Our Kids Are Stressed Out, So What Are We Going to do About it?

My boys and I were hanging out at our friends house two weeks ago when tragedy hit. We had lost track of time (by “we” I mean me and by “lost-track” I mean I purposefully forgot to watch the clock – don’t judge) and weren’t going to be able to make it in time to see the new Sponge Bob movie (see, now you understand). I of course was relieved beyond belief but my boys were incredulous and frustrated. My youngest, with his surfer-boy laid back mentality, quickly got over it and continued to play. My oldest, who is wound as tightly as a chihuahua on speed, had a meltdown for the record books. Which culminated in me having to take him into another room for a private talk. I let him vent while he balled his eyes out and what came out of his mouth broke my heart. While I was expecting more begging and pleading (which I was fully prepared to face with steely resolve) he instead said something that broke my heart: “I have a math test and a science test next week and I am so stressed out that I just wanted to relax.”

What? My nine-year-old is stressed out?

And while my first instinct was to think “you don’t know what stress is” while I mentally tick through all the terrible things I’ve faced as an adult,I stopped myself. While I’ve certainly faced some doozies, I’m also forty years old. I have the perspective of forty years of benchmarking what really constitutes a tragedy. To my nine-year-old this is his first stress-test. He doesn’t have any perspective. To him two tests in one week and parents who expect high marks is overwhelming.

The next morning I had a breakfast meeting with a business broker I work with. While we were there to talk business the conversation quickly turned to a conversation she had with her twelve-year-old son the previous night. By all accounts her son is one we’d all want – great student, an amazing athlete, and an good-natured kid. The problem is that he told her the night before that he wasn’t feeling right mentally. That he was feeling stressed out and overwhelmed. She was in tears.

As we started talking through her situation and I shared mine from the previous night a light bulb went off over my head. As parents we are always trying to push our children to achieve: do your homework, get good grades, practice your music, score that goal, do your chores. We bequeath to them a laundry list of responsibilities but we don’t think to arm them with the tools to handle the pressure and stress that naturally come with those responsibilities.

It’s never to early to teach those tools. I realized this after speaking with another friend who confided in me that her five-year-old faked a stomach ache every day she had math because she didn’t think she was very good at it. I get a stomach ache just thinking about a five-year-old feeling stressed out.

The first thing we have to do is talk about it. Kids don’t even know stress has a name until you give it one. They just feel it with no way to verbalized it. So give it a name. Call it what it is. Empower them to talk with you about what they are feeling.

Then we need to be empathetic. This is the easy part because we’ve all had our share of stress. But be careful not to fall into the trap of minimizing their feelings because their stressors seem silly to you. Try to walk in their size four shoes and realize that to them Sponge Bob and kindergarten math are both big deals.

Give them the tools to work through the stress on their own. This is their chance to feel empowered as individuals. Help them solve their own problems. I don’t think there is any shame in taking a child to a therapist if you feel over your head. I brought my oldest to a therapist when we were working through diagnosing him with ADHD (yes, I was one of those moms who used to judge all the other moms who overmedicated their children). Not only was the therapist incredibly helpful at that time in our lives but it was the therapist who gave him his best tool for self-soothing. She introduced yoga breathing as a technique to calm my son’s mind when he felt himself spinning out of control. Now when he is stressed he uses his yoga breathing to calm himself (which is how we eventually agreed to see Sponge Bob the following weekend and managed to get him back to playing with the other kids).

I’m going to shamelessly promote a book called Asanas For Autism and Special Needs. It is written by my dear friend Shawnee Hardy and is an idiot-proof guide to introducing your child to yoga. Don’t be fooled by the name of the book. These are poses and exercises that are fun and engaging for every child. And speaking from experience they work.

By Shawnee Thornton Hardy Asanas for Autism and Special Needs: Yoga to Help Children With Their Emotions, Self-regulation, and (1st First Edition) [Paperback] by Shawnee Thornton Hardy
Link: http://amzn.com/B00SCVOL0E

So don’t beat yourself up if you find yourself with a stressed-out kid. You are in good company. You don’t have to ignore it or downplay it. Tackle it head on and just keep breathing.