Your Child’s Mental Health and You

“An idle mind is the devils playground.” Whilst this is not a scripture, it does have merit. Children tend to have minds that wander easily and absorb any information they see or hear , via their five senses. If it brings sensory pleasure to them then the experience will tell them that it is good, possibly rewarding and worth repeating and so a habit is formed. 

Babies are driven by pleasure and reward. If eating a spider from the floor makes them feel good then they will not be governed by logic or morals. Their experience said it was good so that is all that matters. As children grow up it is down to the parents to teach and guide their children to know that “pleasure” is not always a good choice and that they need to know that some pleasure can lead to great harm and even mortal danger.

Your Childs mental health, state of mind, is extremely important in the early years of life and moving up to adulthood. Some experts in Psychology have said that our personalities and habits are formed by the time we become early teens, but that will not be discussed in this article as it is based on Neuroplasticty. In this article I want to share my experience.

“Babies are Driven by pleasure and reward”

Among my seven children, I have at least two diagnosed High Functioning Autistic Children, a girl aged 9 and a boy aged 11. Among my other children, there is bipolar, depression and social anxieties so I am aware of mental health in my own family and have seen the effects of it. I am coming from a place of great experience, not just textbooks and diplomas. I know the struggle is real. 

I have taken time to build some background before I go into practical advice on watching over our children’s mental wellbeing because I want you to know that I can relate to you, the reader, and have empathy and genuine care. As I write this article in hope of sharing some things I have picked up over the years as a parent, now I have established my position I will go on into the practicalities of parenting our children’s mental health. To make it simple I will be making “Points” to consider and for you to think on and ask yourself honestly, “have I noticed this in my child?” or, “am I doing enough to ensure my child’s mind is sound and safe?”.

Let us begin:

See your GP as early as possible in your child’s life to get assessed for any mental health or neurological conditions that have surfaced and cause you or the child’s school concern or questions. By doing this you can catch any difficulties early before the child’s brain becomes ”hard-wired” and causes unnecessary anomalies in their behaviour or way of thinking.

Once you have a diagnosis of any possible mental health or neurological conditions, you have something to work with and a plan that can be carried out to help them along with any medication that is needed.

The Importance of Home Life.

A healthy-minded child will have come from a home where communication is highly important, a place of openness of discussion, questions asked without judgement or fear, where laughter and happiness is a regular occurrence among family members, mutual interests and appreciating each other’s individual personalities and quirks, not trying to be cloned, but each one bringing their own gifts and talents to the table and creating a beautiful tapestry of colours and patterns like a work of art, all having their unique place in the family unit, knowing their own individual importance and having their individual needs met.

Family time should be spontaneous and also planned: mealtimes together, daily devotional reading of the Bible and prayer time should be a time of enthusiasm and joy not legalistic and done from a sense of religious duty. Open discussion of the bible reading and answering your children’s questions are extremely important, helping them to develop their own faith in Christ by asking them to look up things on google and feel that they are contributing to the time of devotion. All these things will help your child develop a sound mind and become a happy soul, feeling that they are not alone in their struggles with any mental or neurological health conditions that they may have, but have the full support of a loving and caring family, a well-oiled machine where all have their part to play in the mental health not only of theirs but of the whole family.

Dealing with our own Mental Health and its effect on our children.

How we respond to stress, anxiety and our own personal state of mind will cause our children to follow suit as we lead by example, for better or worse. They will see and hear how we respond and that will influence them more than our speeches and advice to them on handling their own mind. We as the parents must be living examples to them, taking our own advice on board and practising all the ways of having as healthy a mind as possible. My own children have watched how I react to stress, anxiety, worry etc and it has helped them enormously to see that it is working for me and if I do fail at times they also see how I deal with the failure in a healthy way so they can know how to respond to both possibilities of success and failure. My own 11-year-old son who suffers from anxiety has found great comfort in watching me deal with anxiety through my faith in Christ and Anxiety management skills. It gives him hope and strength to move forward in his own life as he faces the anxieties of going to school and dealing with his autism. As a family my wife, children and I work together as a team to conquer our individual fears and mental health challenges; we support each other. I teach them that we are all in this together not alone, however, there is no burden on their young minds to support my wife and I in our challenges, they are simply supporters cheering us on from the benches and speaking words of encouragement to us and rejoicing in our victories together.

This article is part of an ongoing series so I will now leave you, the reader, to think about what you have read. Did it help you? Have you been practicing things I have mentioned and seen the benefits in your child’s life?