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5 Ways to Cope with Anxiety as a Parent

The hard work and unpredictability that makes parenting so rewarding can also cause a great deal of anxiety. Here are some simple ways to bring yourself to a place of calm.

Make a To-Do List
Ruminating on worries can cause lots of stress. Clear your mind by making a to-do list. Put down everything that needs to be done into your phone or onto a sheet of paper, and as you write them down, visualize yourself removing this task from your mind onto the list.

Watch Your Language
Many times parents believe things will get better when their children move on to the next phase of their maturity. However, the truth is that the worry will continue until you change your pattern of thought. To do this, watch the language you use to describe things. Don’t use phrases such as, “this will be a disaster if I don’t get it done on time” or “I’ll die of embarrassment if I forget.”

Also change thoughts of “I have to” to “I want to”. For example, instead of saying “I have to sign the kids up for karate” say, “I want to sign the kids up for karate because I know they’ll love it.”

Get Some Fresh Air
There’s nothing like some fresh air and sunlight to ease anxiety. Put your baby in a stroller and go for a walk around the block, to a neighbor’s house, or a local park. Take your kids to an outdoor mall or sit on the patio of a frozen yogurt shop and share a frozen treat. You can also try your local library. Some libraries also have outdoor patio areas where you can read with your kids.

Practice Mindfulness Exercises
If your anxiety is difficult to control, try deep-breathing from your belly. While you do this, concentrate on five things you can see, four things you can touch, three things you can hear, two things you can smell and one thing you can taste. This can help calm you when you’re feeling a panic or anxiety attack start to arise.

Use Your Support Network
Call your friends or family to chat or ask for advice. It may also help to vent with a Facebook parenting group or other online message board. You can also call your therapist and make an appointment and work through your challenges.

Try these tips to control and cope with your anxiety, and enjoy the time with your children free from worry.

If you find your anxiety to be impacting your ability to be a happy, successful parent, it might be time to speak with a professional who can help. Please contact me today for an initial consultation.

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Are You Doing Self-Care All Wrong?

The topic of self-care is one that has been discussed openly and often over the past decade. But for many, the concept of self-care is one that is still a bit mysterious, if not downright confusing.

What Is Self-Care?

First, self-care is a practice and a commitment we make to ourselves. It is any activity we do deliberately to support our physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Not only does the right kind of self-care improve our health and life, but it can also improve the relationships we have with others.

Some examples of self-care might be:

  • Creating better habits
  • Eating right
  • Getting plenty of quality sleep
  • Exercising
  • Meditation
  • Spending quality time with loved ones
  • Making time to enjoy a hobby
  • Learning something new

Self-care isn’t always fun or easy, but you do it because you know that the activity is what is BEST for you. In this way, self-care is a bit like acting as your own monitor, making sure you do the things that your mind, body, and spirit need.

What Self-Care Isn’t:

Self-care isn’t necessarily about making yourself feel better. To clarify, here’s an example of two people:

Person A has had a very bad day. When they get home, they change clothes, go for a 30-minute walk, then cook and eat healthy dinner that refuels their body. This is good self-care.

Person B has also had a very bad day. On their way home, person B stops at the store and gets a 6-pack of beer and a gallon of ice cream, then spends the entire evening on the couch drinking and eating in an attempt to make the bad day go away. This is not good self-care.

Self-care is about making decisions and taking action, based on knowing what is genuinely good for you.

Self-care can also get be confused with pampering, such as pedicures and other beauty treatments, which tend to be quick fixes to make ourselves feel better in the moment.

At the end of the day, self-care is a commitment to yourself to live, grow, and evolve in healthy ways. It means making choices that will lead to your best self and greatest potential.

If you would like help to develop your self-care strategies, please contact us today!

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The Mental Health Impact of COVID-19 on Families

If you asked any of us a year ago what would life be like in 2020, it’s doubtful anyone would have guessed we’d be living through a global pandemic, requiring lockdowns and self-quarantining. At the beginning of the year, some families might have thought being forced to stay home from work and school would be fun, like a little vacation. But as the weeks and months have passed, we’ve all learned this has been difficult.

