Helping children cope with stress when the hurts of life feel too big
I grew up in the United States as the daughter of immigrants from Mexico. As you might imagine, I have been thinking and feeling deeply and often about the current ICE raids in the U.S.
I strongly oppose them and desire that we do everything we can to act against not only the raids but also the systems and people in power that uphold them.
But one thing that haunts me when it comes to immigration enforcement is the thought of children anywhere experiencing the stress of feeling like the state is out to get their families or their people.
No child, young, adolescent or adult, should have to carry the burden of knowing that the state, or anyone, is out to get their parents. And I am not just talking about the children of undocumented immigrants with no criminal offenses. I am talking about the children of all parents, regardless of their immigration status, criminal record or any other common indicators of good behavior.
The oppressive forces that shape our world deeply impact us from a young age, and so helping children cope with stress matters.
How fear shapes us
My daughter gets nervous when she thinks I am parking in a spot where I shouldn’t, or when I open a drinkable yogurt that I haven’t yet paid for at the grocery store. Despite my non-punitive approach to parenting, my kid is nevertheless fears that I’ll be punished by the police.
A part of me wonders how much she might have inherited this fear from me. When I was little, I remember fearing that my own transgressions could strip my parents of their naturalized citizenship or get them kicked out of the country.
Like many children do, I carried that fear without somebody to talk to about it. Honestly, these catastrophic scenarios, a result of information and life experiences pieced together in my brain, felt too big to even name. So, I learned that it was safest to always be on my best behavior, just in case.
To this day, the acquired belief that terrible things happening must be my fault, or rather that I must do everything possible to prevent them, is one that still requires my care and attention in my healing journey.
And today, for reasons likely inherited from me and from her own life experience, my child worries about what could happen to me, when she realizes I might be returning a library book late.
If only she knew how close we are to being punished unfairly by the oppressive financial, legal or fiscal systems at any given moment, due to an unexpected medical emergency, a mistake on paperwork or being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
For now, she is protected from having to worry about these possibilities in her day to day reality.
She is protected, as all children should be.
It is unjustifiable, wrong and unfair that so many children are faced every day with the fear of a much more real threat that the state is out to get their parents.
Imagining a different way
As I sit with painful realities like these, created by punitive systems that consistently maintain control through fear and dominance, I also can’t help but think of how it could be.
Do you ever imagine a world where every single child knew that the state was out to help their parents?
Can you imagine, as a child, seeing your parent struggle and trusting that the world is out to help them? Or even better, knowing that when things are stable, there is an entire system of care in place to maintain standards for a dignified life that allows them to trust, connect and thrive?
Can you see how this might help any child to trust that the world is out to help not only them, but everyone?
Even in the instances where children need protection from their parents. Can you imagine if entire families could rely on good leadership to deliver and facilitate the care and community conditions to get every parent the help they need in order to be as present as possible for their children, and to be able to enjoy them?
Do you ever imagine what it would be like for all children to know that they can rely on parents and on the world to help them, and to help their fellow children?
And I mean real help. Not impositions, control or coercion in the name of help. Not charitable responses to problems intentionally created by those in power in the first place. But a genuine knowing and caring about your needs, your hopes, your dignity, your wishes, your fears and your struggles. And to meet you with help in the form of resources, space, support, guidance, waiting, trusting, holding or whatever is most needed at the moment.
Can you imagine, today, easily believing that there is a culture of care around you? That the world is there to help you when you are struggling as a parent and to receive the goodness of your help and contributions as well?
Can you imagine that when you are feeling the most guilty, lost, confused or bad about yourself as a parent, that your first thought would be, “Ok, it’s time to let in some care,” instead of beating yourself up about it?
Can you imagine a world where, when one child is being particularly cruel or bullying another, the response of the adults would be to deliver attention, love and help to both the bully and the bullied, as well as the others who had been affected by witnessing the behavior?
Can you imagine what it would be like if we all took any person’s distressed or violent behavior to mean that they need A LOT of help in the ways of support, caring, listening, healing and loving containment?
Because here’s the thing, I don’t care if the undocumented immigrants being detained right now have a criminal record or not. How different would it be if, instead of an agenda to punish them, there was an agenda to help them? What if every degree of power or privilege meant assumed accountability for the system that caused someone to leave their places of origin in the first place?
Instead, we find ourselves witnessing every day the evidence that our governments and societal norms are set up to do the opposite of help when people are struggling. The explanations for how we got here are broad, sometimes confusing, complex, systemic, and important to learn and understand if we are to work towards something better.
The power we have as parents
But I want to remind you of one opportunity that we have right now as parents amidst all of the discouraging evidence of violence in the news, and for many in our own communities, neighborhoods or families.
You see, from a practical standpoint, when it comes to matters of social injustice and unrest, it is not a responsibility of children to fix anything.
Children who are being harmed directly should be helped immediately. We need to do everything we can for them, from letters to let them know we care to resources channeled to those who can most effectively advocate for and protect them.
Children who are not directly being harmed can be aware of what is happening and how we are taking action towards change. However, as children, they should not feel responsible for fixing the problem.
This doesn’t mean we shouldn't let them participate in our actions of caring, help and activism for those being harmed, especially when they want to be. But we must always remember that children will assume responsibilities that are not theirs if we are not careful to keep the burden off their shoulders.
It’s also not a child's responsibility to become parrots of their parents’ political views. We don’t want them to feel that their belonging in our home is dependent on their ability to articulate our political positions correctly. This only compromises their sense of belonging in our families. And feeling a true sense of belonging will be so important if they are to envision and work towards a world that fosters belonging and care for all.
