Keeping children safe from the anxiety virus

Source: Times of India

Corona virus may not be in parent’s control, but what parents can control is the anxiety virus that has crept into our homes through crevices of uncertainty. Children need a safe place, a constant in the form of emotionally available parents, who will continue to be a shield protecting them from the dangers of the outside world.

Children’s growing minds are still struggling to understand that life has its ups and downs and good and bad times both have an expiry date. Children are not yet ready to make sense of the world with its problems and are depending on their parents. It is the parent’s responsibility to make their home environment such that it enables children to feel hopeful for the future and not anxious about it.

Reassure children instead of nagging and giving them thousands of instructions about the safety protocols. Children turn to their parents for clues about how they should be feeling and responding to stress that they are getting from outside. 

Children need to be reassured regularly that they are safe, and that the adults should do everything to keep them safe. Encourage children to talk about their feelings and make them feel that they are in control. Anxiety tends to come from uncertainty so it’s important that children feel they have control over it.

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