The unusual behavior of the child, we used to write off on the whims, bad Education or transitional age. But this may not be as harmless as it seems at first glance. This can mask the symptoms of a child’s nervous breakdown.
A child’s health is a natural concern for parents, often from the period of pregnancy. Cough, snot, fever, sore stomach, rash - and we run to the doctor, look for information on the Internet, buy medicines. But there are also unobvious symptoms of ill health, to which we are accustomed to turn a blind eye, considering that the child "will outgrow", "this is all the wrong education", or "he just has such a character."
Preventing Nervous Disruption
That's when you need to call the police for help. If he feels overloaded, he may close his eyes, close your ears, or curl. Beating autistic children may resign or live, depending on the person. Try to engage in physical activities that help him get rid of energy, such as walking, gardening, or anything that mentally refreshes him or her.
- Watch your baby’s body language.
- Before a crash, the child usually shows stress and frustration.
- Ask the child if something is wrong.
Usually these symptoms manifest in behavior. If you notice that the child is behaving strangely, this may be one of the symptoms of a nervous breakdown. The child does not look into the eyes, does not talk, often falls into hysterics, all the time crying or sad, does not play with other children, is aggressive at the slightest reason, is hyper-excitable, poorly holds attention, ignores the rules of behavior, is timid, overly passive, has tics, obsessive movements, stuttering, enuresis, frequent nightmares.
Pay attention to touch and other input types. This can help ask a child’s brothers and sisters to move their romp outside or take the child out of the noisy kitchen. Bedrooms, soothing corners and even bathrooms can be sufficient, if necessary. Try to take the child outside or to a quiet room to rest. . Do not blame the child for his nervous breakdown. Breakdowns are incredibly difficult to control, and your child is probably upset by the collapse. Do not shout at him, do not blame him for intentional embarrassment, and do not write down his behavior to teach him how this "naughty" is.
Symptoms of a child’s breakdown
In adolescence, this can be a permanently depressed mood or apathy, mood swings, eating disorders (gluttony, refusal to eat, strange food preferences), intentional self-infliction of wounds (cuts, burns), cruelty and dangerous behavior, deterioration in school performance from - for forgetfulness, inability to concentrate, regular use of alcohol and psychoactive drugs.
Together consider ways to deal with this. Your child does not like collapse and probably would like to know how to cope with stress. Here are some simple things you can offer your child. Use positive reinforcement. If the child applies good coping mechanisms, give him sincere praise for his efforts. Tell him how proud his good behavior and his efforts are. Try to pay more attention to identifying good behavior than to punishing bad.
Use the star table. Make a star table and hang it in the kitchen or in the children's room. Use green stars for any successful completion of the copy mechanisms and blue stars for any attempt to defuse a collapse. Use the red star for any uncontrolled tantrum or breakdown. Encourage your child to turn his red stars into blue ones, and his blue stars into green ones.
Also characterized by increased impulsiveness and low self-control, increased fatigue over a long period, hatred for oneself and one’s body, ideas that others are hostile and aggressive, suicidal feelings or attempts, bizarre beliefs, hallucinations (visions, sounds, sensations).
Panic attacks, fears and high anxiety, agonizing headaches, insomnia, psychosomatic manifestations (ulcer, arterial pressure disorder, bronchial asthma, neurodermatitis) can occur.
Understand the causes of failures
There is a possibility that he will be embarrassed in order not to cope with his feelings. Explain that collapse is inevitable to some extent, so the goal is to get better, but not perfect. If the child seems to want a red or blue star, remove the table. An autistic child is not properly equipped to cope with the environment and active and overly stimulating actions. Too much activity or too much noise in the child’s environment can lead to its suppression.
- Never be ashamed of your child for failing to control the breakdown.
- This is a sign of a perfectionist position that can cause great damage.
- Watch out for an overwhelming or stressful environment.
- Then it is difficult for the child to cope with excessive stimulation, causing disorder.
The list of symptoms of mental and nervous disorders, of course, wider. It is necessary to pay attention to all unusual, strange and alarming moments in the child's behavior, given their resilience and duration of manifestation.
Remember: what is normal for one age may be an indication of a problem in another. For example, lack of speech or vocabulary poverty is not typical for children over 4-5 years old. Stormy tantrums and tears - method 2-3 old child test the strength of parents and learn the limits of acceptable, but inappropriate behavior for the student.
Autistic children can struggle to communicate or understand each other. This may seem incredibly frustrating. Teach your child to communicate his thoughts and feelings to others. It helps him to express his needs and prevent excessive loss of emotions. Listening to the message of the child, he shows that you are interested in what he has to say, and this encourages you to talk more with you.