But how is COVID affecting families? Well, it affects parents, children, and spouses a little differently.

How it Affects Children

Kids haven’t enjoyed the time off nearly as much as we all initially thought. Disruption to normal routines caused many teens and adolescents to feel anxiety. Add to this being away from their friends, and many young people are also feeling sad, lonely or even depressed.

Summer vacation for many children was very different that they expected due to travel and activity restrictions. Boredom has set in for many kids, which has led to acting out and mood swings.

The pandemic also negatively impacted those youths already suffering from a mental health issue, such as those on the autism spectrum. For many of these children, a disruption of routine combined with cancellation of speech therapy sessions has stalled their progress and increased anxiety.

With some schools opening and some only offering online classes, life is still not back to normal and many children are struggling to manage the ongoing uncertainty.

How it Affects Parents

Parents have, without question, been hit hard by the pandemic. With forced school closures, many parents have had to learn how to home school while also learning how to work from home.

As if that wasn’t enough, parents have also had to become mental health therapists, helping their children navigate through the fear, anxiety, boredom, and depression they are experiencing.

How it Affects Spouses

Quarantining and self-isolation have definitely impacted our familial and romantic relationships. When you are locked in a house with your family, things can become chaotic and, well, everyone gets on each other’s nerves. Now forced to spend a lot of time together, while also enduring financial hardships, worrying about health, and educating and organizing the children—just going grocery shopping can become very stressful.

For those couples who had relationship issues under the surface, they may find the sudden and intense stress has brought these issues to the fore. This can be a turning point for many relationships: will this current crisis bring us closer or finally drive us apart?

Without question, we are all living with an intense amount of stress and it is affecting us all in different ways. If you and your family struggling to manage the stress, it’s important that you reach out and get some help from a counsellor. We offer telehealth services, which means you can get the benefits of therapy right over the internet.

If you’d like to explore treatment options, please reach out to us. We would be more than happy to discuss how we may be able to help.

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Yes, Virginia, You Can Learn to Love… Okay Like, Exercise

Hate exercising? You’re definitely not alone. At any time during the year, thousands of people across the country commit to working out, only to fall off the wagon weeks later.

So what gives? Why does exercising feel so hard and is there any possible way to like it more?

Exercise feels like a chore because there are so many misconceptions (AKA myths) out there surrounding it. The best way to like exercise is to put some of these myths to bed.

Let’s DO THIS…

Myth #1: You Need to Exercise X Minutes a Day for X Days a Week

Most people think there is a certain magical number of days and minutes of exercise, and if we hit it, we have exercised “enough.” But this model can lead to difficulty when we exceed our capacity. For example, if you haven’t been the gym in awhile, and then hit the gym hard for 45 minutes a day, 5 days a week, you’re likely to get injured and be forced to stop this pace of activity.

There IS NO magic number. The real magic begins by simply moving your body more. So don’t focus on a number, focus on creating a better habit in yourself and moving your body more each day.

Myth #2: Exercise is Boring

Then you aren’t doing the right exercise for YOU. No one says you MUST take a spinning class or a yoga class. No one says you MUST run 5 miles a day or do 100 squats a day.

What do you enjoy? If you like dancing, take dance classes every week. Do you like to swim? Maybe you used to play tennis and it would be fun to get back into it.

There are almost endless activities and ways to move your body, so pick something that isn’t boring to you and do that.

Myth #3: No Pain, No Gain

Wrong.

Now I guess we should start by discussing what “pain” actually means. If you haven’t moved your body very much except to walk from the sofa to the kitchen to retrieve another beer, then yes, you can expect that your muscles might get a little sore. But sore and pain are NOT the same thing.

If, while you are working out, you feel any kind of real pain, STOP immediately. This is particularly true if you are over the age of 50 and very out of shape. Nothing should hurt on your body. This is a sign that you are pushing yourself too hard. When you workout so hard that you can barely move the next day… well, you are hardly going to want to do it all over again.

Go slow, pace yourself, don’t try and be a hero.

If you kick these 3 myths to the curb, choose an exercise you enjoy and just try and move your body a little bit each day, you may find that after a while you… (GASP!)… enjoy exercise!

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