Have you been feeling like your house has turned into a zoo?  If so, then you are not alone! When the shelter-in-place order started, these are some things that my younger clients have told me:

• “I love coronavirus. I get to stay home. I don’t have school.”
• “I’m good! I don’t have math.”
• “I got to watch movies and play all day! It’s great!”
• “It’s like vacation and I’m with my family.”

And as expected, these statements did not last that long.  Children don’t process loss or tragedy and adapt as quickly as adults do.  In about two weeks after my clients made these statements, I started to get phone calls and emails from parents about their children “acting out” and having behavioral issues.  It has started to sink in that the changes might not be so fun after all, and they are grieving their old lifestyle more than they knew.  And before you know it, the confusion, uncertainty, and frustration (combined with cabin fever) start to hit them all at once.  Although I can’t guarantee when things will get better for your child, there are ways that you can help support them and make staying at home more tolerable for everyone.

The first and most important rule of thumb is to be patient and be an active listener. Chances are, your child is not “acting out” on purpose.  I’m a firm believer that there is always an underlying cause for a behavior.  Often times, my clients have shared that they felt unheard or are angry about something in their lives.  Acting out is just a way to externalize those feelings. Imagine if I had taken out half of the words in your vocabulary and you weren’t able to convey your thoughts to me.  Your child’s behaviors are their way of conveying what’s going on inside. It may not be easy but patience can help your children feel that everything will be okay.

Staying active.  Children who don’t get enough physical exercise during the day can often become restless when it is time to settle down.  Anxiety, fear, and sadness can also show up as irritability in younger children.  Keeping their heart rate up, and spending the extra energy will help ease their anxiety and (hopefully) help them feel tired when it is time for bed.  Children are used to using both mental and physical energy 8 hours a day when they were going to school.  Because this component is missing, try filling it with other ways to keep them engaged.  Notice I didn’t say keep them entertained.  I know there is a lot of stress out there for parents trying to keep their children happy now that they are home all day, but that does not have to be the case.  This is about helping them spend excess mental and physical energy.  And for parents who work from home, some of these activities can be done independently after showing them.  Below are some ideas you can try:

Mentally challenging activities

• Starting a jigsaw puzzle
• Learning to knit/sew
• Learning an instrument (there are apps out there for this!)
• Scavenger hunt (can be done on a walk or in the home)
• Crafting (I’ve had clients stay engaged by making and donating masks to neighbors or hospitals)
• Commit to learning a new language for the whole family (maybe even practice holding a conversation in that language during dinner)

Physical activities

• Dancing (Just Dance 2020 on the Switch is super fun!)
• Walking or grooming your pet
• Jumping on the trampoline
• Relay races or obstacle courses in the home
• Twister
• The floor is lava (remember this one?)
• Musical chairs
• Virtual fitness classes for kids

Limit their exposure. This may seem strange for an article about behavioral issues in children; however, the current news coverage about COVID-19 has triggered a lot of fear response in children.  Children are always listening and observing even when you think they aren’t.  I’ve had young clients expressing their fears about getting sick, when things will open, how many cases are in San Diego and so much information that even I have not yet seen.  Children can easily misinterpret what they hear and become frustrated about something they can’t understand. In turn, this can bring about more confused feelings that may already exist.

Lastly, staying connected to family and friends can help bring about some normalcy in their lives.  Has your child facetimed their grandparents, aunts, or uncles lately?  It may be helpful to reach out to other parents and set up virtual play dates.  They might just show each other their toys or their room, but it is good to help them feel connected especially if they miss their friends.  I’ve recently helped a client set up a Netflix Party with their friends so they can have a virtual slumber party (it was a hit!).  This can be a real mood booster for some kids!

Remember that you, as a parent, are grieving too.  It’s okay that you may feel short lately and found that you can’t have as much patience as you would like.  Your children learn by example, so as long as you are trying and showing them that it is okay to pick yourself back up… that is an important life lesson on its own!
​

As a therapist who specializes in working with kids, teens, parents, and families, I have noticed a growing and very concerning trend in my work. So many of the kids, teens, and even young adults that I work with are struggling with anxiety, crippling perfectionism, and so much self doubt that they struggle to do things they desperately want to be doing. At the root of so much of this are feelings of incompetence and a huge fear of failure. 
 
