Over the past year, anxiety has risen for everyone. And yet, while we have acknowledged that rise in anxiety and stress, the expectation has been that we continue to function at the same level in our day to day activities. This isn’t working! We see the breakdown in our kids struggle to complete basic tasks and focus at school all day long. We see it in our own shortened fuses. It makes me think back to that talk I gave last year with a desire to expand and underline one point in particular: 

The best way to help our kids with their anxiety is to take care of our own. 

If we are less stressed and less anxious: we have a greater ability to be with someone who is more stressed and anxious. What does this mean? It means we can handle the whining, the pushing back, and the apparent lack of productivity with more grace. And we can see it for what it is – a message saying, “I’m not okay, I don’t feel safe, I need you to help me feel safe.” 

When we ourselves are stressed, tired, and anxious: we see the whining and push back as defiance or bad behavior. We need our kids to fall into line so we can manage our own feelings and so, frequently, we unintentionally make their worries bigger. Our children are like super sensitive antenna, picking up on and absorbing the feelings around them. When we are worried, it reinforces for them that they need to be worried too. 

So, what do we do? It can feel selfish, but we figure out how to take care of ourselves and our own worries and stressors first. We exercise, eat well, and get sleep. We talk to our own therapists. Often, we can involve our children in our stress relieving activities – going on walks together, baking together, watching a movie or playing a video game together. 

We should also talk honestly about what is going on with our children – with developmentally appropriate language, of course. We let them know when we are worried and stressed and, to the best of our ability, why. We name our own feelings and what we are doing about them. We model taking breaks and lowering our own standards for ourselves. When there is a plan to handle the stress and anxiety, we talk about it – which parts are in our control and which are not. 

We can give ourselves – and our children – the space to fall apart, to not be okay, to scream and cry and yell. Often it is incredibly helpful to have someone in this space with us and so a therapist for your child is a great idea. Not so that all problems can be solved, but rather so that there is someone to sit with your child in their grief, sadness and worry who is not you. 

So much of what we have been anxious about over the past year has been out of our control, and it has been hard to find someone who is taking control of it. It is hard to lower our anxiety when this is the case – when we are in the middle of a stressful event, we can’t process it or heal from it. All we can do is manage through. And managing through can often mean changing expectations of what we can realistically expect from ourselves and others. 

Once we feel more in control, we can help our kids do the same. Some of this work requires a true reckoning of what we are anxious about, what we can and cannot control, and how we need to change our expectations of ourselves in these moments. 

Too often, we are very good at saying “I need to take better care of myself” without being so good at making the hard, sometimes life changing steps to do so. 

At Seven Corners Psychotherapy we can help you and we can help your children manage through the big feelings that we are all experiencing and the big feelings that are brought on by individual circumstances. 

We have a variety of individual and group therapy options that may meet your needs. To highlight one in particular, we are currently putting together a parenting group with a focus on helping parents build new skills of connection with their children while taking care of their own needs. Email groups@sevencornerspsychotherapy.com to learn more.

With a new year and a new President, there is new hope that we will have the leadership to help solve some of the big, structural stressors in our life. 

If you are looking for that help in a more personal way, we are here!