{"id":4635,"date":"2024-10-22T12:29:55","date_gmt":"2024-10-22T19:29:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/?p=4635"},"modified":"2025-01-15T09:42:25","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T17:42:25","slug":"helping-your-child-talk-through-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/helping-your-child-talk-through-problems\/","title":{"rendered":"Helping Your Child Talk Through Problems"},"content":{"rendered":"

Picture this. Your child arrives home from school<\/a> looking stressed and sad, but when you try to talk with them about why\u2014they clam up. Or you\u2019ve finished dinner, cleaned the kitchen, and sent your kids off to bed but then one comes into your bedroom looking worried and tells you they\u2019re having a problem with something.<\/p>\n

How do you encourage your child to talk about problems? How do you help your child solve whatever problem they\u2019re having?<\/h3>\n

Parents want to hear their children\u2019s worries and help lighten their loads.<\/p>\n

But it can be so hard to talk with our kids! And harder still to know how to help them fix their problems. I know that as a parent I want my kids to feel comfortable talking with me about anything that troubles them\u2014but I don\u2019t always know the best way to get them to open up. And, when they do tell me their concerns, I tend to jump right into trying to fix them even though I know that doesn\u2019t always work so well.<\/p>\n

For advice about this, I talked with Dr. Robert Black<\/a>, a clinical psychologist who specializes in pediatric behavioral medicine. He offered a stepwise approach for these conversations.<\/p>\n

Acknowledge your child\u2019s concerns in a way that keeps them talking<\/h3>\n

You can start by saying, \u201cYou look like you\u2019ve had a tough day.\u201d Or, \u201cYou seem upset.\u201d When they start to share the trouble, reflect back <\/em>to them what you heard. Perhaps your son says he thinks he\u2019s overweight. You can help him continue to talk by saying, \u201cYou\u2019re worried you are overweight.\u201d rather than jumping in with questions (or offering reassurance.)<\/p>\n

Dr. Black explained that this reflective listening<\/em> is likely to be a very helpful skill for parents. \u201cIt\u2019s a good way of helping children clarify their thoughts and feelings without the pressure from parents of asking lots of questions\u2014though we do love our questions, they\u2019re often not as helpful as we hope or think they will be!\u201d<\/p>\n

Help them solve their problem<\/h3>\n

Next\u2014after they\u2019ve explained how they\u2019re feeling and what the issue is\u2014 you can pivot to helping your kid solve it. Notice that I\u2019m not suggesting we solve our kids\u2019 problems for them, but instead help them learn to find their own solutions. You can shift to a more solution focused or active type of strategy by saying, \u201cLet\u2019s figure out how you could make the changes you want to.\u201d Or, \u201cWhat can you do to fix this?\u201d<\/p>\n

This approach gives children and teens<\/a> a powerful tool! \u201cThe ability to know from an early age that they can identify something they want to be different, make a plan, and create the change, is a skill that parents should help kids develop,\u201d said Dr. Black.<\/p>\n

These two steps\u2014reflective listening and shared problem solving\u2014will usually help parents and kids. We all want our children to grow up knowing they can overcome challenges and create change when needed. Taking these steps may help your child feel both supported by you and able to solve life\u2019s inevitable problems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Picture this. Your child arrives home from school looking stressed and sad, but when you try to talk with them about why\u2014they clam up. Or you\u2019ve finished dinner, cleaned the kitchen, and sent your kids off to bed but then one comes into your bedroom looking worried and tells you they\u2019re having a problem with something. How do you help them?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":4636,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[674],"tags":[597,599,547,576,72],"class_list":["post-4635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-parenting","tag-anxiety","tag-child-stress","tag-school","tag-stress","tag-teens","ages-all-school-ages"],"metadata":{"_edit_lock":["1736962948:6"],"_edit_last":["6"],"_thumbnail_id":["4636"],"qode_animate-page-title":["no"],"qode_show-page-title-text":["no"],"qode_show-page-title-image":["no"],"qode_show-sidebar":["default"],"qode_hide-featured-image":["no"],"slide_template":[""],"ase_chapter_enable_timeline":["off"],"video_format_choose":["youtube"],"_wpb_vc_js_status":["false"],"_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":["674"],"_yoast_wpseo_primary_ages":["293"],"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":["How to listen and help child talk about problems"],"_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":["How do you encourage your child to talk about problems? How do you help your child solve whatever problem they\u2019re having?"],"_yoast_wpseo_linkdex":["67"],"_yoast_wpseo_content_score":["90"],"_yoast_wpseo_focuskeywords":["[]"],"_yoast_wpseo_keywordsynonyms":["[\"\"]"],"_yoast_wpseo_estimated-reading-time-minutes":["3"],"_yoast_wpseo_wordproof_timestamp":[""],"_yoast_indexnow_last_ping":["1736962902"],"wpfp_favorites":["303"],"ase_map_component_start_point":["a:2:{s:3:\"lat\";d:29.76;s:3:\"lng\";d:-95.38;}"],"ase_mapbox_style":["openstreet"]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4635"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4851,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4635\/revisions\/4851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpthrivingfamilies.org\/pediatricsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}