I have been contemplating this challenge and recent parenting trends and have noticed that this happens more in the families I work with where parents seem to be struggling to let their kids deal with things on their own. Unfortunately, these parents get kind of a bad rap as “helicopter” parents when in fact, they are parents who are simply struggling to know when it is appropriate to let their kid/teen/young adult fail or struggle through something. And the root of this struggle is usually so much love for their little one (who may not be so little anymore) as well as overwhelming fear about what might happen for their kid/teen/young adult if they do not participate so heavily in their lives. 
 
This fear is one most parents know well. What if they don’t get into a good college?  What if they make choices that screw up their whole life? What if they do something I can’t help them undo?  What if they can’t get a good job? And the list just goes on and on. As a result (I believe), we are overdoing it in the parenting department. We are rescuing our kids way too much and then we come to find that our kids seem to need to be rescued.  Weird huh. 
 
When you look at what happens and what a person will think if they are being rescued from situations, it starts to make sense. When we rescue a person from a situation that they are either capable of handling on their own or almost capable of handling on their own, the message we are giving them is not one of their own ability but one of their need for us to handle things for them. We teach them that they need us and that they can’t do these things on their own. We teach them to ask for help before they need it, before problem solving on their own, and to at all costs avoid struggling with something. 
 
Instead, we need to give our kids the following kinds of messages by verbalizing them as well as by our actions in letting them handle most problems on their own: 
 

• “I know you are struggling but you are also resourceful and able to figure things out on your own”
• “I’m here to help but I can’t solve this problem for you”
• “I have faith that you can figure this out” 
• “No matter what happens, we will figure this out together but you need to take some steps at solving the problem first”
• “I know it’s hard, but you can do hard things” 

 
I could go on and on but I won’t. The point is that we definitely need to help when it is needed. But we are so often confused about when it is needed that we are rescuing way too often, which is not helping our kids/teens/young adults develop into the independent and capable people that we know they are meant to be.  I encourage you to trust yourself as a parent and trust your “little one,” however old they may be, that they can figure things out and will benefit from a little struggle and failure along the way. Just like most of us did on our way to becoming independent adults. 
 

By now, you’ve probably heard about the children being separated from their families at the US-Mexico border. Just to be clear, there is no official Trump administration policy stating that families entering the U.S. without papers are to be separated. The “zero tolerance policy” is that all adults entering the U.S. illegally are to be criminally prosecuted; however, when these adults are sent before a judge to see if they will be deported or sent to federal jail, that’s when separation happens. So, while the parents await to see what happens to them, the “unaccompanied children” have to be dealt with.  Children are then separated and transferred to the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Most children do not have relatives already in the U.S. so they are placed in short-term shelters or foster families since criminal defendants don’t have a right to have their children with them in jail. 

Now politics aside, we cannot ignore that separating children from their parents has several psychological and even biological implications. Forced separation places children at a high risk for mental health issues. The trauma of being separated from their parents or family members only adds to the stressful experiences they have already endured in order to arrive at the border. The accumulated stress from these traumatic experiences disrupts their brain development, and the effects can unfortunately last a lifetime.

Parents are essential in fulfilling the child’s fundamental needs for early attachment, or parent-child bond. In my work with attachment, being deprived from parental care (even if children are placed in stable and loving families) can cause both short term and long term biological and psychological issues. This disruption in attachment creates a belief system that their parents are unreliable and that the world is unpredictable, which can become problematic. In the short-term, these children are at a higher risk for problems with sleep, impulsivity, emotion regulation, anxiety, and depression. The long-term implications are impaired cognitive functioning and social-emotional functioning, and the increased risk of developing mental health disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder, severe anxiety disorders, depression, and the list continues. The consequences of family separation are profound; so, if you are personally affected or would simply like to take action, please check out the resources below. 

Donating or Joining the Community

• Young Center for Immigrant Children’s rights
• Families Belong Together
• Together Rising
• Texas Civil Rights Project
• Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center
• Detained Migrant Solidarity Committee-Fianza Fund

Contacting your Elected Officials

• Contact your Senators and Representatives to urge them to support the Keep Families Together Act(SB3036), a bill that would stop family separation. 
  • Call your members of Congress at 202-224-3121. There are a few pauses, but don’t hang up, wait for the audio recordings and follow the prompts to get connected. When connected, say you support SB 3036 and you are asking that they support it too.
  • Alternatively, you can also email your senators.
• Here’s a script in case you do not know where to start.

