De-stressing With Kids During Stressful Times
guest post by Paint Love’s founder and board chair, Julie McKevitt
Yesterday while “social distancing” with my kids at home, I helped my daughter paint a rocket ship and totally lost my mind. She wanted to feel the paint with her brush, then her finger, then her hands, and then....her face. (Yes, while sitting across the table, she looked me in the eye, held her hands to her face, and in an act of defiance, rubbed them alllll over.)
It was thrilling for her and the complete tipping point for me. The stress and anxiety I had been bottling up from this week came out in an extraordinarily impatient moment. Like the rocket ship we were building, my emotions blasted off.
How we react and behave during these incredibly stressful times impacts our kids in so many ways. With a large portion of the children in Georgia and around the country facing the potential of being home for weeks of the school year, already maxed-out emotions and worry are going to run even higher in caretakers and the small hearts we are gifted to guide and love.
Given the story I just shared, if I prepared to give you tips on keeping calm and de-stressing with your kids during the upcoming days, I would feel like a total hypocrite. But thankfully for me, Paint Love has some of the best trauma-informed staff who know and work with kids, and they have helped me come up with this list of ways to de-stress with our kids. And best of all, in the coming days, Paint Love staff is going to go in-depth on practical ways to activate these in your daily life.
SIX WAYS TO DE-STRESS WITH KIDS
Be the calm you want to see. Be mindful of your mental state and how you spend the day, including what you say on the phone, on the internet, etc.—even if your kids don’t hear or read those comments, negative thoughts can consume you.
We’ll give some tips on keeping your calm so you can co-regulate kids’ amped up emotions, and art projects that will help settle anxious thoughts.
Communicate with honesty. Start by asking what kids have heard or think they know, and respond to their specific fears prepared with an age-appropriate message that reassures kids they are safe, but always share with honesty. Saying “I don’t know” is okay. Refocus worry away from fear and toward empowering them to take steps to protect others.
We’ll share some helpful resources about talking with your kids, what is age-appropriate, how to be a positive buffer for stress and refocus worry, and art projects that let them express their feelings when words might be hard to find.Plan some fun. Dance parties are my easy go-to.
Create a schedule for your day - some structure can help tame chaos and manage expectations. Put art + craft time, outside adventures, and dance parties right on your schedule. We’ll send you some fun, easy activities you can do together, but remember that a little boredom is also okay, even healthy, to encourage creativity.
Find a “yes” opportunity. Be available for yes. Even amidst working from home, find at least a small amount of time where you can simply say “yes.” (Yes, I’ll play. Yes, we can get messy. Yes, let’s go outside.)
We’ll share collaborative and community building projects you can do with the people in your house, or to share digitally with loved ones to keep connection strong despite the distance.
Reframe the mess. Extra messes are coming. Learning to view some of these messes as learning opportunities for your kids can be powerful. (Side note: This would have been a great way for me to view my daughter’s face painting “experiment” and allowed me a better understanding of her perspective.)
We’ll share projects that let kids test boundaries safely and take ownership of choices in their creative process that actually help them regain a feeling of control in a crazy time.
Get outside. Nature!!!
Nature is a great stress reliever; we’ll share some nature themed crafts and projects and more about how important it is to let kids stretch their imaginations with creative free play time.
HELPFUL NEXT STEPS FROM PAINT LOVE
While Paint Love is unable to serve children facing trauma in person in the next few weeks or more, we are looking for ways to serve children in our new “distanced” capacity.
Research from the National Endowment for the Arts shows that art could actually lower the stress hormone cortisone in the brain, and it has lots of positive impacts for kids and adults alike, especially in stressful times.
That’s why the Paint Love staff has committed to send email and blog updates on how caregivers can create the healthiest environments for their children’s minds and hearts. We’ll post more about how to enact these six ideas above, simple art project tutorials, and ideas you can test out to help everyone find some peace and fun in a stressful time.