Me and Raising a Happy Child

Questions To Ask

2015-03-03T11:31:00.001+05:30

Hiring a remodeling contractor is the best solution if you aren’t sure how to complete the job. Before you hire someone to do the work, you need to ask a few questions so that you get the best company possible in the home. You want to hire someone who will give you the best prices as well as someone who will complete the work in the shortest amount of time. Find out how long the company has been in business, and don’t be afraid to see a license for building. If the person is just someone who does the work on the side, then you won’t know if the work will get done as well as it would if the person had taken classes and become professionally licensed.

Ask about a free estimate. If there is a fee that needs to be paid up front, this might be a sign that you won’t get any money back if the work is left uncompleted after paying. Find out if you need to supply the materials or if the company will make sure the proper materials are purchased. One of the most important things to ask about is a warranty. See if the company will come back to the home to do repairs if something goes wrong after the job is completed. When you find a company you like, it's best to get a quote now before anything changes with the job.

Play Settings and Structures For Kids

2014-02-26T01:44:00.000+05:30

Parents can install fun playgrounds right in the backyard of a home. There is no need to drive to local parks just for children to enjoy some playtime on playgrounds. These days, homeowners can shop for playground structures that are sold online. Modular structures are available for quick delivery and installation anywhere on a residential property. No permits are needed in order to install modular playgrounds that are not physically attached to the ground. In fact, there is no need to make land excavations or other changes to a property when installing fun structures for children.

Playgrounds come with relatively affordable price tags because of their composition. For example, recycled plastic material is used to make these fun structures for the enjoyment of kids. Therefore, homeowners can save a lot of money when shopping for play structures that are made from completely recycled material. A consideration to start your playground is an example of creating a fun setting for children in the backyard of a house.

Slides are the most common features of playgrounds for young children. These structures are titled at a safe angle as to prevent kids from sliding down too fast and getting injured. Additionally, slides are covered with smooth surfaces to prevent injuring children. All steps and other inclined components of a playground are also inclined at minimum angles to prevent any mishaps and possible injuries. Protective barriers and rails are used in playgrounds that are elevated several feet above the ground where falling is possible.

Momo Baby Shoes

2013-10-20T04:06:00.002+05:30

Baby's first shoes are saved by mothers all across the world. Gone are the rigid, hard-soled high tops that tortured many a baby's feet in the 1950's. Those shoes were no less intimidating when they were new than when they got bronzed and showcased on the mantel! Thank goodness babies can now enjoy soft shoes crafted into cute designs made from soft materials.

Comfortable shoes don't mean they are not good for baby's feet. Think about your own feet. If the shoes pinch or are so stiff or the soles are not flexible then they aren't going to be your favorite shoes to wear. Likewise, cute shoes doesn't automatically equate to shoes that are not good for your feet. Momo Baby has dozens of baby shoes for girls or boys that allow feet to breathe and grow naturally. The shoes come adorned with cute animals or embellishments babies love like trains and flowers. Many of the designs have a variety of colors so choosing a pair is equally fun for a boy or a girl. For instance, the owl baby shoes at MomoBaby.com come in pinks, browns and neutral colors. The soft, rubber soles keep baby sturdy on his or her feet lessening the likelihood of slipping. Elastic around the ankles keep them secure on their feet. Treat your baby and yourself to to several pairs for several days of fun!

Times of Special Stress

2013-05-14T17:29:00.001+05:30

All parents want their children to be happy and carefree, protected from the world’s hurts and disappointments. But events sometimes turn the lives of children topsy-turvy in ways that leave them, baffled, uneasy, perhaps deeply troubled. These disturbances, as discussed on the following pages, may rang from such seemingly innocuous situations as moving to a new house to serious occurrences like divorce or the death of someone the child loves. Children are hit particularly hard by such events because they involve loss and change, two experiences that threaten the security youngsters derive from stable and routine living patterns. Another factor disturbing to the child is lack of control over what is happening. It is the parents, not the child, who decide whether to move, whether to have another baby, whether to divorce. No one consults the child about these important decisions. She is left feeling helpless in addition to feeling upset. Doubtless the parents, too, are distracted and worried by the same problems at the same time, in some cases coping with emotions even more intense than those the child experiences. Nonetheless, caring parents will try to ease the pain and reduce the damage these crises can inflict. By understanding the emotional effects of such events and showing your child how to deal with them, you will help prepare him for the inevitable future disappointments and tragedies of life. Learning to survive a negative experience will make your child stronger.