Sign Petitions

• https://www.petitions.moveon.org/sign/familiestogether?source=homepage
• https://action.kamalaharris.org/sign/petition-180618-nielsen/?t=3&akid=73%2E176936%2ENRkXFy

​Note from Thrive Founder, Erica Wollerman: 
​While I usually try to avoid posting anything political on our website and Facebook page, since our practice is dedicated to supporting children, teens, parents, and families, I personally felt that the separation of children from their families was a topic we just could not ignore. At Thrive, we spend our time uniting families and working through communication issues, conflict, and difficulties connecting as well as childhood trauma at times. We are all concerned about the damage being caused to these children, teens, parents, and families and wanted to share not just our opinions, but information about why we are concerned as well as ways some of you can help. 
 

The concepts of resilience and grit have been hot topics recently, particularly in the parenting, education, and psychology fields. This is for good reason as these qualities have been shown to be some of the most important traits you can help your child/teen develop in order to become successful adults. Interestingly, these are also traits that many adults are noticing seem to be lacking in some of the younger generations, which is a concern being written about all over the place online it seems. 
 
These hot topic concepts also come up often in my office frequently, particularly when parents begin to recognize that these are character traits that their children, teens, or young adults seem to lack. I hear comments and concerns from parents due to their children or teens not being able to persist or manage their frustration during difficult tasks. Sometimes, it shows up in their inability to make decisions and follow through on them because they are fearful of their ability to manage a possible “wrong” decision. 
 
I thought it could be helpful to write a blog with my tips for ways parents can help their children build resilience and grit from a young age to help prevent some of these challenges. As a psychologist who specializes in treating individuals across the lifespan and in working with parents, I believe that I have a unique perspective on how this trait may develop in small ways over a life. 
 
Before we get into this topic too much, it might help to give some background on these concepts. 
 
Resilience
I love the way resilience is described in this article on the American Psychological Association’s website – “Resilience is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or significant sources of stress… It means "bouncing back" from difficult experiences.” (You can find the original article and related information on resilience here).
 
Grit
As described by Angela Duckworth in her TED talk on grit (Check it out here!), grit is “perseverance and passion for long-term goals.” 
 
I believe the most important thing to know about resilience and grit is that they are character traits that can be developed and are not innate things that we either have or don’t have. These traits result from conscious choices about how we cope with the world and how we handle the adversity that we will inevitably face in our lives. 
 
Hopefully these brief descriptions help you see just how important these traits are. Resilience is essentially the ability to continue when life is difficult and to overcome failure and Grit is the tendency to persist when the road to overcome failure becomes tough. 
 
6 Ways to help your child develop resilience and grit: 
 
1.  Expect that life will have challenges
I love that parents want to raise their children with the mindset that things will go well for them. I totally can relate to wanting to have things be smooth for your child – it is really tough to watch your child struggle! However, this idea that things will go well and that problems are the anomaly is unfortunately completely inaccurate and misguided. Challenges in life are the norm and should be expected. Therefore, we as parents can do our best job for our kids by preparing them for challenges and how to use them as learning experiences! 
 
I think normalizing challenge and struggle for your children is important and you can do that in many ways. For example saying something like, “I know that is tough, sometimes things in life will be tough for us, but we can handle it” or “Life can be really unfair and difficult sometimes, I think this is one of those times, but I know we can get through it together.” Another way you can do this is by sharing some of your own challenges with them. For example, if your child is struggling in a friendship, you can say something about how you remember what that was like for you as a child and the ways you learned to deal with the feelings you had. This will help them know they are not alone and that they are not the only ones dealing with a difficulty. 
 
2.  Allow them to experience failure
This is absolutely crucial!  I hear from parents all the time just how much they want their kids to be happy and to succeed. However, they often mistakenly help their kids avoid failure too much and prevent them from the learning opportunities that come with failing. This can give them the message that they are not capable to dealing with or surviving challenges. 
 
I would even take this one step further and suggest that you as a parent embrace failure. Failure means so many wonderful things – it means that you tried something new that was outside of your comfort zone, it means you pushed yourself and found your limit with something, failure means that you were brave. We often have a negative perception of failure in our culture and I would encourage us to reconsider this, especially as parents!  Failure is not the worst thing by any means, it is a step on your path and a learning opportunity. (Check out my longer blog post on this very topic here).
 
