Backbone and Bounce: Building Resilience

What can parents do to help their children bounce back under adversity, with a basic sense of confidence in themselves in spite of difficult circumstances? And when a parent has a child that collapses when things are difficult, what can be done to foster resilience?

In a sense, these are perhaps the key questions of parenting! During any ten-year period, I would venture to guess that in the lives of most families, at least one genuine crisis will develop, or ongoing difficulties will grind toward the unworkable stage. And though we work hard to prevent it, our children will be hurt by these crises, and will need a reservoir of inner confidence in themselves to come through well.

So how do we build resilience? Studies have shown that if just one person in a child's life is consistently supportive, a child is much more likely to overcome difficult circumstances. Just one person who is enthusiastic about the child. Just one person who lights up when the child walks into the room. Feeling close to one dependable adult is at the heart of resilience for children.

We parents love our children deeply, but sometimes our communication with them gets muddled. Disapproval, impatience, or indifference clouds our interactions with our children when we're overloaded. We have to play many roles with them--sleep monitor, cleanliness checker, homework prodder, educational guide, the list goes on! And as we juggle those roles, our ability to feel our hearts lift when they walk in the door can wilt.

Dedicate Time and Enthusiasm

Special Time is a simple way to remind our children that we love them. It works especially well when there are persistent irritants in our relationship with them, because it disciplines us, the parents, to be pleased with them for a specific period of time. I call Special Time a "listening tool" because it's a reliable tool for putting us parents in the "listening," accepting, and enthusiastic role, so that our children can tell that we're behind them.

To do Special Time, you set aside a period of time, short or long, whatever you can carve from your day or week. You say, "Hey, tomorrow I'm going to have 1/2 hour after dinner, and we can do whatever you want to do! Think about it, and we'll make it a date!" (If you have older children, you need to set conditions around whether or not you have transportation to go somewhere, and whether or not you will spend money, and how much.) Then, you enthusiastically go with whatever activity your child chooses. Jumping on beds, building a fort in the living room, making pancakes, going outside and playing catch, lighting a whole box of matches one by one in the back yard…whatever they've chosen, you love them, make lots of eye contact, touch them affectionately, and energetically throw yourself into the play. Set a timer, and don't let anything short of an earthquake interrupt your focus on your child. When the timer goes off, let your child know you loved being with him, and let him know when the next Special Time will be.