The Feelings Revealed in Children’s Art

2013-03-07T08:16:00.000+05:30

For 35 years, one of the children’s art specialists has been collecting the art of young children and using it to explore the interior world of childhood feelings. Her collection, sampled on these pages, shows the amazing range of information about a child’s state of mind that the youngster’s art can yield. Painting and drawing come as naturally to young children as speaking. The act if guiding a crayon or paintbrush across paper not only is fun, it is a satisfying means of self-expression as well. Art lets children communicate feelings their limited vocabulary can not convey-hopes and fears, pleasures and anxieties and opinions. But the messages, as in all art, are given in code and may be hard to decipher.

A picture’s real meaning often lies beyond its subject matter and technique. Young children tend to draw the same things-houses, trees, people, vehicles, animals, the sun and to draw in similar ways. They also typically exaggerate and distort, production bodies with limbs too long or fingers too numerous. Generally, the best guide to a picture’s meaning is the child’s own commentary. The remarks here were prompted by questions from the teachers in whose classes the drawings were made. Significantly, the questions were never as direct as “What are you drawing?” or “Is this a house?” - but rather, “Would you like to tell me something about this painting?” Children who decline such invitations to explain, however, should never be pushed. It is far more important to let a child enjoy the immediate pleasure of creation than to discover what the picture may mean.

Auto Insurance

2013-03-06T18:23:00.000+05:30

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Imaginary Friends

2013-02-01T11:49:00.000+05:30

When called to account for being naughty, some children pass the blame on to an imaginary playmate. The existence of such a ‘‘friend’’ may come as a surprise to you, but be assured that it is quite normal for children between the ages of two and five to invent such companions. The child may imagine the playmate as another child, an adult, an animal or even favorite toy or blanket come to life. It is not clear why some children have these friends while others do not. In most causes, the child is aware at some level that the friend is only pretend. Unless your child becomes dependent on an imaginary companion to the exclusion of human relationships, do not worry. If it reaches that point, however, ask your pediatrician for advice.

Children assign many roles to imaginary playmates, and by paying close attention to the reported antics and pronouncements of such as character, you may gain some insight into your child’s state of mind. Sometime the playmate provides an emotional outlet, voicing fears or hostilities for the child. Other playmates do naughty things that rest parental limits, allowing the child to watch mother’s reaction from a safe distance. For the child who is trying to learn self-control, an imaginary playmate may serve as a jiminy cricket-like conscience. And in many cases the character is nothing more than a reliable companion.

For you, however, an imaginary friend may be more of an exercise in patience. Usually the best strategy is to accept your child’s fantasy without encouraging it. Let her know that you realize the friend is make-believe and that you understand the fun of pretending. Punishing your child or ridiculing her fantasy may only encourage her to hide the companion. Imaginary friends are generally developed to fulfill a particular need. When that need is satisfied, the playmate will disappear. Like other expressions of the child’s imagination, a fantasy friend helps her explore new territory along the path to emotional maturity.

Tall Tales

2013-01-30T11:47:00.000+05:30

During this period, a child’s stories may take on the characteristics of a tall tale. The child will claim to have accomplished an incredible feat - she rode her tricycle a million miles. If challenged, she may indignantly proclaim that it is not just a story, it is true. There is usually no harm in just acknowledging the story and letting it to at that. At times you might gently interject some reality – it may not have been a million miles on the trike, but it was farther than yesterday. This lets her know you understand her tale and that you take it for what it is worth.