3.  Let your kids make decisions and deal with the outcomes
Let’s say that your child is debating about what sport they want to play or what class they want to take in school. You know that the one they are choosing may not be entirely the best fit for them but they really want to try it. I would recommend you let them make the decision and then deal with how it turns out. Maybe they love it – great, they now made a decision that worked out for them and that’s a great learning experience!  Maybe they hate it – great, now they have made a decision that they can learn so much from. The best part of them hating it is that you can then work with them on how they deal with a difficult class, teacher, sport, etc. for the duration of the semester, season, etc. 
 
Another example would be for a younger child when they choose ice cream at the ice cream shop you are pretty sure they will hate. Let them choose and then don’t rescue them from the outcome. Everything in life is there to teach us something so help them find the lesson there!  
 
4.  Don’t rescue too much or too quickly
When your child is struggling with something, try not to just jump in and either do it for them, fix the problem, or correct their mistake. Try to figure out exactly where their skill level is for dealing with that situation and then support them through scaffolding, expecting them to push themselves a little bit beyond their existing skill level to deal with it. For example, when your child is completing a puzzle and feels that it is too hard, push them to work for a few more minutes before you come to help. When you come over to help, don’t just do it for them or point out where the pieces go, talk them through their process of decision making and give little suggestions that will help them figure it out on their own. 
 
The most important thing is that if you as a parent view challenges as opportunities to learn, your child will too! 
 
5.  Teach your kids to persist through challenges 
So when a challenging situation comes up, model for them how to deal with it in a healthy, persistent way. It helps if you have a positive attitude about life’s challenges also!
 
Our language around challenges really matters in these situations – here are some examples of ways to talk positively about challenges: 

• “Oh this is tough, what a great way to learn!”
• “I love a challenge”
• “Mistakes and challenges help our brain grow”
• “Let’s try to look at this another way”
• “It’s important that we keep trying rather than giving up”
• “I think we can figure this out together” 
• “I know it’s tough but we can do hard things” 

 
6.  Be comfortable with your own struggle and failures 
If you can feel comfortable with the fact that things will not always go our way in life, you will inevitably pass that message on to your child. If you expect perfection or things to go smoothly, you will pass that on to your child too. So, I think it is important that you think about your relationship with adversity while you think about how to help your child through it. If you notice that you struggle with your own failures or with being resilient or having grit, perhaps it would be a good time to work on that in yourself while you work on it with your child!  
 
Some great resources for developing more grit and resilience for yourself as an adult: 

• Brene Brown’s work – All of her books are amazing but Rising Strong speaks to this the most 
• Angela Duckworth – Her Ted Talk or book, Grit would be a great place to start!
• Researching information on Growth Mindset – there are a ton of resources online!
• Pema Chodron’s work and books 
• ​Sheryl Sandberg's book Option B has a great discussion on building resilience 
  

 
I hope that this list can be a jumping off point for you in learning how to help your child overcome adversity to develop more grit and resilience! If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. 
 
As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio.  
 
To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.
 

Most people think of depression as an adult mental health issue, but children and teens can develop depression too.  Sometimes adults assume that children or teens can’t be depressed because they have nothing to worry about, but even those who live in a stress-free and loving environment can develop depression. 

Many children and teens with depression are often left untreated because adults don’t recognize their symptoms. It can be difficult to tell whether a child or teen is going through a temporary “phase” or is actually suffering from depression. While most adults with depression look sad, children and teens may look more irritable or angry. Children and teens who cause trouble at school or at home could be suffering from depression.

The following are common signs of childhood depression:

• Changes in behavior (ourbursts, irritability, anger, defiance, academic issues)
• Physical complaints (headaches, stomachaches)
• Decreased interest in activities (no longer enjoys previously enjoyable activities)
• Low energy, increased boredom
• Isolation from peers and difficulty with relationships
• Poor concentration
• A major change in eating or sleeping
• Significant weight gain or weight loss
• Frequent talk or thoughts about death, dying, or suicide (in younger children, these themes may present themselves through play)
• Hopelessness 
• Crying more often or more easily
• Harming self (cutting, scratching, hitting)

It’s important to note that not all children or teens will have these symptoms. Some children and teens may continue to function well in their environment despite experiencing depression. 

