Separation Anxiety
How should you deal with separation anxiety? Although it can make life rather difficult for parents, separation anxiety is a normal stage of your child’s development. It is an indication that your child has formed a secure attachment to you and feels happy and safe when they’re with you. Being separated from you for short […]
5 negative emotions your child needs to experience
Everybody loves the positive emotions, right?! Bring on happiness, joy, pride and love by the truck full. But negative emotions make us feel uncomfortable and often, we do our utter best to avoid them. Yet, negative emotions are important. We probably all agree that people who are able to control their emotions navigate the difficulties […]
How to help children with Selective Mutism
Children with selective mutism are physically capable of speaking, but do not speak in specific situations or to specific people. For more information on Selective Mutism and how it presents in children, read this article: http://www.childpsych.co.za/barriers-to-learning/selective-mutism/ Selective Mutism (SM) is a debilitating disorder and may have a very negative impact on a child’s daily functioning in […]
Expresso video 1: What is bullying?
Last week I chatted to Expresso’s Elana Afrika-Bredenkamp about bullying. In the first segment we looked at what bullying is, what the psychological effects are and what signs to look out for. Bullying can be described as aggressive behaviour by one party (individual or group) against another in which there is a real […]
Expresso video 2: How to address bullying
In this video I chat to Expresso’s Elana Afrika-Bredenkamp on how parents should address bullying. It is absolutely vital that parents get involved if they know or suspect that their child is being bullied, but how they go about doing so is important: keep in mind that your child is most likely already feeling embarrassed […]
Expresso video 3: Why do children become bullies?
Bullying is a serious problem and as a society we often react with great empathy to the child who is being bullied. But what if your child is the bully? Children bully others for a variety of reasons. Surprisingly when we talk to bullies we often find that they themselves suffer from a low self-esteem […]
Self-mutilation in children and teens
Self-mutilation (sometimes also referred to as self-harm or self-injury) is defined as all acts by which an individual deliberately sets out to harm his or her own body. In the majority of self-mutilation cases suicide is not the main aim and the injuries inflicted are not life threatening. I realise that this is a […]
