How To Take Care Of Your Emotional Well-being While Raising Your Child
The process of raising and educating children is a set of activities that demand a lot from us both physically and psychologically; However, that does not mean that as parents we should limit ourselves to giving up all our well-being to achieve these kinds of goals.
Taking care of ourselves continues to be essential, and it will also allow us to give the little ones all the support and protection they need. during childhood and adolescence.
How to enhance our psychological well-being as parents with children?
Follow these tips and guidelines to prevent situations in which raising the youngest members of the house ends up wearing down your emotional well-being.
1. Apply fixed and clear rules of coexistence
Establish clear “rules of the game” regarding what can and cannot be done at home, and the responsibilities of each person, It is key to avoid creating a chaotic environment at home, which exposes us more to stress and frustration. This includes adults and also the little ones, although for the latter it is necessary that the rules be few and very simple, according to their capacity for abstract thinking.
Thus, the rules that young boys and girls must comply with must be very clear and refer to situations and activities that are easy to recognize. And of course, you have to lead by example: showing that everyone follows those rules is more effective than simply repeating over and over again what those rules are.
Get the little ones involved in household chores (to the extent of their abilities and their leisure time needs allow it) It is the best way to make them respect those rules. This will not only save some of the work for the elderly; In addition, it is good for their development.
If they are very young and cannot yet collaborate in a meaningful way by carrying out household chores, encourage them to participate in a symbolic way starting with their own self-care: adopting measures to play at home safely and without exposing themselves to risks, following certain guidelines to mess less, etc.
3. Make sure you have quality time for your partner
If you have a partner, It is important that you take measures to prevent parenting from taking up absolutely all of your time. to the point that you cannot dedicate hours a week to maintaining the emotional bond between the two of you. To do this, it is advisable to design a schedule and take a global view of the time you have throughout the week; That way it will be easy to make the necessary reorganizations to optimize the use you give to those hours.
4. Make time for yourself
In the same way that your relationship deserves to have its moments and places of intimacy, you must also be able to have moments for yourself. Remember that it is not simply about feeling good “disconnecting” from the world of tasks to be done, but rather It is something necessary to maintain your psychological well-being, something that will have a positive impact on the way you raise and educate your children.
These techniques are varied but for the most part they are simple and easy to apply at home, without having to buy expensive materials.
Some of them focus on controlled breathing using the diaphragm, and others focus more on the activation and relaxation of muscle groups in the body. For example, you can start by trying the technique called Jacobson’s progressive muscle relaxation. You can dedicate the last part of the day to this type of exercises because in this way you will also be preventing problems when falling asleep.
6. Practice Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a useful tool to prevent the appearance of recurring painful emotions in contexts of certain stress, among other things because it helps to leave behind psychological rumination and thoughts that generate anxiety.
7. Practice exercise
Leaving the domestic context for something other than work is especially necessary in the case of fathers and mothers with young children. The ideal is to opt for aerobic exercise, preferably in environments surrounded by nature. to disconnect and breathe fresh air (which, by the way, also has psychologically beneficial effects in terms of mental agility, according to various research).
