Traveling is stressful for adults, kids and seniors, and everyone acts out and somatizes their feelings to some degree, but when children are the stress victims, there are ways that you can help them go easy on themselves. Read my tips and advice below.
4 Tips To Alleviate Kid Stress:
1. Keep the parents stress level low. Kids are connected to parents more than you think they are, and they look to parents for cues on how to feel and behave – especially in stressful situations. If parents are stressed, you can bet that the kids will pick up the stress and express it or imitate it. So the more you alleviate your own stress, mom and dad, the more you alleviate your children’s stress.
2. Sleep schedules. Try to keep kids on their normal sleep schedules as much as possible. Compensate for late nights with easy days and nap times. Don’t follow up a late night with a busy day and expect good behavior and healthful living. Keep a balance.
3. Be prepared. The better prepared you are, the more you can keep your kids “in the loop” on what the schedule is. Granted there will be surprises, unexpected behaviors and events and excitement as well as other things. When you give a child a sense of control of the day — simply by letting them know what’s happening during the day, the weekend and the week, and/or times that the events are happening, the kids will relax. Believe it or not, kids like to feel like they’re part of the big picture and not victims of it.
4. Parent and child time. Take some time out in every day to have some time alone with your child — or with each of your children. Take a walk. Snuggle and watch cartoons on television together. Read a book together or toss a ball around together. In all the hustle bustle, remind your child and yourself how important they are to you. Especially when you have too much on your plate.
