5 Tips For Dealing With Your Child's Stress

"But Lori, she looked me right in the eye and did it ANYWAY!"

I can't tell you how many times I've heard this from parents trying to understand their child's behavior. 

Have you ever felt like your child deliberately chose to misbehave or disobey you for NO reason? It can be maddening to experience behavior that seems deliberate or comes out of nowhere. 

One minute, you're having a great day and the next, your child is a blubbering mess on the floor or raging uncontrollably... and you're wondering what just happened.

Sometimes, kid-stress does not appear to have any obvious, outward signs.

But, the internal conflict that your child may be unable to verbalize is slowly simmering beneath the surface without anyone's awareness.

And then, BAM!

An outburst strikes, seemingly unconnected to anything in the present moment, and delivered with such hurtful indigntion - it seems consciously calculated. 

Your knee-jerk response to such behavior may be to perceive an assault on your parental authority. But if you focus only on behavior, you miss the hidden stress that set-off your child's survival mechanism in the first place.

Negative behavior is purposeful - but not consciously planned or thought-out in the ways we might think. This type of behavior is ruled by the lower brain structures - by the impulse to fight, flee, or freeze.

There are important steps you can take to de-escalate the situation and in this episode of TEACHable Moments, I'm sharing how you can deal with your child's stressful behaviors.

It's so important to be a detective and investigate how stress manifests in your kids.

Do they...

become clingy
lose sleep
act out
twirl their hair
suck/chew on clothes/things
zone out
 
Stress can be protective, but when its silent messages go unnoticed, it affects our ability to meet our everyday responsibilities and interact in healthy ways.

So what about you? What kinds of signs do your kids show when they're stressed?  Are they visible or invisible?

I'd love to hear from you! After you watch - leave me a note in the comments below and share your story. It might just help someone else better understand their child's behavior.

Have a wonderful week!

Talk soon,
Lori

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