How to Understand Natural Stresses in a Child
Each age has its natural stresses or we can call it Children Development Stage Symptoms, but there are certain age related physical or psychological symptoms that crop up regularly. By recognizing them as normal, transitory signs of development, parent can avoid setting them up as problem areas.
Knowing and Understanding Natural Stresses in a First Year
• Colic and crying-normally two-three hours per day in the first three months
• Spitting up after feedings
• Thumb- or finger sucking
• Infrequent bowel movement in a breastfed baby
• Constipation-hard bowel movements which can be softened by changes in diet
• Waking at night just prior to developmental spurts
• Feeding refusals associated with wanting to feed self at 8 months or so
Knowing and Understanding Natural Stresses in a Second Year
• Feeding aberrations-refusing one food after another, eating only one meal a day
• Temper tantrums and breath-holding spells
• Withholding stools and problems around toilet training-usually from training instituted too early and too much
• Pressure to conform
Knowing and Understanding Natural Stresses in a Fourth to Sixth Year
• Headaches or sick stomachs in boys just before school
• Bellyaches in girls
• Tics, masturbation, lying, stealing, fears, and nightmares, especially in boys as they develop aggressive feelings they can’t handle during the day
• Transient periods of bed wetting (enuresis) in boys
Knowing and Understanding Natural Stresses in a Early School Years
• Overreaction to illness, to injury
• Using illness to substitute for school fears
• Constipation
• Occasional bed wetting during illness or hospitalization
• Headaches due to tension
• Stomachaches due to tension
Knowing and Understanding Natural Stresses in a Adolescence
• Lack of appetite or anorexia
• Overeating
• Delayed onset of menstruation
• Concern about body image, associated with early or delayed development
Many of the symptoms named above are surprisingly common as children develop. They often become of concern to the child himself. If parents add their own overreaction, they are redoubling anxiety in the child. Children are able to handle their own concern, but not that of their parent’s. If parent block communication by, for example, being overly strict or punitive, the child may settle on the physical complaint as a safe way of getting attention or otherwise dealing with the adult.
When the child expresses concern about a symptom, there is a fine line between the possibility of the parent’ overlooking a possibly serious disorder or neglecting the child’s genuine needs or, on the other hand, taking it too seriously and emphasizing its value in his mind. When a child has paint, parents must first make sure it isn’t serious. They then can reassure the child, both by their attitude and by their having checked it out that he needn’t be over concerned either. If it is ignored, the child may have to try harder to get the parents’ attention.
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