January 2022
A Piece of Advice: Do not neglect children’s mental health care!
Here we are welcoming in a new year after enjoying the Christmas holidays with family and friends. Unfortunately, though, just like last year, the entire world is not able to practice the inherited traditions of Christmas and New Year’s Eve festivities due to the Corona virus and its variants.
In Lebanon, there is no doubt we suffer from the danger of the virus, but we also suffer from the danger of collapse at all levels due to the economic and political crises that have put us under overwhelming psychological and moral pressure. The effects of the devaluation of the Lebanese pound on our daily lives is crippling. It is not easy for an entire people to feel poor and powerless!
With the new year, we go back to our work and children return to school. SKILD Center and its team start receiving children and providing support in the fields of special education, psychomotor therapy, speech therapy, and psychotherapy. The center also resumes support to students with learning difficulties in private and public partner schools.
With this post, we continue introducing friends of SKILD Center, readers, specialists, and parents to the varied topics addressed in the electronic library. We invite caretakers to benefit from advice presented in episodes under Psychological Support addressing the following issues:
Understanding Feelings; Children’s Use of Smartphones; Psychological Problems of Academic Pressure; Talking about Puberty; Bullying and Cyberbullying; Breathing and Relaxation
Techniques; The Use of Electronics; Picky Eating; Managing and Avoiding Tantrums; Quarrels between Siblings; Performance and Anxiety.
Despite a child’s development and progress, we have not yet succeeded in providing a challenge-free environment for our children. Parenting is still a heavy responsibility. We, the SKILD team, is trying to alleviate the pressure on caregivers by sharing advice in a supportive community through the mother tongue, Arabic.
Do not delay seeking professional help, because early intervention is the key to preventing serious mental illness! If issues are left to fester, psychological problems will negatively affect children’s health and will prevent them from living a normal, productive life. Signs of Psychological stress include: A change in sleeping or eating patterns; Medically unexplainable physical pain; Poor school performance; Social withdrawal; Excessive worrying; Constant anger or sadness; Aggressive behavior; Suicidal ideation or threats of self-harm.
“Parental stress has been identified as a major affecter of caregivers’ psychological well-being and a risk increaser for unwillingly placing children with disabilities in the care of others. Recognition of effective means to ease caregiving burdens must guide policymaking and will help to provide better and tailored support and intervention for the children.”
In conclusion, we at SKILD, wish you a successful new year despite all your challenges and we hope you will follow our articles in the coming months.
Why don’t you suggest topics you would like discussed in forthcoming articles? You can share your suggestions with us at the following email address mhajj@skild-org.edu
Source: Psychological well-being of caregivers of children with intellectual disabilities: Using parental stress as a mediating factor, 2011, by J. M. Cramm and A. P. Nieboer. Journal of Intellectual Disabilities, 15(2), 101–113 . DOI: 10.1177/1744629511410922