Sometimes, however, your child may tell what you consider to be an outright lie. Here again, you will often need to exercise restraint. ‘‘Lie’’ is too wrong a word for the transparent fibs that small child tells. Children generally fib only to protect themselves from punishments and, since the line between fantasy and reality is so easily blurred, your child may actually believe she was not at fault. In dealing with his type of behavior, it is usually more constructive to forgo punishment and instead to talk with the child, emphasizing your appreciation for honesty. In this way you will teach her that she has little to fear in taking responsibility for her actions.

Story telling skills

2013-01-28T11:42:00.000+05:30

Like other forms of fantasy, children’s stories reflect their experiences, fears, emotions and desires. Your tow or three year old may attempt to tell a story using phrases and short sentences, but he can only sustain it with much questioning and prompting from you.

By the age of four, your child will pick up conventional storytelling devices such as “Once upon a time and “the end,” and he may become more fluent in telling a tale. This age is the imaginative peak for children’s stories. The action is seldom bound by reality, and the story settings may be wildly exotic. You can encourage storytelling by reading to your child regularly. New characters, situations and locations from books become fuel for his own stories.

While the plots of young children’s tales often involve eating, sleeping and the appearance of a kindly figure, violence is far and away the predominant theme. You are likely to hear a great deal about struggles with monsters, children getting spanked, stolen food death, killing and crashing. Although such stories may make you rather uncomfortable, remember that they are usually a child’s way of dealing with fears or feelings of aggression. And they give you a perfect opportunity to talk through such concerns with your youngster as the two of you discuss the gorier details of the story line.

A child’s humor

2013-01-26T11:40:00.000+05:30

Pretend play also helps in less serious matters. By finding humor in play, a child releases tension and reclaims that elusive sense of personal power. Your child probably loves to catch you making a silly mistake. For a moment, she can feel smarter than you. In the same vein, a child delights in mimicking your authoritative voice and manner. Even just acting silly herself – making mistakes on purpose, falling down or pretending to be clumsy – can allow the child to feel more in control.

Two other subjects that many children like to laugh about are sexual differences and bathroom matters. This kind of humor may drive you to distraction, but it seems to help relieve a child’s anxieties about these issues. In egging each other on to yet another toilet joke, children fin a sense of camaraderie among peers sharing the same uncertain feelings. And by finding amusement in a subject that began as a worry, the child learns a lesson in optimism.

The uses of pretend play

2013-01-01T11:36:00.000+05:30

The most common form of childhood fantasy is pretend play. A child’s first attempts at pretending are usually simple imitation. At about 15 to 18 months, the child may “drink” from an empty cup or pretend to go to sleep. But once he is able to use symbols in his thinking, the youngster may pretend there is a cup when none exists or pretend to lay a doll down to sleep.

Between two and three years old, your child will begin to build make believe games around real experiences such as shopping trips and television conversations. At this age, children are exploring their sexual identities. If you see your child alternate between male and female roles, do not be alarmed. Many children experiment in this way to learn what sex differences mean. Beyond the age of three, the child begins to identify more strongly with the parent of the same sex and most often emulated that role.

By the age of five or six, the child is more interested in people outside the home, and you will see the role playing become more realistic and complex. Now a number of characters may take part in the same story. Police, fireman, ambulance drivers and helicopters pilots may all be called in to help in an imagined disaster.

Pretend play will often focus on your child’s awareness of his place in the world. Children have little control over their lives, yet their desire for control is great. By playing superhero, monster or wizard, your child creates a scene where he is the master. By acting the part of a school crossing guard, the child gets to tell Mom and Dad when to stop. Children crave such reversals.

