What should I do if my child has depression?

Some time ago, the People\’s Daily published a set of data: the depression detection rate among teenagers in our country is as high as 24.6%. People may not be too sensitive to just say the numerical percentage, but if it is replaced by this statement – \”About every 4 children, one is diagnosed with depression\”, isn\’t it shocking enough? Before, when I heard about depression, I felt that this kind of thing was far away from us. But in the past two years, there have been more and more depressed children. A good middle school teacher said that there are currently two children in her class diagnosed with depression, one with moderate depression and one with mild depression. She and her parents gave these two children a \”high degree of freedom\”: they could arrive at school at any time they wanted every day; they would not be too strict if they couldn\’t finish their homework and didn\’t listen carefully in class. They are afraid that their children are already anxious enough, and any extra effort from parents and teachers will make them unbearable. Where the child will go in the future and what his future achievements will be will depend on the control of depression. Everything is a big unknown. The child is still underage, but his spirit is already overwhelmed. This has to be said to be a kind of tragedy. Behind the high depression rate are innocent children kidnapped by daily anxiety. These negative emotions are invisible and intangible, but they stick to children, affecting their quality of growth, and may even suddenly overwhelm them one day. Bridget Walker, a Ph.D. in American psychology, said in the book \”Help Children Get Rid of Anxiety\”: Most of children\’s negative emotions are related to anxiety. Anxiety can manifest itself in children in a variety of ways. Emotional reactions such as depression, avoidance, shyness, rebellion, pessimism, and even lack of self-confidence and anger are all ways children deal with anxiety. These emotions seem to be reactions to normal emotions, but their biggest disadvantage is that they are not easy to detect, and they will not disappear as the child grows. When accumulated, they will either invade the child\’s body or corrode the child\’s spirit. Children\’s studies and grades are important, but keeping children emotionally healthy is an aspect that parents should not neglect. Anxiety has its ups and downs on a daily basis, and you encounter some \”irrelevant\” emotional tangles in your children, such as: unwilling to go to school for various reasons; afraid of attending a certain teacher\’s class; having social problems with children… Are you the same? Comfort the child like this: It\’s okay, it will be fine in a while. Privately, you will also comfort yourself: as your children grow up, they have more things to think about and have more things to do, and it is normal to have some unpleasant thoughts. But in fact, anxiety and depression will form \”pimples\” because these small emotional problems are not resolved in time. In the end, the knots will get bigger and bigger, making the children no longer able to resolve the knots. Anxiety is chronic, it doesn\’t go away as a child grows, and it hides, shifts, and comes back. It is precisely because of this that many parents mistakenly believe that anxiety will disappear on its own over time. The book tells the story of a 12-year-old boy who got straight A\’s and had extremely perfect demands on himself. Whenever the boy felt he didn\’t have enough time to complete his homework, he would cry. At first, the boy\’s anxiety only manifested itself in homework. Later he was transferred to the \”choir\”. If he couldn\’t remember the lyrics or sang the lyrics,If the law is a little wrong, it will collapse. Later, the boy\’s anxiety shifted to sleep. As long as he worried about homework and grades, he couldn\’t sleep well all night… The boy\’s anxiety was good and bad. Whenever summer vacation was about to come, his anxiety became magically \” \”disappeared,\” but as soon as the summer vacation ended, the boy\’s anxiety returned. Therefore, don’t think that your child’s anxiety will disappear on its own. If parents ignore them and allow their children to be dominated by emotions such as worry, fear, and guilt, they are likely to become physically and mentally exhausted, depressed, or even depressed as time goes by, and feel hopeless about life and study. So, is all anxiety in children harmful? Neither. Moderate anxiety can actually improve children\’s performance. For example, \”Children are afraid of being last,\” \”Don\’t want to lose a game,\” or \”Afraid that their speech will not be good tomorrow.\” Under this kind of nervousness, they will motivate themselves to work harder and be more cautious. A general principle is: as long as these anxieties do not affect the child\’s normal life, most of them are transient and harmless. Why being reasonable is not a good way to cure children’s anxiety. Scientists have discovered that children who are prone to anxiety have a lack of ability—they do not learn from past experiences. Like the 12-year-old boy mentioned earlier, every time he was anxious, his parents would comfort him: Look, you were able to complete your homework in the past, get good grades, and get praise from the choir teacher. But the boy always collapsed more. He cried and shouted: But this time is different! The root cause of anxiety is that children cannot correct their inherent cognition with what they have experienced. In other words: the situation that children imagine is inconsistent