort of the brave space and the anxiety that comes with that. They don’t have to handle it all at once. The move through the brave space can be a shuffle rather than a leap. 

The more we normalise the anxiety they feel, and the more we help them feel safer with it (see ‘Hey Warrior’ or ‘Ups and Downs’ for a hand with this), the more we strengthen their capacity to move through the brave space with confidence. This will take time, experience, and probably lots of anxiety along the way. It’s just how growth is. 

We don’t need to get rid of their anxiety. The key is to help them recognise that they can feel anxious and do brave. They won’t believe this until they experience it. Anxiety shrinks the feeling of brave, not the capacity for it. 

What’s important is supporting them through the brave space lovingly, gently (though sometimes it won’t feel so gentle) and ‘with’, little step by little step. It doesn’t matter how small the steps are, as long as they’re forward.♥️
Of course we’ll never ever stop loving them. But when we send them away (time out),
ignore them, get annoyed at them - it feels to them like we might.

It’s why more traditional responses to tricky behaviour don’t work the way we think they did. The goal of behaviour becomes more about avoiding any chance of disconnection. It drive lies and secrecy more than learning or their willingness to be open to us.

Of course, no parent is available and calm and connected all the time - and we don’t need to be. 

It’s about what we do most, how we handle their tricky behaviour and their big feelings, and how we repair when we (perhaps understandably) lose our cool. (We’re human and ‘cool’ can be an elusive little beast at times for all of us.)

This isn’t about having no boundaries. It isn’t about being permissive. It’s about holding boundaries lovingly and with warmth.

The fix:

- Embrace them, (‘you’re such a great kid’). Reject their behaviour (‘that behaviour isn’t okay’). 

- If there’s a need for consequences, let this be about them putting things right, rather than about the loss of your or affection.

- If they tell the truth, even if it’s about something that takes your breath away, reward the truth. Let them see you’re always safe to come to, no matter what.

We tell them we’ll love them through anything, and that they can come to us for anything, but we have to show them. And that behaviour that threatens to steal your cool, counts as ‘anything’.

- Be guided by your values. The big ones in our family are honesty, kindness, courage, respect. This means rewarding honesty, acknowledging the courage that takes, and being kind and respectful when they get things wrong. Mean is mean. It’s not constructive. It’s not discipline. It’s not helpful. If we would feel it as mean if it was done to us, it counts as mean when we do it to them.

Hold your boundary, add the warmth. And breathe.

Big behaviour and bad decisions don’t come from bad kids. They come from kids who don’t have the skills or resources in the moment to do otherwise.

Our job as their adults is to help them build those skills and resources but this takes time. And you. They can’t do this without you.❤️
We can’t fix a problem (felt disconnection) by replicating the problem (removing affection, time-out, ignoring them).

All young people at some point will feel the distance between them and their loved adult. This isn’t bad parenting. It’s life. Life gets in the way sometimes - work stress, busy-ness, other kiddos.

We can’t be everything to everybody all the time, and we don’t need to be.

Kids don’t always need our full attention. Mostly, they’ll be able to hold the idea of us and feel our connection across time and space.

Sometimes though, their tanks will feel a little empty. They’ll feel the ‘missing’ of us. This will happen in all our relationships from time to time.

Like any of us humans, our kids and teens won’t always move to restore that felt connection to us in polished or lovely ways. They won’t always have the skills or resources to do this. (Same for us as adults - we’ve all been there.)

Instead, in a desperate, urgent attempt to restore balance to the attachment system, the brain will often slide into survival mode. 

This allows the brain to act urgently (‘See me! Be with me!) but not always rationally (‘I’m missing you. I’m feeling unseen, unnoticed, unchosen. I know this doesn’t make sense because you’re right there, and I know you love me, but it’s just how I feel. Can you help me?’

If we don’t notice them enough when they’re unnoticeable, they’ll make themselves noticeable. For children, to be truly unseen is unsafe. But being seen and feeling seen are different. Just because you see them, doesn’t mean they’ll feel it.

The brain’s survival mode allows your young person to be seen, but not necessarily in a way that makes it easy for us to give them what they need.

The fix?

- First, recognise that behaviour isn’t about a bad child. It’s a child who is feeling disconnected. One of their most important safety systems - the attachment system - is struggling. Their behaviour is an unskilled, under-resourced attempt to restore it.

- Embrace them, lean in to them - reject the behaviour.

- Keep their system fuelled with micro-connections - notice them when they’re unnoticeable, play, touch, express joy when you’re with them, share laughter.♥️
Everything comes back to how safe we feel - everything: how we feel and behave, whether we can connect, learn, play - or not. It all comes back to felt safety.

The foundation of felt safety for kids and teens is connection with their important adults.

Actually, connection with our important people is the foundation of felt safety for all of us.

All kids will struggle with feeling a little disconnected at times. All of us adults do too. Why? Because our world gets busy sometimes, and ‘busy’ and ‘connected’ are often incompatible.

In trying to provide the very best we can for them, sometimes ‘busy’ takes over. This will happen in even the most loving families.

This is when you might see kiddos withdraw a little, or get bigger with their behaviour, maybe more defiant, bigger feelings. This is a really normal (though maybe very messy!) attempt to restore felt safety through connection.

We all do this in our relationships. We’re more likely to have little scrappy arguments with our partners, friends, loved adults when we’re feeling disconnected from them.

This isn’t about wilful attempt, but an instinctive, primal attempt to restore felt safety through visibility. Because for any human, (any mammal really), to feel unseen is to feel unsafe.

Here’s the fix. Notice them when they are unnoticeable. If you don’t have time for longer check-ins or conversations or play, that’s okay - dose them up with lots of micro-moments of connection.

Micro-moments matter. Repetition matters - of loving incidental comments, touch, laughter. It all matters. They might not act like it does in the moment - but it does. It really does.

And when you can, something else to add in is putting word to the things you do for them that might go unnoticed - but doing this in a joyful way - not in a ‘look at what I do for you’ way.

‘Guess what I’m making for dinner tonight because I know how much you love it … pizza!’

‘I missed you today. Here you go - I brought these car snacks for you. I know how much you love these.’

‘I feel like I haven’t had enough time with you today. I can’t wait to sit down and have dinner with you.’ ❤️

#parenting #gentleparenting #parent #parentingwithrespect

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