How to treat nervous disorders in children?
Avoid too much deviation from the normal daily life of the child. Autistic children rely on daily routines to give them a sense of security and stability. Changing the procedure is like this, as if you have spoiled the order of the universe, and they could be confused and panicked.
Fears of strangers, losing mom, darkness, death, natural disasters are natural, according to age norms, up to and including adolescence. Later, phobias can indicate a poor mental state. Make sure that you yourself do not require the child to be more mature than he really is. Children's mental health preschool age depends largely on the parents.
If there is a change in everyday life, it helps to explain it as soon as possible. For example, if tomorrow you have to have breakfast at the airport to pick up your aunt, tell him the day before, and then you get in the car. It helps the child imagine what will happen.
- This gives him the opportunity to prepare emotionally.
- Try to use daily and weekly schedules.
- Laminate them so that you can record changes on them with a voice recorder.
Carefully observe how the child behaves in different situations and different environments, what he is at home, and how he plays with children on the playground, in kindergartenAre there any problems at school and with friends? If caregivers, teachers, other parents complain to you about the behavior of your child, do not take it to heart, but specify what worries them, how often it happens, what are the details and circumstances.
Sometimes certain types or numbers of cases with a child that the child does not expect or does not appreciate may lead to breakdown. This can be especially important when it comes to their food. He expects people around him to respect their need to be independent and do something themselves.
If you pull the knife out of his hand, it may seem like you want to pull it out and start crying. Outwardly, this may seem like a trivial problem, but it is of great importance for the child. Therefore, it would be better if the child himself performed this task and simply asked if he needed help. Many parents find it helpful to help the child perform specific task and ask, “Do you need help?” If the child seems to be coping with it. Using the options allows the child to feel the impact on the help he received or not. Soothing is a very useful coping mechanism that helps self-control and makes a nervous breakdown less serious.
- For example: a child may want to put butter on his bread.
- It can begin as a tantrum and cause a nervous breakdown.
- Do not try to stop the child from cutting during a nervous breakdown.
Do not think that they want to humiliate or blame you for something, compare the information and draw independent conclusions. Perhaps a side view will be a necessary hint, and you will be able to help your child in time: visit a psychologist, psychotherapist, psychiatrist, neurologist. Neuropsychiatric disorders in children can be treated, the main thing is not to start the situation.
Permanent symptoms several months after injury
This is a depression to which it is possible, even if it is not enough to explain it, to give an external reason: mourning, divorce or rupture, a serious accident, aggression or accumulation of tensions that a person cannot overtake. The classic scenario is one who loses a spouse or one of his parents and does not mourn.
Is there a propensity for reactive depression?
We are talking about reactive depression, when mental suffering, disorders of sleep and appetite persist with the same force several months after the initial trauma. Signs of anxiety are also present in the reactionary depression. However, this starting point of reactionary depression cannot be the only explanation for the change in the disease. The initial injury is a necessary, but not sufficient reason to explain the mechanisms of psychogenic depression. This would concern, but not only, more fragile personalities who have already experienced depressive episodes.
The stigmatization of mental problems and disorders in our society is still common. This causes additional pain to people who suffer from them and their relatives. Shame, fear, confusion and anxiety make it difficult to ask for help, when time passes and problems get worse.
According to statistics in the United States, where psychiatric and psychological assistance is delivered much better than in Ukraine, an average of 8-10 years elapses between the appearance of the first symptoms and seeking help. Whereas about 20% of children have certain mental disorders. Half of them, they really outgrow, adapt, compensate.
Everyone does not go from sadness to melancholy, and the same person does not systematically fall into depression every time an event upsets his life. Depression also depends on the circumstances and moments. The presence of a gentle environment does not necessarily prevent a switch to a reactionary depression.
Antidepressants are less effective in this type of depression. Therefore, they may be associated with anxiolytics. Tracking in psychotherapy is greatly shown to help the patient fight negative thoughts that invade and support psychogenic depression. Indeed, these patients often experience a strong sense of guilt. They blame themselves for not having treated their deceased parent well, because they had survived this accident, because they loved the one who left him.
Mental disorders often have a genetic, organic basis, but this is not a sentence. With the help of education in a favorable environment, they can be avoided or significantly reduce the manifestation.
Unfortunately, the opposite is also true: violence, traumatic experiences, including sexual, emotional and pedagogical neglect, harassment, a dysfunctional or criminal family environment, greatly harm the development of children, causing them non-healing psychological wounds.
