There is a great deal of stress in everyone’s lives these days and that includes children and teenagers. Children and teenagers come under stress from many sources but especially from warring parents and exams. However, children and teenagers are not as well prepared to deal with stress as adults ought to be.
The death of a parent and bullying at school are also reasons for stress in children and teenagers. The death of a parent can necessitate counseling, bullying requires adult help, usually from school staff. These four cases of stress in children and teenagers can lead to mental health problems like depression, ADHD and aggression.
Other causes of milder stress, which can however be the straw that broke the camel’s back, are as follows.
Transferring to a new school, new town or joining a new organization, like cub scouts is stressful to a great deal of kids. They will not have many, if any, friends there and will be uncertain of the local customs, which can be nerve wracking. Being on edge like this is extremely stressful.
Learning how to deal with deadlines is not easy for a lot of young people. Nor is working alone to complete a project. Both of these abilities are taught through homework and most children have issues with homework. They hate it. This also causes stress to build up, particularly if the child does not know how to do the homework and there is no one to help. Perhaps the child does not want to ask or perhaps the parents are incapable of helping.
Connected with school, if a parent is too assertive about achieving high grades, it can have stressful effects that are opposite to what was wanted. Parents have to recognize the fine line between encouraging and pushing their children to do well in school.
Low self esteem due to a brighter or more praised sibling is also the cause of stress. Parents who have a favourite and make this obvious run a serious risk of hurting their other children. Never ever choose a favourite (my ‘number one son’ or ‘my little princess’) and if you can not help yourself, then never let it show.
The news can disturb some children, especially gory details like terrorist bombings and natural disasters. These are felt much more intensely of course if they happen locally. Similar to this is if a close family member suffers a terminal illness or even a serious accident like a car collision and the loss of a limb. They may undergo short term stress if they have an illness like mumps or measles or break an arm or a leg too.
Children quickly pick up on problems between their parents and also on financial problems in the house. Try to keep these things to yourself and do not quarrel often in front of the children.
You can help in the home by making sure that your children have love and understanding and by not being too demanding. They are only children, but they often have to put up with adult sized stress too. Try to help them not make too big an issue of problems.
Owen Jones, the writer of this piece writes on several of topics, but is currently involved with work on high blood pressure charts. If you want to know more or check out some great offers, please go to our website at High Blood Pressure Recipes.