As parents, we can take a longer view when it comes to being our children’s guides in the midst of oppressive realities. And in the context of this larger perspective, we create the conditions for them to develop qualities that will prepare them well for the hard work of helping our world to heal:
a strong sense of self and belonging,
an intrinsically motivated capacity for cooperation,
and a worldview that centers the dignity of all living things.
This is why I want to talk about one opportunity that we have as parents to help shape such a worldview through how we talk about and experience help in our day-to-day lives.
As social beings, we humans are meant to, among other ways of being connected to each other, give and receive help. Sadly, many of us did not grow up seeing an abundance of examples that dignified the act of giving and receiving help. Many of us never learned about help as a mutual act of love, caring and good relationship. In fact, we might have learned the opposite.
For example, euphemisms abound early on about the “very fortunate” graciously helping the “less fortunate.” These ideas of good deeds by the privileged in order to "help poor people" create inner hierarchies in our minds, deeming those with less financial and material resources as “less than”. Needing help meant you were on the losing side in a world where winning is determinant of your worth. But this is simply the lie of a culture shaped by capitalism, racism, sexism and ableism.
As parents, we have the opportunity to imagine a different world with our kids where needing help is a natural, necessary and universal part of simply being a human. Through our politics, new experiences, continued learning and ongoing practice, we are able, little by little, to embody and enact this different way of seeing the world.
And if you are parenting by connection, your children are very likely already understanding this on a felt level. Parenting by connection invites us to respond with help through connection, listening and thoughtful guidance to children’s concerns and struggles; as opposed to the unhelpful, qualifying responses of teaching, lecturing, praising or punishing.
The more we practice parenting by connection, the more our children experience:
a felt sense of trust in us,
trust in the process of receiving and giving help,
trust in the healing and strengthening outcomes of practicing help regularly.
Processing with our kids
On top of this felt and embodied understanding that help is good and that they can trust it to be available to them, our children benefit from explicit guidance and language around this idea.
Like much of what Fred Rogers taught and did, the idea of “looking for the helpers” in moments of social unrest and violence that his mother taught him, resonates easily for many parents. For most of us, it feels right and well, helpful, to notice with our children, how help is always present in even the worst of circumstances.
However, it is also important that we point out and notice with our children the places where help should be, but is lacking. To base our observations of what is lacking in the world, on the premise that help should be present. In doing so, we acknowledge the necessary role of help in all aspects of life. This is where our language can be so powerful.
“Mommy, why are they taking people’s parents away?”
“Because they are being told to do that. They think that their job is to punish people who don’t act the way they think they are supposed to or are different from them. But that won’t help anything or anybody. I want to live in a world where the people in charge actually bring help and love to everybody, which is what we all really need.”
From the reason why some people become angry when they see others helped, to the reason why anyone might take a job that requires the inhumane treatment of others, to the reason why people commit crimes, all of these can be reflected on in the context of how different it might be if they had received good care and help when they needed it along the way in their lives.
We can talk to our kids about how in the absence of help, punishment, unfair treatment and violence will abound and wound, and will in turn lead to more pain. We can reflect together on how little sense it makes when people claim that any of these will help anybody. Even those who benefit from punitive practices, injustice and violence, will not be truly helped, as they are further severed from their humanity.
We can reflect on the fact that inflicting pain, and then leaving people on their own with that pain, is likely to cause them to repeat the pattern of inflicting unnecessary pain on others.
And on the other side of the coin, we can highlight how the power of responding to pain with help, can transform everything.
If loving, strong and steady help is the balm that you are learning to bring to your child's pain, this is one major way in which you are changing the world.
This is a job done mostly through our actions, and sometimes with a few carefully chosen words.
Every time your child is hurting and you bring help in the form of caring, listening and love, you show them a version of the world where it is right to give and receive help when someone is hurting.
Every time that you notice you are too tired, triggered or stressed to respond to their hurt with the help they need from you, and you decide to acknowledge this by saying, “I’m sorry that I can’t help you with your feelings right now,” you reinforce the rightness of help when someone is hurting, even when it is not always possible.
Every time that you say, “I’m sorry for the times when we grownups act unkindly and don’t listen well to kids, especially when what you really need is our help,” you reaffirm the assumption that it is right and necessary for adults, for those in power in general, to listen well and provide help.
Every time you bring them help in the form of a loving limit when their behaviors are hurting themselves or others, you show them that sometimes help looks like setting a limit or boundary for the sake of safety and fairness.
In addition, as you thoughtfully talk about the harsher truths of the world with them (with consideration for their developmental needs and particular temperament), you have the opportunity to share how different it could be. To invite them to imagine a reality where all of the people want to help each other, feel safe enough to receive help when they are hurting, and are able to heal and grow together.
Creating a world where help is available
As they become increasingly exposed to a world set up by those in power to make us fear each other instead of help each other, children who’s pain is met regularly with help are likely to see clearly that this is not the way it has to be.
It will serve them to have a practice of noticing where those in positions of power, from parents to teachers to government officials, are falling short. And to turn towards themselves and know their own capacity to deliver help, and enlist you in their endeavors when they need a little more support to do so.
And we do the same. We shift away from a dominant, inherited worldview where love, caring and help are scarce and conditional, determined by our behaviors or other qualities oftentimes out of our control.
And we choose and practice our way into a worldview where we can see everyone, including ourselves, as needing and worthy of a lot of care. Where nobody is the exception to needing a little help a lot of the time. Where we affirm that help is not about who is less or more fortunate, but rather, the ways in which we can be giving, receiving and coming together to make change so that the world is a fair and free place to be for everyone.
As healing parents, we bring the pieces of a home that feels like help together, little by little. We learn and practice tools that deliver help in the way that children most need it and can truly feel it. We mess up, and then bring help through the balms of repair and accountability for the ways in which we caused hurt. We look for, and bring helpers into our lives, and we learn to become more attuned helpers and more open receivers of help.