AS a therapist, and a mom, one of things that I really wanted to stress with my kids was mental health awareness. In this world, stigma towards mental health is pretty high. Of course, we have come a long way, and I see that! However, I continue to see external and internalized stigma in so many people.
As someone who grew up in an Asian family, whose parents immigrated from another country, mental health was definitely not something that we talked about often.
I wanted to change that. As someone that struggled with her mental health in her youth, I knew how detrimental it can be to not address our mental health!
Ignoring our symptoms makes things worse. So, from the time that the boys were very young, we worked to help them name their emotions. We celebrate their emotions.
One the things I always say to the boys (and clients) is "no emotion is bad or good. It's what we do with those emotions that can be problematic." I then give examples: It's okay to feel mad and frustrated! It isn't ok to hit and kick and hurt people and ourselves. It is ok to feel sad! It isn't ok to self harm because we feel sad.
We also try to separate out behaviors, emotions and the PERSON. Aki struggles a lot with this. He will say, "I'm a bad kid." This comes from a teacher's aide unfortunately saying this to him when he was in first grade and he has internalized this in a big way. It's very sad and unfortunate, and we continue to work on his self esteem and negative self talk. I always say to him, "we will ALWAYS love you. We may not like some of the BEHAVIORS that you do (naming the behaviors), AND that will never diminish that love that we have for you. It is ok to feel those emotions- let's work on expressing them in a more helpful way to you and others so they can help you."
We don't shy away from mental health and mental wellness. We try to talk about it openly and let them know that it is okay to feel whatever they feel. It's a hard journey, and it's worth it!
With these in mind, let's jump into this week's Therapist Mama Bear Tip!
Comments