The patient needs to be helped to realize the strong guilt that he causes irrationally. The presence of a loving and attentive environment does not prevent the emergence of a reactionary depression. But it is very helpful to help a person get through. Note that the depression reaction also takes the form of a masked depression, especially when it becomes chronic.
Reactive depression, outdated concept?
The concept of reactive depression can help your doctor diagnose a depressive disorder. He can also use it as part of his dialogue with the patient. This concept still makes sense to the general public, which, as a rule, considers depression of a reaction to be more justified than a characteristic depressive episode without an objective reason.
The attitude of the parents to the child from birth to 3 years of age, how the pregnancy took place and the first months after birth, the emotional state of the mother during this period laid the foundations for the mental health of the child. The most sensitive period: from birth to 1-1.5 years, when the personality of the baby is formed, its further ability to adequately perceive the world and flexibly adapt to it.
We are also talking about pathological mourning.
However, it is less used by experts in recent developments in the classification of depressive pathology. Some experts prefer the concept of "pathological mourning." On a daily basis, this is a person who is cared for according to his story. There is no specific treatment for psychogenic depression, as it could be.
On the other hand, some typical depressions that once fell into the psychogenic category, such as postpartum depression or burnout, are currently the focus of attention of specialists. Like tics, repetitive sudden, quick and purposeless movements or sounds that can be very difficult to control at will. Small children often do not even know that they do this, they do not perceive them.
Serious illness of the mother and child, her physical absence, strong emotional distress and stress, as well as abandonment of the baby, minimal physical and emotional contact with him (feeding and changing diapers is not enough for normal development) are risk factors for the occurrence of disorders.
What to do if it seems to you that the child is behaving strangely? The same as at temperature: seek a specialist and seek help. Depending on the symptoms, either a neurologist, a psychiatrist, or a psychologist or a psychotherapist can help.
They can be largely caused by mental stress, especially in sensitive children. These include bloating, biting and licking lips, tongue and palate, headaches, handshakes or rhythmic movements, etc. For the vast majority of children who develop tics, stress is the main cause.
Probably the most common beginners are: visiting nurseries, nurseries, separation from parents or parents, painful injuries, traumatic experiences, etc. according to experts, it is likely that the tendency of tics may be hereditary. However, there are, of course, cases when the cause of the child’s behavioral change has not been found.
The doctor will prescribe medications and procedures, a psychologist and psychotherapist with the help of special exercises, exercises, conversations, will teach the child to communicate, control his behavior, express himself in socially acceptable ways, help resolve internal conflict, get rid of fears and other negative experiences. Sometimes you may need a speech therapist or correctional teacher.
Interestingly, tics affect twice as many boys than girls. The critical periods are the age between the fifth and sixth years and the period after the start of school, from seven to ten years. In context, it is perfectly logical that tics will worsen or become more pronounced during times of stress and uncertainty. Many parents, on the other hand, will be surprised that if a child, who usually suffers from a tick trick, is immersed in the game, he is somewhat busy, confiscated, therefore these words are almost not similar.
Stunning neck and shoulder twist, shaking hands Diarrhea Tongue Movement around the teeth and glands, saliva.
- Blowing and sniffing Sharpening Squeezing the lips and jerks of various facial muscles.
- Century Swing Opening and twisting the mouth, licking the lips.
- Nasal wrinkles, jerks and nostrils Repeated cough.
Not all difficulties require the intervention of doctors. Sometimes a child reacts painfully to sudden changes in his family: parents divorce, conflicts between them, the birth of a brother or sister, the death of someone from close relatives, the appearance of new partners with parents, relocation, the beginning of a visit to kindergarten or school. the system of relationships prevailing in the family and between mother and father, parenting style.
Be prepared that the advice of a psychologist may be necessary for you yourself. Moreover, it is enough to work with adults, so that the child calms down and his undesirable manifestations disappear. Take responsibility for yourself. “Do something with him. I can no longer, ”is not the position of an adult.
Preserving children's mental health: necessary skills- empathy - the ability to read and understand the feelings, emotions and condition of another person without merging with him, imagining the two as one;
- the ability to express in words your feelings, needs, desires;
- the ability to hear and understand another, to conduct a dialogue;
- the ability to establish and maintain the psychological limits of the individual;
- the tendency to see the source of control of one’s life in oneself without falling into guilt or omnipotence.
Read the literature, attend lectures and seminars on parenting, engage in their own development as a person. Use this knowledge in communication with the child. Feel free to seek help and advice.
