May is Mental Health Awareness Month and the Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, recently issued a proclamation declaring that the first week of May is Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week from May 1-May 7. And fun fact, May 7th is Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day, which also happens to be my birthday!
That’s why I was thrilled when FOX 5 San Diego invited me to the studio to do a segment on How to Support Children’s Mental Health. I was interviewed by Raoul Martinez at the anchor desk and we had a very important and insightful conversation. If you missed the LIVE segment, I wanted to share what we discussed in this blog.
The theme for this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week is Anxiety, which has been a major focus this entire year with the moms/parents I work with as well as the children/clients I work with. I am constantly talking about anxiety on my podcast, in my blog, and on all of my social media channels. I also give tips on how to manage anxiety in my newsletter, so please make sure to subscribe here! To help support your child’s anxiety, here are my favorite books for children with anxiety. You can shop for the books here!
Causes of Children’s Mental Health
First and foremost, I believe our schools are not typically equip and set up to support our children’s mental health. Whether it’s due to budget issues or hiring freezes, there are not enough professional mental health therapists to be at each school to support and assist children in need. Many of the schools I have worked in share a social worker that has multiple schools on their workload and maybe will be at one particular school once a week, with probably dozens, if not hundreds of children on their caseload. In some cases, a school doesn’t have any mental health therapist on their staff at all. This is a major problem! So there are certainly societal and systemic challenges that our children have in the schools. If a child has suicidal ideation on a Friday, but the assigned therapist isn’t there on Fridays, that’s a problem. Sure, principals may be “trained” on high risk situations, but that doesn’t mean they have he professional insight, education, or professional experience working with children in these crisis situations.
Furthermore, there are more significant peer pressures than ever before. There are many benefits of social media for our youth in terms of expression and connection, however, there are so many more ways children are exposed to violent news images and articles regarding things like school shootings that they may not be able to digest in a mature way because their brains are still forming and developing. Social Media also comes with a higher level of peer pressure. Children are mainly seeing other’s life highlights, real or curated, that makes them feel not good enough or like they need to live up to false standards. Plus, there is the issue of who befriends them online, who likes their photos, and who might be friends with who, and who is invited to certain parties and events. They are just exposed to so much more than we ever were in generations past.
We are still also learning the ramifications of the pandemic and the affect it had on our children’s mental health. Children learned a whole new level of isolation and also so many fell so behind in their academic work that they have been on learning overload and have been playing catch up ever since. There has been so much anxiety about falling behind and knowing enough for things like state testing, GATE testing, spelling tests, reading groups, math tests, etc. Children are feeling defeated and unintelligent and it’s definitely affecting their self image.
Then, there is the unnecessary focus on a child’s behavior in schools and whether a child is acting appropriately or not. I am specifically talking about color clip charts in elementary schools and how detrimental they are to a child’s mental health. Children are publicly judged and shamed in front of their entire class of peers on whether they are behaving good enough or not, based on the individual teacher’s standards. Children are feeling anxious about whether or not their clip will be moved that day or what their peers will think of them if it does. I have even seen children get their clip moved because they weren’t working fast enough. What?! And instead of a child believing they made a bad choice, they internalize what is happening and start believing they are a bad child. My biggest problem is when a child makes one bad choice that may last seconds but then isn’t given the option to move their clip back up if they are “good” for the rest of the day. This outdated system is affecting children’s mental health and needs to be replaced with a more positive behavior support system.
How To Know Your Child is Struggling
Most parents will know if their child is feeling “off” on any given day. Some symptoms may be subtle and sometimes parents may not be able to put their finger on it right away, but after repeated negative behaviors, a parent will pick up on the fact that something is wrong. Some children will start isolating and wanting to skip school, sports practices, parties, playdates, and even family events. Some children will have physiological symptoms like headaches, stomachaches, and GI issues/challenges. And other children might show a lot of irritability, hyperactivity, compulsion, flight or fight mode, depressive symptoms, or anxiety symptoms.
How We Help and Support Our Children
There is a lot that a parent can do proactively and preventatively, and also reactively, to support their child’s mental health. But if your child is really struggling and they need professional help, please don’t wait. See my resources below to support you (and them!). At home, parents can show empathy to their child and make sure they validate their emotions and experiences. Let your children know you are present and are there to support them. Some children might need to talk, some want a hug, and some just want to know you are there when they are ready and need a little space. If you give them space, limit it, and let them know you’ll come back before bed or the next day to check in – and always keep the door open for connection and communication. Be involved and get to know their friends and their teachers. Ask questions and be curious. Find something in common that will connect you with them.
I also highly recommend doing a Daily Check In with you child. This is a brief exercise that you can do on the drive home from school each day or around the dinner table in the evening. Children don’t want a long, drawn out lecture, so make it short, and maybe even make it where they don’t have to look you in the eye during a dramatic sit down. Simply ask them on a Scale of 1-10 how their day was. If the number is on the high end, move on, their mental health seems stable. But make sure their behaviors are matching the number and that they aren’t just telling you a certain number to move on and make you happy. If the number is low, ask some follow up questions. Make sure you follow up with open ended questions so they can’t answer “Yes/No”, “Fine” or “OK” or “Nothing.”
Resources
If your child is needing professional mental health care, please find a licensed therapist on PsychologyToday.com. If your child is in crisis, call 911 and or the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.
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