Help Your Child Deal With Stress

by Stuart Shanker

There's no such thing as a bad kid. That's what a lifetime of experience has taught Dr. Stuart Shanker. No matter how difficult, out of control, distracted, or exhausted a child might seem, there's a way forward: self-regulation. Overturning decades of conventional wisdom, this radical new technique allows children and the adults who care for them to regain their composure and peace of mind. Self-Reg is a groundbreaking book that presents an entirely new understanding of your child's emotions and behavior and a practical guide for parents to help their kids engage calmly and successfully in learning and life. Grounded in decades of research and working with children and parents by leading child psychologist Dr. Shanker, Self-Reg realigns the power of the parent-child relationship for positive change. Self-regulation is the nervous system's way of responding to stress. We are seeing a generation of children and teens with excessively high levels of stress, and, as a result, an explosion of emotional, social, learning, behavior, and physical health problems. But few parents recognize the "hidden stressors" that their children are struggling with: physiological as well as social and emotional. An entrenched view of child rearing sees our children as lacking self-control or willpower, but the real basis for these problems lies in excessive stress. Self-regulation can dramatically improve a child's mood, attention, and concentration. It can help children to feel empathy, and to cultivate the sorts of virtues that most parents know are vital for their child's long-term wellbeing. Self-regulation brings about profound and lasting transformation that continues throughout life. Dr. Shanker translates decades of his findings from working with children into practical, prescriptive advice for parents, giving them concrete ways to develop their self-regulation skills and teach their children to do the same and engage successfully with life for optimal learning, social, and emotional growth.

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction

336 pages, Paperback

Published September 11, 2018

Reviews

[Laura Hughes · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is pretty hard going, so far as books about helping difficult children go. The text is dense and there’s a lot of background information, lots of details of studies and really digging back into the biology and psychology of challenging behaviour. The author clearly knows their stuff and has taken the time to research their theories and techniques. However, it’s not massively helpful as the parent of a child who needs help. I found myself hunting for the techniques, the things to try to help my son. It was like wading through treacle. It’s also very US-centric which isn’t much help when dealing with the horrific state of Sen diagnosis and support in the UK.
What I mostly learned was to control myself, and because my child is so connected to me at a basic level, he might also learn control. This may not be the message I was meant to get.
There are other books out there that are much more practical in suggesting ways to move forward.

[Jen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've wrote a detailed review on my blog - https://raising2children.com/book-rev...

This book kindly offers advice on how to parent our children from an evidence- based research perspective. It introduces the concept 'stress behaviour' which has changed how I see my kids challenging behaviour. It has also made me think how I deal with that behaviour. Truly a fab book to support all parents