How can we support young children during quarantine?

For those of us who are parenting young children right now, the struggle is truly real. It has been and continues to be at times completely overwhelming to try to both continue to work as well as parent my own toddler. I am hearing the same from the families that I work with at my office (virtually of course right now!). I thought it might help to compile some of the things that my family has been doing to help support our son right now.

The truth is this blog post came out of a particularly difficult morning where my son was struggling to adjust on Monday to having another “dad working in the garage” morning. I could tell during breakfast that he was sad and missing dad but just couldn’t say it. Of course, these feelings then manifested into some behaviors which are of course expected at this age but can leave any parent (including me) feeling completely inept.

I wanted to offer support to other parents struggling with similar situations by sharing the way I have been trying to handle things as much as possible (believe me, I am not perfect either!).

• Verbalize the emotions I think he might be feeling – since our son is not ready to share his feelings in words (we settle for his dino roars when angry these days!) – I try to help him label what is going on. Sometimes I do this in the moment if he is receptive and if not, I try to do it afterwards when he is feeling calmer.
• Perspective – I put myself in his shoes as much as possible and try to remember how confusing this situation must be for him to have us home but sometimes working and sometimes all together.
• Reframe – I reframe the situation to consider that he is not “giving me a hard time” but having a hard time himself.
• Balance – I am trying hard to give quality time when I can and to notice when I think he needs some time to play independently
• We try to keep a schedule – since my husband and I are juggling child care and work and have designated “work” or “Luca” time, this helps but I try to keep a routine in the morning that we both like… play, breakfast, play, walk, some iPad or TV time while I get ready for work
• Keeping the image that everything is fine – I am working hard on relaxing while around Luca and not talking as much about the stressful things in our world – we don’t avoid the topic of why we aren’t going to daycare but keep it light referring to “germs” and wanting to stay home to stay safe together
• Easy going – We have definitely relaxed some rules as well to help this situation feel a bit more fun. In the past, we used to go out and do a lot of social outings and things and since we can’t, we are trying to make things as fun as possible at home

This is a particularly hard time to be a parent to a young or school age child. As parents, we often are the ones setting the tone in our families and I notice that while my family is adjusting to this situation, we are much quicker to struggle than we used to be. I think this is just the nature of the situation so we are trying to be proactive in our self-care right now.

If you are struggling to figure out how to engage in self-care because most of what you used to do is now unavailable (ex. Massages, nights out, time away, gym classes, beach days, etc.), try to start with thinking about your personal needs. And not what you think you should need but what you really need as a person to thrive. For me, I need some down time as well as time to feel connected with friends and our community. While this is by no means as possible for me as it was before, I have found that even a little bit of time by myself (even just a walk on the weekends alone) and just a little bit of time to miss a daily routine like bedtime has been helpful. I am fortunate that I have a partner who can help with this and recognize that some people don’t have that available right now. I would encourage you still to focus on figuring out what it is you are looking for in your life and strategies or ways to access it, even while social distancing.

As always, I am of the belief that the more parents are feeling effective, peaceful, and calm within themselves, the more they can parent from a place of intention and less reaction.

At Thrive, we are happy to help support you and your family if you are struggling right now! We are accepting new referrals both for individual therapy and parent consultation but also group therapy! We have three groups currently – Teen Anxiety, Young Adult, and Parent Support. Check out this page for more information about our groups!