Youngsters also pretend play to help them understand troubling experiences. When a new sibling arrives, for example, watch your older child’s play for clues about feelings. She may express anger and jealously by scolding or spanking a doll – or by throwing it across the room. The child probably knows that she could never treat the baby that way. But acting out a fantasy like this releases built-up tension and lets a child find out how it feels to give way to emotions. It is probably best not to interfere at such a moment. But afterward, ask the child to talk about what is bothering her, and sympathetically explain the reality of the situation if it is something – like a new baby – that cannot be changed.

Unpleasant memories and fears can sometimes be mastered through fantasy. Children who are frightened by animals or who develop a fear of doctors sometimes switch roles and pretend to be object of their fears. By assuming an active role in the drama and replaying real or imaginary scenes, the child takes control of the situation. You can encourage such play by providing the props – puppets, dolls, a toy doctor’s kit or some fanciful clothes to dress up in.

When imagination develops!

2012-12-17T01:01:00.001+05:30

Babies are not born with fully developed powers of imagination. In the infant and early toddler stages, their understanding of the world is based-solely on direct interaction with the people and things around them. Then, usually at about 18 months, a child develops the ability to form mental images and, as her vocabulary expands, to give these images names. Now that she is able to like her knowledge to symbols – to create and name a mental image of a boat and how it works, for example – the child begins to combine objects and ideas in creative ways. She uses one object represent another: A bar of soap floating in the bath becomes a boat crossing a pond. Emotions, too, come into play. The child imagines a doll as a new baby to be fed and loved.

Fantasy becomes the child’s tool for exploring the adult world and, by trail and error, for finding a place in that world. The child is constantly seeking ways to assimilate new experiences into her picture of reality. Confused by the differences between male and female, a little girl may announce that she is a boy and try to sample life from that perspective. Troubled by feelings of anger or aggression, a boy may shout “Bang! Bang!” and lure his father into a make believe fight. Imagination also provides the opportunity to fulfill a wish, to be in control or just to hold onto good feelings for a while longer.

Nightterror Part.II

2012-12-02T17:03:00.000+05:30

All you can really do for night terrors is making sure that the child does not hurt herself. Remove toys from the floor around her bed so that she does not trip if she sleepwalks. Do not try to wake the child up. That will usually just agitate her more and prolong the episode. If she wants to be held or comforted, then do so, but do not force your help on her. After a brief period, she will simply settle back to sleep.

Children of any may enjoy an elaborate fantasy life as a normal and healthy part their development, but fantasy plays a particularly vital role in the years between two and five. Almost any exercise in imagination – whether it is pretend play, humor, an imaginary friend, a tall tale or even an outright lie-may, at bottom, be part of the child’s effort to understand the world and learn how to behave. Remember that there is a big difference in the way you see reality and the way a young child sees it: Toddlers and preschoolers are still learning to distinguish between what is real and what they have imagined.

Most of your child’s fantasies will be make – believe games. The child feeds a toy bears with an empty spoon or dresses up and marches of “to work”. But you may also see pretend behavior that it disturbingly aggressive. What do you do when your child spins out yarns about murdering the new baby? And you will definitely see behavior that, while not disturbing, is perplexing and demands a response. How should you react when your little girl keeps shooting your with a banana? Should you be concerned when your little boy prefers to dress up like Mama or jokes endlessly about “poo-poo”? Strange as it may seem, any of this behavior may be part of your child’s learning process.

Night Terrors Part.I

2012-11-30T17:01:00.000+05:30

Some children have more nightmares than others, and frequency of bad dreams is not necessarily cause for alarm. It is not unusual for a child to experience nightmares for several nights in a row, followed by several nights of calm sleep. But recurrent nightmares may indicate that the youngster is having difficulty adjusting to a trauma, such as and accidents are to stress in the family. One other possibility to consider is a medical condition called apnea, in which the child’s breathing, is interrupted, causing him to awake frequently. The disorientation and fright that accompany this wakening may easily be confused with a nightmare. If your child has prolonged and repeated nightmares, you should consult your physician.