What can parents or caregivers do?
The best thing parents or caregivers can do is to be proactive about your child’s mental health. Younger children often lack the language to tell their parents what they’re experiencing. Teens on the other hand may have a better understanding of depression but may feel embarrassed about coming forward. Learn the warning signs of depression in children and teens and take note of how long the problem has been going on as well as how often they happen. Then, you’ll have a record of concerning changes you can address with a mental health professional. Depression is treatable so seek help as soon as possible! 

​If you are concerned about your child/teen and would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. 
 
As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio.  
 
To stay in the loop on the services offered at Thrive Therapy Studio and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.

At Thrive Therapy Studio, we work with children and teens of all ages and often their parents are very concerned about one behavior in particular, lying. This is one topic that seems to come up over and over again regardless of the reason why we are seeing a child/teen in therapy. Parents ask all kinds of questions… Why does my child lie?  How can I make them stop lying and tell the truth? I’m so frustrated, what do I do? What’s wrong with them?  Are they a pathological liar?
 
Interestingly, lying in small doses is actually not a behavior that concerns me as a therapist. It shows a child or teen’s resourcefulness as well as their growing autonomy from their parents, which are all developmentally normal and generally considered good things. When we see a lot of lying, however, it is concerning to us as well as parents.
 
When parents talk to us about lying, it is often a conversation about what is wrong with their child or teen… Not so much about what they could be doing differently. Interestingly though, I am often going to focus more on the parent's behavior than the child or teen initially. First, I want to explore with the parent how their behavior may contribute to their child/teen’s lying behavior. Often, children and teens talk to me about being afraid to tell their parents the truth about things, even small mistakes that they make, because they have learned that their parents get really angry, yell, punish them, and generally “can’t handle the truth.”
 
Unfortunately, while understandable, these parent responses make children and teens feel unsafe around their parents and make them feel that they can’t really tell them things, particularly not hard things or mistakes they have made. For children sensitive to failure and who already struggle to admit their mistakes, this compounds the challenge of truth telling exponentially.
 
This brings me to the main way parents can prevent and reduce lying. Parents can prevent and reduce lying by responding to their child calmly and with an interest in finding solutions, rather than immediately jumping to blame, shame, and consequences for the child. For example, if you find out that your child did not do well on a math test, you felt they were well prepared for, rather than being angry and asking them “what they did wrong or how could this happen,” you can say something like, “I am so sorry to hear that test did not go the way you were hoping. It must have been hard to talk to me about it but I am so glad you did. What do you think might be helpful in the future or do you think there is anything you can do to improve this grade now?”  If you respond in this way, your child is much less likely to hide grades in the future and to talk to you about how things are going academically.
 
This does not mean that consequences should not be given. At times, consequences are perfectly appropriate, they just should not be given in a hasty way out of anger or shame, but perhaps in a conversation with your child or teen. You can even ask them what they think would be appropriate as a consequence for the mistake or situation that came up. For example, if your child accidentally broke something in your home, the conversation might go something like this… “Thank you so much for telling me what happened, I can tell that was difficult. I’m disappointed that the window is broken but I do know that mistakes happen to all of us. What do you think you could do to prevent accidents like this in the future?  What do you think would be a fair consequence?” Hopefully your child/teen would come up with something along the lines of being more careful to prevent this accident from happening again and then you could arrange for a way for them to help pay for the broken window. This makes the most sense as it is a natural consequence that results from cause and effect, something is broken and we pay to fix it.
 
Here are the basic steps for responding to difficult moments with your child or teen using the above example:

1. Connect and respond with empathy – Thank you so much for telling me what happened, I can tell that was difficult for you
2. Express some degree of your feelings calmly  
3. Validate that mistakes happen and are not the end of the world – #2 and #3 are combined in this example - "I’m disappointed that the window is broken but I do know that mistakes happen to all of us."
4. Come up with ways to work on this in the future - What do you think you could do to prevent accidents like this in the future?
5. Discuss consequences if calm and if appropriate for situation - What do you think would be a fair consequence?

 
Through these steps and a lot of patience, you can definitely help your child or teen respond to you in a different way and create a culture of honesty in your family! 

As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child therapy or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio.  
 
If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapy Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304.
 
If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.