If you’re a parent with anxiety, you probably have anxiety about passing on that anxiety to your kids. Depressing, huh.
I’m speaking for myself here, and probably a lot of others.
Of course, anxiety often has a genetic basis, and there’s only so much we can do to help our kids out with something they’re genetically susceptible to.
But we can do something.
Or at least we can follow eight really good recommendations, according to experts in child development.
Caroline Bologna has a tremendous read on those 8 things.
I’d recommend reading her whole write-up, but I’ll briefly list and make some comments.
a) Don’t encourage avoidance. Sometimes we think we’re helping our kids by delivering them from a stressful situation. But instead we’re promoting avoidant behavior.
The goal is to build resilience. Resilience is one of the best possible skills, btw, for your child to develop. It ain’t reading, writing, and arithmetic because at some point – no matter how good your child gets at those – they’ll reach a point of resistance. At which resilience comes in.
b) Treat your own anxiety. Our kids are frighteningly good at picking up on the slightest changes in our anxiety levels, and since they model everything we do (at least until they’re teenagers), they’re going to believe that airplanes are dangerous if you have a panic attack every time you get on one.
As a parent who struggles with generalized anxiety disorder, this is one of my greatest challenges and might be yours — how can I remain the model of calm and strength when I feel anything but?
It’s a tricky one that I’m still trying to figure out.
Note, however, that experts say you can use your anxiety as a teachable moment.
For example, if your child is anxious, you can talk to them about your own anxiety (while avoiding specifics that might scare your child like “Billy, I might lose my job which will leave us destitute, so see I have anxieties, too”).
If your child knows you get anxious, and you pass along your coping mechanisms, they might feel a) less lonely and b) more likely to believe they can get through it.
So one of the primary reasons I work on my anxiety is for my kids.
They’ve got enough of my genes without my adding nurture to the mix, too.
We shouldn’t be afraid of reaching out for professional help.
It’s, quite literally, for the kids (and good for us, too).
c) Talk about feelings. A lot of Christians of a certain type reel at that word “feelings.” In fact, an entire swath of Americans scoff at “snowflakes” and the “feelings” culture (while, ironically, also taking extreme offense over anything that violates their own political feelings).
But read the Gospels.
Jesus was constantly being “filled with” a feeling.
Compassion, mostly. But also, righteous anger (humans are incapable of righteous anger without it leading to anger-anger, so the whole “I just have righteous anger” thing is the saddest phenomenon dominating politics right now).
Jesus was a super feeling person, and there’s not a single case where he diminishes anyone’s feelings.
We should never, ever minimize our kids’ feelings, tell them to just get over it, or make them feel ashamed for them.
The only thing we’re doing is forcing them to suppress those feelings, and they will come out, one way or another.
Either now, through acting out, or later, through growing bitter and angry at the way they were raised.
So embrace exploring feelings.
And as the experts tell Bologna, validate your child’s feelings as best you can, but don’t just leave it there.
Talk about how you can cope with the feelings.
Use personal examples. Come up with a solution together.
d) Be careful about saying “CAREFUL!”. Admittedly, caution is in the eye of the beholder.
But as the article notes, here’s a quick example. If you’re at the playground and you feel your child is doing something unsafe, instead of just saying “CAREFUL,” explain why they need to be careful.
Don’t issue blanket warnings without explaining why caution is warranted.
And to plug Christianity into all this.
Don’t give into the Christian culture of fear.
I was recently listening to a podcast conversation with David French, where he noted just how terribly afraid Christians are about today’s culture.
Christians tend to imbue “the world” with far more power than Christ himself, the Spirit himself.
It’s a theological inversion that leads to an isolated life of useless fear.
Instead of sheltering kids in a protective bubble (that’s destructive to their long-term health), Christians need to say, “What’s ‘the world’ against Christ?”
e) Don’t praise results. Instead, praise effort. I can’t emphasize this enough. American culture says the win is in the win, when it’s actually in the try.
Depressed people are often victims of this success-aholic mentality.
The “strong” are the ones the world says are strong.
In reality, the strongest people I’ve met are those who experience severe mental or physical disabilities and still get up every day to do this thing.
That takes a strength that neither the world nor, sadly, the church recognizes.
America’s achievement-driven culture has seeped (and in many cases, been fueled by) the church, and that’s creating a culture where “greatness” is being conflated with “goodness.”
When our kids see us wowed by the success of others, the results of others, it puts insane pressure on them to produce their own wow, their own success.
This is one of the sharpest disconnects I’ve noticed in American Christianity — sermons might emphasize spiritual growth, but conversations after church and during the week emphasize school performance, work achievements, and just generally, a mindset completely opposite from the “be careful of building barns” message that Jesus taught.
And again, for kids prone to anxiety, this emphasis on achievement is going to put the kind of pressure that will eventually lead to implosion.
“Celebrating success, celebrating excellence” — what could be wrong with that?
Nothing, except it might be doing your child deep harm, while also undermining Christ’s message that the world’s success and excellence is not that of the kingdom of heaven’s.
f) Don’t ask leading questions. This is a little less obvious, but here’s an example.
My son is worried about riding the bus.
Let’s say I want to know why. I shouldn’t ask leading questions like: “Are you worried that the driver will lose control of the bus and be part of a 12 car pile-up?” Or “Are you worried that kids will be cruel?”
There’s a chance my son is, in fact, worried about that, but if that’s not his primary concern, I’ve just added to the list.
So we need to be careful that, in our efforts to understand our childrens’ anxieties, we don’t fuel additional fears.
g) Don’t be authoritarian. Without a doubt, the most toxic kind of Christian parenting I’ve seen is the kind that’s been taught in many churches, for many years — the authoritarian model.
It’s one that literally uses fear to produce a desired result.
It might “work” in the short term, but it always destroys in the long run.
This is when a parent is so authoritarian about certain behaviors that the child grows up, living in 24/7 fear of staying on the good side of their parents’ graces.
Now, to be fair, this isn’t a phenomenon solely unique to the Christian church, but it’s definitely one the Christian church struggles with.
Growing up in an environment where nearly every family employed the authoritarian model (the “Godly” model), I can tell you that nearly ever kid either turned away from Christ or, if they held on, were so scarred that they had to undergo years of therapy to make things right.
Authoritarian is not “Godly.” It is the opposite. It is destructive.
Jesus’ yoke was easy and his burden light. God forbid we impose it on our children, or else they’ll become the children of fear, not of freedom or peace.
h) Don’t send mixed messages. I brought up a bit on this earlier, but Bologna gives a good example.
“I get this a lot from parents who say to their children, ‘I want you to really enjoy taking this time being a kid,’” Yip explained. “Then they follow up by saying, ‘Have you studied for your SAT yet? That’s really important to do. You really need to get on studying with your SAT because the deadline is approaching, and if you don’t get on it, this is your last opportunity.’”
She urged parents to mean what they say and stay true to their intentions when delivering a message. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing, with 24/7 academics or 24/7 enjoying being a kid.
“Say something like, ‘Your SATs are coming up, and that needs to be a priority. I want you to be able to find some way to balance your time and prioritize what is most important to focus your attention on,’” Yip suggested.
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