Night terrors are much less common than nightmares and are often mistaken for bad dreams, although the two experiences are quite different (Box, right). The name ‘‘night terrors’’ is somewhat misleading, since the child will not always be terrify. He may scream or thrash about, but he may also talk quite calmly, sleepwalk or just stare into space. Parents frequently describe their child as looking possessed during such as episode. Because night terrors occur in the deepest stage of non-REM sleep, the youngster never fully wakes up even if he becomes very agitated.

Night terrors tend to run in families. Researches believe that they are related to quirks in a child’s awakening mechanism: Instead of shifting smoothly from deepest non-REM sleep to the dream state of REM, the child partially rouses. But night terrors do happen more often when a youngster is very tried, so their occurrence can also tell you that your child needs more sleep.

One of the real problems in helping a child who is having night terrors is that it is not always obvious just what is happening. You may be groggy yourself and assume that the youngster is simply distraught from a nightmare. Keep in mind that night terrors most often occur in the first four hours of bedtime, when the child is most tried and spends more time in the deeper stages of sleep. Nightmares generally occur in the latter half of the sleep period, especially in the hours near dawn when REM sleep prevails.

Nightmares

2012-11-28T16:53:00.002+05:30

    Although nightmares represent only a small percentage of children’s dreams, they may seem more prevalent than is actually the case if they frighten your young sleeper into waking, crying and rousing the entire household. Researchers believe that all children have bad dreams, probably beginning in their second year, but that the earliest such dreams are infrequent and very simple. A two –year –old, for example, may relive a frightening experience such as getting stung by a bee.

   Nightmares are more commonly experienced by children from three to six years of age. Fevers and certain types of medication sometimes provoke scary dreams, but in most cases nightmares are brought on by the fears and other normal emotional concerns that arise from the developmental changes of early childhood. For example, a three year-old child struggling with new found feelings of anger and aggression may project these negative feelings as frightening imaginary monsters that threaten him in dreams. Certain stressful experiences can cause daytime feelings of jealousy and rebellion that may surface during sleep as nightmares. A youngster who has a new brother or sister may find that his hostile feelings toward the baby are turned in upon himself in his dreams.

    He may envision beings chased by someone big and threatening, or being left alone by the side of a desolate highway. These nightmares seem utterly real to children and often cause them to awake in a panic. It rarely will soothe a child to tell her that a nightmare was not real or that it was only a dream. Real or not, it genuinely frightened your child, and she needs your sympathy and support. The best thing you can do is to hold her close and talk to her in a calm, reassuring tone of voice. Let the youngster know that you will always take care of her and protect her. Stay with her if she is afraid to go to sleep. It is not wise to make a habit of lying down with the child or taking her to your bed. But sometimes a story, favorite toy or simply a night light will help the youngster get back to sleep.

   With older children, it sometimes helps to talk about the dream the day after. You might encourage a five or six year old child to act out the drama and to think of ways to overcome the things that frightened her. Though this may not alleviate the specific fear that caused the bad dream, it may reduce the child’s anxiety about nightmares.

How children's dream evolve

2012-11-23T19:30:00.000+05:30

The nature of a child’s dream life generally mirrors his overall pattern of mental and emotional development throughout the early years. True dreaming seems to begin between the ages of 18 and 24 months, after the child develops the ability to form mental images. If you could enter the world of your toddler’s dreams, you would find it a rather one dimensional place, visited here and there by static images of the things the child has seen during the day. You might see animals – most likely farm animals or small species such as monkeys, squirrels and birds. Researchers studying the dream experiences of youngsters three years of age and older speculate that young children portray themselves as such animals in their dreams because they cannot yet envision their self portraits in human form – and, perhaps, because they identify with the impulsive behavior of small creatures they see out-of-doors. At this stage, too, children’s dreams frequently appear to be influenced by physical states such as thirst, hunger or fatigue, which may combine with animal imagery to produce dreams of small creatures drinking, eating or sleeping.

