Being a parent means thinking of the well being of your child, no matter what their age is. Even if they are full adults, we worry about their health, relationships, careers, financial situation and overall wellbeing.
Just recently, a study has concluded that many parents are still worrying and losing sleep even though their children are adults.
The study conducted by Amber J. Seidel of Penn. State University analyzed the relationship between parent’s worry over their children, and their sleep patterns, and showed that this stress remains into the child’s adulthood.
Seidel, for the CBS News, admitted:
“I feel that many share this value, yet I think much of the socialization in our culture focuses on family when children are younger,” I seek to study topics that help us understand how family continues to be a central part of our lives throughout adulthood, and I encourage considering family-level influences in all situations.”
This study was published in the journal, The Gerontologist, and involved 186 heterosexual, middle-aged married couples from the Family Exchanges Study. The three main questions of the study were: how much support they offer, how stressed they are, and how much sleep they are getting.
The parents were asked to rate the different types of support they offer their adult children on a scale of 1 to 8, with 1 being daily and 8 being no more than once a year. Types of support ranged from practical help such as financial assistance to emotional support including advice and discussing daily events.
The parents also rated how stressful they find it to help their adult children, and how much they worry about their adult children, on a scale from 1 to 5, with 1 being “not at all” and 5 being “a great deal.”
Finally, participants reported the amount of sleep they got each night. The wives reported sleeping 6.66 hours per night while the husbands slept about 6.69 hours a night.
The results included that for husbands, the support that they provided their grown children was associated with poorer sleep; conversely, the husbands slept more when their wives reported providing support for the kids. No such impact was seen in the women’s sleep.
However, for women, sleep was impaired by experiencing higher stress with their children. Stress levels over this issue did not appear to affect how much the husbands slept.
Overall, the study found that the giving of support itself affected the men, while stress over the support was what affected the women.
Seidel hypothesizes that the results may be a side effect of how involved many parents are with their grown children’s lives these days.
“Current research on young adults suggests that parents and children are maintaining high levels of involvement,” she said. “Although parents and adult children have always maintained some level of involvement, we do see an increase in what is often termed ‘helicopter parenting’ and ‘landing pad’ children.”
Seidel says that this trend along with the emergence of technology like cell phones and social media gives parents a deeper insight into what is going on in their adult children’s lives, which may lead to more cause for concern.
Parents can help themselves deal with stress by developing healthy coping strategies, which may include better eating habits, exercise, mindfulness, support groups, or therapy.
“It is important to remember that having stress present in our lives is not the problem,” Seidel says. “It’s the inability to cope in healthy ways with the stress that is problematic and may lead to immune suppression.”
She also suggests that parents reflect on their level of involvement in their adult child’s life, how their child is receiving it, and whether they are enabling their child, seeking to control their child, or providing support.
Seidel says future research should continue to explore how the relationships between parents and their adult children can affect all areas of health and well-being.
If you’re past the age of adolescence and still experience your parents stressing over your every move, or if you’re a parent struggling with stress over your grown children — it’s normal!
Therefore, we offer several tips on how to avoid such consequences and deal with constant worrying and stress:
Well-Balanced Meals
Healthy foods maintain the healthy function of the brain and thus promote a healthy sleep.
Exercise Daily
Exercising offers numerous health benefits, and can help you fall asleep easily.
Limit Alcohol and Caffeine
These worsen anger and lead to anxiety and panic attacks, so make sure you limit their use.
Talk to Someone
You can open up and tell your worries to someone you trust and thus let your feelings out.
Time for yourself
Take some time to do things you love, like listening to your favorite albums, read a book, get a massage, or walk in the park.
Community work
Find a way to take part in the activities in the community and stay connected to others in order to fight everyday stress and relax.
Keep a Journal
Your journal can become your best friend if you start writing down your thoughts. This will not hurt anyone and you can express all your feelings.
This will also provide an opportunity for you to control your behavior and stress, and be more aware of the real situation.
Yet, continue loving your children endlessly, as they will always cherish and remember the healthy and positive relationship with their parents.
Source: youcantbreakme.co, lovethispic.com
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See also:
Harvard Psychologists Say: Parents Who Raise ‘Good’ Kids, Do These 5 Things
With the world constantly changing, that means new habits and new behaviors that can be very different than the ones we grew up with as kids.
The new generation has new technologies that allow them to do things the older generation was not blessed to have. However, these technologies have distracted most children from the need to go out and socialize.
Parents can find it challenging to raise their kids if they’re basing their teachings on how they were raised as kids. Because of this struggle, Psychologists at Harvard University have found that there are certain elements that a parent must do that are very important for a kid’s childhood. Read on to find out what they are.
5 Secrets to Raising Good Kids
1. Quality time
It’s not enough to just spend time with your children, you need to be with them completely. No Xbox and no IPhone can ever replace the bond a parent has with their child. By communicating with them, listening to them and doing things they enjoy doing, they will learn how to be a considerate and caring person.
When you’re communicating with your child and listening to their dilemmas, it’s very important not to take sides on a situation. You want your child to learn from their experiences through their own perspective.
2. Broad perspectives
In other words, you should teach your children how to see the big picture and its importance. Specifically, children often need help developing broad perspective and expanding their circle of friends in order to develop their character and personality properly. that “It is important that children learn to zoom in, listening closely and attending to those in their immediate circle, and to zoom out, taking in the big picture and considering the range of people they interact with every day,” Harvard`s research argues.
3. Appreciation and gratitude
Spoiling your children does no good, as it makes them unable to acknowledge the roles of others in healthy way. Children need to appreciate the people who contribute to their wellbeing and happiness in order to do this, and they simply will not do it if they are spoiled. Specifically, if children are taught to appreciate people and happiness, they will grow up into generous, healthy, compassionate, and happy individuals. “Expect children to routinely help, for example, with household chores and siblings, and only praise uncommon acts of kindness. When these kinds of routine actions are simply expected and not rewarded, they’re more likely to become ingrained in everyday actions,” the study argues.
4. Empathy and ethics
Every parent MUST provide their children with the environment they need to bond and socialize properly. Also, they must show that they are selfless rather than selfish, so that the child ends up being more selfless as well. As per Harvard’s research, “It’s very important that children hear from their parents and caretakers that caring about others is a top priority and that it is just as important as their own happiness. Even though most parents and caretakers say that children being caring is a top priority, often children aren’t hearing the message.”
5. Moral role models
Children learn mostly from their parents. So you should be very careful about your manners and how you behave in front of your kid. You should not hesitate to apologize in front of your kid if you commit a mistake. Kids have impressionable minds and they acquire things from their surroundings quickly. You should earn the respect and trust of your child by being honest, humble and kind to them and they will learn to behave in a similar manner.Source: dailypositiveinfo.com, providr.com, http://seizepositivity.com
