Fostering Resilience: Helping Kids Cope with Disappointment
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“Don’t cry, honey…I don’t want you to be disappointed. ”
”Enough. You should be happy with what you have. ”
”I’ll take care of it. I’ll call the teacher and make it right.”
Have you ever heard these words come out of your mouth? Probably! You are a parent who loves your kids so much. Their hurt is your hurt. Of course, you want to make their life easier. But I want to tell you something…
You don’t need to protect your child from feeling disappointed. Instead, teach them how to cope with their feelings. When we fix things for them, our children miss out on learning important coping skills.
Hard feelings become hard behaviors. Rather than controlling situations to avoid meltdowns, walk through them WITH your child. It will serve you both now and well into the future.
Here are some examples of fixing vs. allowing:
You don’t have to get this “right” all of the time. Use it to INFORM your thinking. Sometimes, it’s okay to avoid disappointing your child. YOU are the parent and YOU get to decide what’s best for them.
Feelings are HARD. They’re hard to process and hard to understand for little ones. Reading books about feelings is always helpful in having them understand what they’re experiencing. Here are a few books about feelings that I love!
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THE PLAY PLAN
The Play Plan is an ebook containing play invitations that are easy to set up, inexpensive, and apply children of all ages. The 25 play prompts are divided into five categories and use items that you most likely already have at home. These play prompts consider children of all ages, all developmental stages, and all learning capabilities. Each prompt can be tailored to fit your unique child’s needs. Play is meant to be simple.
QUIET TIME & INDEPENDENT PLAY
This downloadable ebook is your personal guide to Quiet Time and Independent Play. This ebook will teach you the basic steps to implementing a Quiet Time and Independent Play strategy that works. The guide teaches you my proven 5 step method for implementing a daily break without using screens. (Guide includes 5 bonus invitations to play.
If you want to create a home that is filled with play and creativity, the key is to let your child know how much you value the time and effort they spent playing.