Early dreams involve very little dramatic or social interaction, and the settings are vague and nondescript. But as children reach the age of five or six, their dreams become more sophisticated, in parallel with their mental development. Story lines grow more complex and are less influenced by the child’s bodily states. Now when a child dreams about food, the eating takes place in a social context. Animals still appear frequently – sometimes dressing and behaving as people – but family members are portrayed as well, and there is increased interaction between the characters in a child’s dreams. The faces of strangers, sometimes frightening ones, may also appear in the dreams of a five-year-old. Researchers believe that these may simply be failed attempts at constructing more familiar characters. Recreation and play are dominant themes, and settings are more specific: Buildings and landscapes that are a part of the child’s waking life now appear in dreams.

The dreaming stage of sleep!

2012-11-21T19:23:00.000+05:30

In addition to sleeping longer hours, children up to the age of five spend a proportionately large amount of their sleeping time in the light stage of slumber known as REM asleep-named for the ‘‘rapid eye movement’’ beneath closed lids that characterizes the stage. This is the part of the sleep cycle in which most dreaming occurs, as opposed to the deeper, non-REM stage. Newborns spend up to half of their sleep time in the REM state, with the proportion of REM sleep decreasing gradually as the child grows older.

Much remains to be understood about children’s dreams. In fact, no one knows for sure whether infants and very young children really have dreams at all, since children under the age of two do not have sufficient language skills to describe such experiences. Sings that infants experience REM sleep are obvious. They twitch their eyes, kick their feet, such, smile and grimace in slumber. Some experts argue that this is not necessarily proof of dreaming. They speculate that the child’s brain, like a computer running a program, is simply rehearsing reflexes for actions like sucking, smiling or moving the arms and legs. Others believe that the REM sleep activities are indeed physical reactions to primitive dreams about sensory experiences.

What is clear is that when a child first begins dreaming, bits and pieces of recollected dream images lap over into her daytime consciousness and become mixed up with real experiences. Consequently, your preschooler may ask questions about unfamiliar people and events that you cannot possibly answer, because they refer to things that took place in her dreams. These seemingly nonsensical questions may be the first clue parents have that their child has indeed begun to dream.

Dreams and Nightmares

2012-11-18T19:20:00.000+05:30

Dreams and nightmares loom larger in a child’s emotional life than in an adult’s. The reason is simple: Young children need more sleep than older people do so they have more time to dream moreover children may be confused and disturbed by their earliest dreams- which are isolated images quite unlike the complex pageants of grownups’ dreams-because they cannot understand where these images come from. To a three-years-old, a dream experience may seem as real as anything that happens in daytime life.

While the great majority of a youngster’s dream images are pleasant or at least neutral in feeling, it is perfectly natural for him to suffer an occasional nightmare whenever the normal stresses of growing up spill over from his waking hours. It is these few unpleasant experiences-scary dreams of monsters and other threats-that will usually demand your attention in the middle of the night.

You may also have to see your child through a rather unusual sleep disturbance called a night terror, during which the youngster may appear to be wide awake and reacting fearfully to a nightmare, but in fact is still deeply asleep and unaware of what is happening. These mid sleep dramas aside, most young children are able to take their dream adventures in stride.

Fear and Causes to concern

2012-11-04T01:58:00.000+05:30

In extreme cases, a child’s fears may be so intense that they interfere with his daily activities. A youngster who has an obsessive fear of insects, for example, may balk at going outside and can make life difficult for himself and the entire family. If common sense tells you that your child’s fear is unusually severe or long-lived, then it is time to seek professional help for this problem. For the most part, however, you will find that young children’s fears are as fleeting as they are varied.

You can help your child to be less fearful generally by encouraging him to be as independent as his age and his abilities allow. It is only natural to want to protect your youngster against potential danger and frightening situations, but keep in mind that children need opportunities to develop a sense of competence and self-reliance. Meeting their fears head on gives them that kind of opportunity. Eventually, experience is the child’s greatest weapon against fear. He learns that though his parents leave him, or a jackhammer startles him, or shadows play on his bedroom wall, in the end nothing bad really happens to him at all.

