Supporting your child’s emotional health – Owen Connolly’s advice

There are many causes of childhood trauma, for example; difficult birth, separation anxiety, or any life threatening experience particularly in children under the age of three years. In this instance the child may need special attention. For example, a traumatised child may demonstrate unnecessary fear or have a sense that the world is very hostile towards them, therefore the child would have a greater need for emotional intimacy. This is exercised by reassurance as to how loved and valued they are as your child, thus reflecting back to them their qualities such as how precious and unique they are.

It is important for the child to feel understood by the parent/primary carer. This type of understanding is best communicated through play as you engage with the child, whilst allowing them to lead in the play process. It is important that you maintain eye contact with the child and repeat back to the child their particular request in the play process, i.e. “You want me to put this block on top of that block”. It is very similar to turn-taking that is evident in attachment when you smile at the child and the child smiles back. In other words it is a continuation of the turn-taking between an infant and mother/father.

This interaction will enhance the parent-child relationship as well as increasing the child’s confidence in taking direction from you, the parent. The child learns that what they have to say is important, that you are interested in them and they are having an important emotional need met which is attention. You can introduce relaxation programmes in your parent-child play. For example, progressive relaxation in which you tense and then relax different parts of the body to help the child to understand the difference between feeling tense and feeling relaxed. Similarly, you can introduce “Belly Breathing” which promotes emotional self-regulation and relaxation. This involves taking deep breaths in through the nose and breathing out slowly through the mouth. A fun way to practice this is to imagine that in one hand you are holding a rose and in the other hand you are holding a candle. You smell the rose (breath in) and you blow out the candle (when you exhale). Another exercise which we find very effective and fun is “Teddy Surfing”. The child lies down flat on the ground and places a medium sized teddy on their belly. As they breathe deeply, the teddy will rise and as they exhale slowly the teddy will fall, as a result the teddy is surfing on their belly!

For further information on topics relating to childhood stress and trauma visit our website at www.counsellor.ie We have an online facility in which you can pose your questions and Owen Connolly or Suzanne Condron will get back to you.

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