What Triggers Stress in Children?
Highlights:
- Stress can affect children in many ways and can be identified through physical and emotional symptoms
- Physical symptoms include headache, stomach ache, teeth grinding, bedwetting, nail biting, and nightmares
- Emotional symptoms include temper tantrums, excessive crying for no reason, new fears, aggression, extreme clinginess to the parent, withdrawal, and anxiety
Children are also susceptible to stress just like adults. However, it might be difficult for them to express. Even small changes can impact a child's feelings of safety and security.
They may present with physical symptoms like:
‘Children learn how to respond to stress as they grow and develop. So, teach them how to recognize the signs of stress and how to deal with them in healthy ways.’
- Change in appetite
- Headache
- Bedwetting
- Nightmares
- Sleep disturbances
- Stomach aches
- Feeling cold
- Teeth grinding
- Nail biting
- Sweaty palms and soles
Other physical symptoms were with no actual physical illness.
Emotional symptoms like:
- Sudden change in attitude
- Withdrawing from family and friends
- Excessive crying for no reason
- Difficulty in concentration
- Extreme clinginess to the parent
- Aggression
- Anxiety
- New found fears
- Temper tantrums
Some of the commonly known triggers in children include:
- Arrival of a new sibling
- Change in routine
- Unfamiliar situation
- Delay in milestones
- Pandemic — that stopped the world
- Starting school
- Changing schools
- Learning difficulties
- Conflict with friends
- Bullying
- Moving to a new location
- Tight schedules leaving no time to play
- Illness / death of family members
- Relationship issues between parents / divorce
- Financial problems in the family
- Going through bodily changes (noticed mainly during adolescence)
- Unable to cope with pressure from self / parent / peer / school
- Illness or hospitalization
If your child has had a stressful week and the anxiety goes away once things have calmed down, then it's normal. Children have their own methods of coping, but if the stress is significant, frequent, or doesn't go away, that's when it's time to seek help.
You can help your child by learning to recognize the signs of stress and teaching them healthy ways to deal with it. Children learn how to respond to stress as they grow and develop.
Source: IANS
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Hannah Joy. (2021, December 22). What Triggers Stress in Children?. Medindia. Retrieved on Sep 20, 2024 from https://www.medindia.net/news/healthwatch/what-triggers-stress-in-children-204823-1.htm.
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Hannah Joy. "What Triggers Stress in Children?". Medindia. Sep 20, 2024. <https://www.medindia.net/news/healthwatch/what-triggers-stress-in-children-204823-1.htm>.
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Hannah Joy. "What Triggers Stress in Children?". Medindia. https://www.medindia.net/news/healthwatch/what-triggers-stress-in-children-204823-1.htm. (accessed Sep 20, 2024).
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Hannah Joy. 2021. What Triggers Stress in Children?. Medindia, viewed Sep 20, 2024, https://www.medindia.net/news/healthwatch/what-triggers-stress-in-children-204823-1.htm.