Fear of Strangers

2012-10-29T00:17:00.000+05:30

A threatened sense of security, in fact, underlies many childhood dears. A child’s first predictable anxiety - a fear of strangers – surfaces midway through her first year. Before this time, a baby will smile at anyone. But by about six months, her mental development enables her to distinguish between familiar and unfamiliar faces. Because the unfamiliar ones tend to leave her confused and uncertain, she may cry or try to hide her face when a stranger – even a close relative – approaches. The best way to minimize this fear is to expose your child early on to a variety of people.

Another security-related fear that arises at about this time is the child’s fear of being left by her parents – a development often referred to as “separation anxiety” or “separation protest.” It begins around the age of seven months, at first as a simple mental awareness that a familiar parental figure has disappeared from the scene. Later expressions of separation anxiety are more related to the child’s deepening emotional attachment to her parents: Distress at being apart form these primary suppliers of love and security, even for brief periods, usually emerges at around 18 months and may continue until the child is three years of age.

How Children cope with fear

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Despite their vulnerability to fears, children may develop a surprising array of psychological strategies for dealing with their own anxieties. You may notice your youngster, for example, going through a superhero phase of pretend play between the ages of three and five, when imagined fears tend to proliferate. Constantly reminded of their smallness and lack of control over events, children of this age often play the all powerful hero in their fantasy games as a way of fending off the fantasy villains that threaten them.

Other children try to overcome fears by experimenting with the source. For example, a child who is fearful of being flushed down then toilet may try to flush a toy down the drain. Mommy may find it annoying to have to retrieve a sopping wet toy from the toilet bowl, but the child’s reaction is quite the opposite: he feels reassured to see that the toy does not really disappear.

A youngster may also become quite strongly attracted to an object that he once feared, in an instinctive attempt to desensitize himself. If he was afraid of dogs, the child may suddenly stop to admire every dog that he sees. And may children use rituals as a method of holding their fears in check. A child who grows anxious and upset at the approach of bedtime is often comforted by a familiar routine – listening to a story, brushing teeth, then being tucked in and kissed goodnight – because it reinforces his sense of security.

The role of Imagination

2012-10-23T23:04:00.000+05:30

But the main reason for an increase in irrational fears after 18 months is the child’s awakening imagination, which begins to intermingle with such emotions as anger and jealousy. These strong feelings often find expression in fears of imaginary enemies, such as robbers, monsters and bogeymen. The toddler may refuse to stay in a room by himself, or he may demand that objects like scary masks or stuffed animals be put somewhere out of sight.

Fears arising from his imagination reach a peak between the ages of three and five. Struggling to distinguish between real and make-believe, children of this age often invent fantastic explanations for things they do not understand, and in the process, they may assign human feelings and motives to inanimate objects.

In the movie The Wizard of Oz, an apple tree gets angry and hits Dorothy when she picks an apple. A scarecrow talks with a lion and a mean lady turns into a witch. To a three year old, all this is quite believable. And because of a young child’s egocentric view of the world – his tendency to see himself as the pivotal player in every event – he imagines how all this might affect him. It may be a natural step for him to go from watching the movie fantasy to worrying that a witch or a tree might attack him in his own backyard.

Children also acquire fears through experience. A child who has been stung by a bee may fear all insects, just as one who can remember a painful inoculation may cringe at the mere mention of the doctor’s office. Fears can be triggered as well by abrupt changes in the family situation, such as the birth of a new sister or brother, or the divorce of the parents.

