It is our goal at The Fearless Campaign to educate, advocate and bring awareness to mental health issues with a focus on prevention. This goal also include our school aged children. The pandemic has impacted the adults in a way that has crippled our country. The deaths, job losses, civil unrest and uncertainty has caused great mental strife. One additional residual effect of a global pandemic has been school closures. The school closures have been instrumental in helping reduce the curve of Covid 19. However, a stat many are unaware of is 1 in 5 students have a mental health issue that keeps them from learning. If that’s not alarming enough, keep in mind that this statistic is before the pandemic. Now, many months into the pandemic, our kids are increasingly at risk for anxiety, depression and other ailments. It will be especially important to monitor our children during this holiday season. Kids are resilient but still need love and stability to help with the natural maturation process. The Fearless Campaign is providing a few things that could help the navigate the anxiety of kids during the holiday season.
· Allow child to call friends and family on a scheduled occurrence
· Have a hot chocolate and movie night
· Parents can view these challenges as an opportunity for learning and growth. The kids will feed off your energy. The positive and negative.
· How understanding the “porcupine and turtle” concepts can help your child with emotional self-regulation over the holidays
· A simple art activity that can head off challenges over expectations before they arise
· Practical ways to infuse a gratitude practice in your family culture i.e. preparing grandmother’s cake for a neighbor and the importance of love etc
· The importance not just of self-care, but self-compassion for parents