Building Resilience in kids

Its not often that I listen to a Managers motivational talk and actually either listen or have one of their comments leave a lasting impression on me.

Anyway several years ago I was working for the Children's centres and we headed off to a day out kicked off by a talk from the Head of the department. I am sure he will forgive me that I don't recall his name or his actual job title.

I sat down expecting to be half asleep and to only have to provide rounds of polite applause. Instead what he said made so much sense to me and explained so much. Why do some kids do well in life, while other sink like a stone? What protects some kids from the toll that life takes upon them, while others are destroyed by very similar events?

Resilience is the answer, there are set things in life that make children better able to cope with life, and to then turn into adults who are better able to cope.

Many of these resilience factors are obvious eg good parent income, however there are also factors within the child eg not being impulsive. Its the bringing together of these factors that give a child that backup and the ability to cope with stress and changes in their life.

I have taken this from an American website, as it explains the basic idea so much better than I can:

Dr. Ginsburg summarizes what we know for sure about the development of resilience in kids by the following:

• Children need to know that there is an adult in their life who believes in them and loves them unconditionally.
• Kids will live “up” or “down” to our expectations. 
• http://www.healthychildren.org/english/healthy-living/emotional-wellness/pages/Building-Resilience-in-Children.aspx?nfstatus=401&nftoken=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000&nfstatusdescription=ERROR%3a+No+local+token

It is very true that its so much easier to take a leap when someone is there to catch you if you fall.

 

So I guess the point I am trying to make is that I can not imagine having no one in life to rely on, this must be a very scary position to start out from.

Its obvious that all kids need someone that provides their cornerstone, so they can then take those leaps into the world.

Vicks vapour rub in the eye, Insert a very bad word here_______

After countless nights of no sleep, and coping with a very poorly baby as well as two dogs and three other kids I think I have finally snapped.

No it was not the news that Elliot may need steroids to get better, or having to take another day off work, or even Ali coming home and being ill ( and unable to help while I worked).

The final straw came when after giving Elliot his inhaler, painkillers, antibiotic and vapour rub. It was not my child suffering that has pushed me over the edge, I am ashamed to say it is my own!

Can you imagine how tired you have to be to rub vapour rub onto a child and then proceed to rub it straight into your own eye.

Words can not describe the stinging heat type pain, if you have ever rubbed a hand on your face after cutting chillies its a very similar but possibly more intense pain.

My advice is very strongly NOT to rub vapour rub directly onto your eyeball, now that is good advice!

At least the pain has woken me up a little bit, just in time for when Elliot has finally settled and I could have had some sleep, oh well.

PS I was curious about this so looked at the tub and it very clearly states:

For external use only; avoid contact with eyes.

Drat there is my opportunity to sue them gone!

Dummies in the daytime arggghhhhhhh

You know how they say that ex addicts are the most judgemental and critical of those that they seeing making the mistakes that they once themselves made.

I have to now put my hands up to this one, we were once a family of dummy addicts, and now every time I see a dummy I jump straight into hypocrite judgement mode.

Normally I am a very rational person, and I certainly think that every parent should find the parenting style and techniques that suits their family.

Let me take you back just over 9 years, in those days dummies were not hugely encouraged and there was lots of press all about how they could delay speech and language development, and how hard it was to wean toddlers off of them.

We started well, especially considering that we were living in a relatively new area with no family support nearby and no local friends. Add to that the fact that Aidan was our first baby, and I was very very ill and awaiting a major operation.

I admit that we did not have the first clue about how to care for this baby that had suddenly rampaged into our lives. Despite the 9 month warning we were very unprepared. We resisted the dummy for many weeks, but eventually we gave in.

Fast forward many many months and all our vows about how to use the dummy had vanished into dust. At one point Aidan had the dummy a lot during the day, just out of habit, when he was tired, when I was tired, when he was upset and just generally anytime he fancied. At night we had got to the ridiculous point of him having 2 dummies in his hands and one in his mouth, yes I know!

When he was 2 we managed to stop the dummy by telling him that nanny had thrown it out and had said that he was too big for it.

The subsequent 3 had no interest in dummies, Elliot and Caitlin would not even contemplate sucking one, and Alex was a thumb sucker from day one.

Back to my point, I now see a child awake, alert and happy in the day, and I have to say that I only just manage to resist the urge to remove their plug.

Now what kind of loon reaches out to take the dummy out of someone else's child's mouth, I think I may be going bonkers.

I know the cot death studies have suggested that using a dummy with a baby is a good thing, and I agree with that, and even using them for night time when the child is a toddler. Its the daytime when the dummy stops the child from interacting with the world, that's when I get that urge ( control yourself woman)

Does anyone else experience this urge to interfere, maybe about dummies, or some other random parenting issue?