Because the main task of parents is to love a child, accept its imperfections (as well as their own), protect its interests, create favorable conditions for the development of its own individuality, without replacing it with your dreams and ambitions about the ideal child. And then your little sun will grow up healthy and happy, able to love and care.
TO physical health All parents treat their children attentively and reverently. At the first sign of a cold, coughing, runny nose, moms and dads are armed with all sorts of drugs, folk remedies and begin to intensively recover children's body. But the state of the child’s nervous system is not always paid due attention, and the consequences, unfortunately, are not long in coming.
The crying of a child in infancy is most often explained by its capricious nature. In fact, if you look, you can select different objective reasons : improper care, the onset of the disease and its course. To date, according to statistics, nervous disorders in children different ages diagnosed quite often. According to experts, half of school-age children show signs of emotional instability, hysteria and other conditions. But an accurate diagnosis can be established only when parents, who notice nervous disorders in children and their symptoms turn to a neuropathologist, and this happens quite infrequently, and then, most often only in very neglected cases.
Quite often we hear the parents say that the child is nervous. But the concept of "nervous" may include a rather extensive list of symptoms. Deviations from the norm can be either congenital, for example - in neuropathic children, as well as acquired - with improper upbringing, frequent stressful situations, ordeals. When nervous disorders can be affected as nervous system, and separate parts of the brain, as well as the psyche as a whole. To identify nervous disorders in children, to determine their type, and to appoint appropriate treatment can only be qualified medical specialist.
What should parents pay attention to? Sometimes, when in contact with a difficult situation, a neurotic reaction can occur even in an adult, children have a hard time at all. Everybody reacts differently: some - they become self-contained, others - make a powerful tantrum, which is accompanied by rolling on the floor, shouts and tears. But if such reactions begin to become a habit, such states in children become commonplace, then parents should be attentive to their manifestations, perhaps this is neurosis - nerve diseaseFor which treatment it is necessary to consult a neurologist.
According to experts, the basis of neurosis is almost always certain internal conflict, which provokes the child to such actions, making him emotionally unstable. Neurosis can often occur monosymptomaticand be expressed by any one symptom - stuttering, ticking, enuresis, etc.
Nervous tick - various unconscious movements, most often manifested in the form of twitching cheeks, eyes, hand movements, sobs, smacking, etc. The main cause of the appearance of nervous tics is stress. Their signs appear in those moments when the child does not produce any meaningful action, calm. In the process of activity - games, various activities, the tick disappears.
Insomnia - one of the symptoms that parents should pay attention to. Sleep in children becomes restless, they can not sleep for a long time, toss and turn. Such nervous disorders as frequent waking up, talking, crying in a dream can also be observed.
Enuresis - A disease in which a child, after punishment, overexcitement, nervous shock, urinates into bed. In children who suffer from enuresis, increased crying, a variety of moods, unstable mood.
In the period of active development of speech in children whose parents want to accelerate this process, to make a child prodigy out of their child, as well as as a result of stress, separation from family and friends, neurotic stuttering.
Anorexiais an eating disorder and is manifested by sudden loss of appetite. Caused by this disorder in early age - force-feeding, in adolescence - the desire for the ideals of a slim body. It is much easier to cure anorexia at an early age than to overcome this disorder in adolescents for whom it is aggravated by puberty.
Often, nervous disorders in children are provoked by the parents themselves with their excessive zeal and precaution. We list typical mistakes made by parents:
Excessive loading of the child (circles, sections, additional classes, etc.). Children with such a load have almost no free time to play and rest, they are under constant stress, and nervous disorders occur in these children quite often;
Seeing their children’s shortcomings, parents are trying hard to correct them, undertaking all sorts of ways;
Excessive custody;
Insufficient demonstration of their love to children;
Scandals in the family, the child becomes a witness.
Knowing about types of nervous disorders, each parent, having noticed their signs in his child, should contact a neuropathologist as soon as possible. It is better to let the doctor dissipate your suspicions, than you miss the time.
But alone drug treatment The problem cannot be completely solved; it will take a lot of efforts from the parents, who should, first of all, reconsider their behavior, their style of communication with the child, and perhaps even their life. The general guidelines for parents are as follows:
Do not stop the symptoms and manifestations of nervous disorders, it is much more important to timely identify the causes of their occurrence;
If at least one of the parents suffers from any nervous disorders, he has their signs, then it is necessary to undergo a course of treatment;
If you had problems with your parents as a child, do not allow these situations when dealing with your children;
Do not neglect visiting a neurologist, counseling a psychologist.