with reality, but they are unable to realize this. I also don’t realize that my fear and nervousness are unnecessary. Two years ago, a 9-year-old boy in Jurong, Jiangsu Province, jumped from the 17th floor after leaving a suicide note for fear of being punished for breaking the glass of his school. Last year, a 9-year-old girl in Xi\’an did not complete her homework within the specified time. She felt that she could not do anything well and jumped from her home on the 15th floor… We regret that children end their lives for trivial matters. , but we can also see that there is a big gap between children\’s cognition under stress and anxiety and the facts. Rather than saying that things \”kill\” children, it is better to say that the \”dislocation\” of children\’s cognition under anxiety kills them. And if you want to eliminate children\’s anxiety, encouragement such as \”You are awesome\”, \”It doesn\’t matter\”, \”Mom and Dad love you and will always be by your side\” are like a drop of water, which can only relieve the child\’s anxiety for a while, but cannot remove the root cause. Get rid of children\’s anxiety and let them truly accept themselves and their emotions. Managing anxiety is a lifelong task for children. Peng Kaiping, a professor at the Department of Psychology at Tsinghua University, once said: The biggest flaw in our education is that we don’t study psychology, which leaves many children without the ability to find happiness. I feel that if both children and parents can learn one or two skills and tools to manage anxiety, we will benefit a lot in this life. 1. Give bad emotions an \”anxiety nickname\”. In our usual thinking, if a child is sensitive, anxious, or doesn\’t like something, we have toKeep your children away from such things. However, behavioral psychologists believe that appropriately \”exposing\” children to this kind of anxiety or dislike can help children \”desensitize\” psychologically. For younger children, try naming anxiety. For example, if a child has social anxiety, parents can use a relaxed tone and a game to name this anxiety \”wimpy bug.\” Introduce various situations every day to prepare children mentally for defeating the \”wimpy bugs\”, such as: Parents: Chenchen, you want to join your classmates\’ games, but the \”wimpy bugs\” come out to stop you again, what should you do? Child: Hey, you wimp. Parents: Think of a way to get rid of it. Child: Let me take a deep breath first. Parents: But \”weak bugs\” are not afraid to take a deep breath. Child: Then I’ll try to say hello quietly. Parents: The \”cowardly bug\” is a little scared, but not scared enough… Such situation rehearsal can enhance the child\’s psychological quality in facing anxiety. When children are afraid, worried, or unsure of themselves, they can use this method to \”desensitize\” them. This way, when they are overwhelmed by anxiety again, they will not be impatient and go to extremes. 2. Intelligent dialogue For older children, it is necessary to focus on correcting misconceptions that cause anxiety. We can use a 3-step smart dialogue to carry out: the first step is to help the child identify misunderstandings. For example, if a child does something wrong, he may worry about parent punishment or teacher criticism. When you notice that your child is anxious, you can first encourage him to draw or write down the consequences and reasons of his worries. This is because it is often difficult for children to judge their own thinking process. This process of sorting out allows children to clearly see – why I don\’t want to go to school; why I don\’t like Teacher XX\’s class… The book uses thinking Bubbles: It seems simple, but before solving the problem, this step of sorting out is essential. The second step is Socratic Questions. Next, like \”Socrates\”, we must ask the children a series of questions about anxiety to guide them to think critically. For these questions, try not to criticize, and encourage children to think in a different way. For example, if children are worried about failing in every exam, we can inspire them with similar questions: Are you afraid of failing in the exam? Are your test scores consistent with your worries? How long has it been since this happened? How do you know you failed every time? Think about it, is this kind of worry sometimes wrong? These inspiring and collaborative questions can help children slowly get rid of their inherent thinking and re-understand objective facts. The third step is to summarize the \”golden sentences\” and summarize the results of inspiring children with short \”golden sentences\”. The shorter the better, it is best to be catchy and easy for children to remember. For example: I don’t have a crystal ball, so I can’t predict the future. My friend didn\’t say hello to me, maybe he was distracted. Anything can happen. It\’s possible, but it\’s highly unlikely. These golden sentences can make children more confident in the next things and slowly recognize the objective reality. These tips and tricks help children strengthen their psychological construction from different dimensions and help them return to objective cognition as much as possible. There is a sentence in the book that I like very much: What about depression?treat? True bravery is not about not being afraid, but about having the courage to face and try even when you are clearly afraid. The root cause of all children\’s problems actually comes from their perspective on the world. Teach your children the lesson of dealing with anxiety early, and I believe the children will benefit from it throughout their lives.