Jay, my son, has been quite a handful lately. Not wanting to study, refusing to shower at the normal time, being overly aggressive when asked to do something. Refusing and becoming upset at the slightest things. I had no idea what was going on. Then my wife, SO, shed light on his strange behaviour.
He was coming up to exams, and he was getting stressed out about it. It wasn’t something I’d expected. He’s only 8 after all, how bad could exam pressure be at that age? But this seems to be a growing trend, children are being put under a lot of pressure to perform in exams at younger and younger ages. They’re told that what they do now will affect the rest of their lives. And we parents are only adding to this by how we encourage them.
I thought I was being encouraging, but I’m starting to wonder if my encouragement has been given with a mixed message. I may be telling Jay that I’ll be proud of him, no matter how much he scores, as long as he does his best. But does my behaviour reinforce or contradict that message. Could I be telling him, unconsciously, that I expect him to be perfect? It’s something that I do need to watch and be more aware of, how I react can be a stronger message than my words.
Which leads us to communication. To find out what Jay is thinking and feeling, I need to have an open communication with him where he can tell me what the problem is, even if it’s me. This is something I most definitely have to work on. With SO he already does this, many times he’s waited to talk to her when she gets home. I, on the other hand, am the friend, the person he plays games with, it’s always more about having fun than being a support and confidant.
In line with this, I need to be a good listener. The irony is, in general I am a good listener. I’ve lost count of how many times people have confided their deepest hurts to me throughout my life. But with Jay I fall into the trap of only listening so far as to get him to do what I want. I have to remember to listen for listening sake, and put my agenda aside so that I can be a better father for him.
As a trained counsellor, I was taught to empathise with people. Now I have to remember to use that same skill with Jay and stop trying to be a problem solver. Most of the time that’s what anyone needs. We don’t want a solution, we just want an ear to listen to us. And this is what I need to be for my son.
Sure there are times when he will want, or need, help with finding a solution, but to reach that point we need to listen first. It’s like I’ve told new psychology students, we need to sit down, shut up, and listen. Of course, when I say shut up, I don’t mean to remain totally silent. We need to reflect and summarise what the other person is telling us so that they know we are listening and understand.
An example of this would be to say, “So, you’re feeling [X Emotion] because [Event or Reason]. Is that right?” It seems so easy, but trust me it takes work to get it to sound authentic.
There are probably a lot more things I can do to help Jay with his stress and anxiety over exams, and I’d love to hear how other parents deal with this. Please let me know in the comments below how you handle your child’s stress.