From your perspective as an adult, it is not always easy to anticipate the impact of the things that your child sees and hears. Realistic scenes of violence on television are a case in point. A preschooler who laughs in delight as Saturday morning cartoon characters get flattened and “ker-boomed” might react quite differently to a dramatized gun battle between humans or to news coverage of a car bombing. The child might jump to the conclusion that such live-action disasters could happen to him. As you think about appropriate viewing guidelines for your family, remember that the moving images and dramatic sounds of television make it an extremely vivid medium for a small child.

Occasionally, even the words and expressions you use in casual conversation may spark fears in your child, whose grasp of the language is not as sophisticated as yours. When you offhandedly say “May boss is going to kill me,” your youngster might take the statement at face value and start to worry that your life is really in danger.

Why children have fear

2012-10-22T23:01:00.000+05:30

All human beings feel fear at times; it is an innate reaction to potential danger, part of the human instinct for survival. And because babies and young children are so dependent on others for their security, they are prone to many more fears than adults.

A child expresses certain basic kinds of car long before she can talk. An infant, for example, will startle or cry when she hears a loud noise or feels like she is falling. As children grow older, more complex anxieties arise naturally from rapid changes in their emotional make-up and their expanding perception of the world around them.

Children’s interest in their environment increases as they enter their sound year of life, but their feeling of security is easily shaken by new experiences. They may be particularly skittish about sudden, unfamiliar sounds, such as the vacuum cleaner, passing fire engines or barking dog. During the toddler stage, a child’s fears seem to grow more ill-founded rather than less so. Partly this is because of her immature sense of spatial relationships and the child’s distorted sense of her own size in relation to the size of the thing around her. The youngster may display a fear of the toilet or the bath that is based on a concern about somehow being sucked down the drain.

Fears and Fantasies Part.II

2012-10-21T22:57:00.000+05:30

Baffling as such developments may be to parents, this age of flourishing imagination is essential to a child’s well-being. Unfettered fantasy is the magical language of childhood: It helps the youngster adjust to the demands and frustrations of the real world by sheltering him from it. More importantly, it gives him the daring to explore. And imagining what can be is the first step toward true creativity – that uniquely human gift that your child will carry with him always.

Fears big and small are a universal fact of early childhood – probably unavoidable even for the securest of children. Your youngster may voice anxieties as farfetched as “Are monsters real, Mommy?” or as logical as “Will the doctor give me a shot?” The thing to remember is that any worry, however silly it may seem to a grownup, can be quite real and utterly daunting to a young child. As you offer your youngster reassurance and comfort at such times, you should try to do so without using the words “There’s nothing to be afraid of.” To the child, there certainly is.

Many common childhood fears, such as the fear of strangers and fear of the toilet, result from developmental changes and therefore appear at certain ages. These fears wax and wane and sometimes reappear at later stages, but in general, children simply outgrow them. By and large, if you let your child know that strong and loving adults are watching out for his welfare, this will provide the security he needs to overcome the passing fears of childhood.

Fears and Fantasies Part.I

2012-10-20T22:53:00.001+05:30

For the first few years of life, children’s thought processes resemble those of our primitive ancestors: Youngsters are powerfully affected by invisible feelings and ephemeral images, but they cannot understand where these sensations come from. With their limited knowledge, young children find just about everything around them potentially scary. Until their mental abilities have matured enough to distinguish the real from the unreal, the external from the internal, youngsters are naturally susceptible to some degree of confusion and distress.

A child’s imaginative life begins to quicken around the time he turns two, a result of his newly acquired ability to create independent ideas on his own. Suddenly the youngster is the possessor of an entire kingdom of images that exist solely within hid mind: Side by side with the external realities of feeding and dressing, of riding in the car and playing with toys, the child now is contending daily with such illusory complexities as bears under his bed, monsters that chase him in his sleep and “friends” that are visible to him alone. At the same time, the child is struggling to sort out an inner world of intense feelings. Strong impulses that he will one day know by such names as jealousy and love and anger now strike him only as powerful sensations over which he has no control. These and other emotions, half-formed and only vaguely understood, blend with fantasy to create a host of fears and anxieties.