Raising Healthy Children - written by Dr. Robert Puff

One of the most important aspects of raising healthy children is parents' presence in their children's lives. Sadly, studies have shown that most parents spend well under 15 minutes per day actually communicating one on one with their children. The benefit of communicating one on one, making eye contact and paying attention to subtleties in your children's body language allows you a view into their world. By doing this you will be aware if they are having problems at school, with friends, family, or peer pressures. If you don't ask, and don't pay attention, whom will your child talk to? They may talk with their friends, and while it is great to have such a support, do you really want a child or teenager giving your child advice about important life decisions? Many times it may be these very friends who are pressuring them to do things, or perhaps they may have peers who are jealous of them in some way and who may guide them towards not so healthy decisions. While there can be some truly great friends out there that your children may have in their lives, how equipped are they for giving advice on some of the struggles that they themselves have not even faced? There may also be some things in your child's life that they have difficulty bringing up with their friends as well, leaving no one for them to talk with. This amplifies the significance of your communication with them because if they can't talk to you and are receiving poor advice from friends, they will have to struggle with their feelings on their own, most likely bottling them up and harboring them deep inside. This creates great problems for children that lead to problems in adulthood as well.

The great epidemic of children cutting themselves, having eating disorders, and substance abuse as well as a plethora of other addictions have a very strong link with bottled up emotions. Nearly all of these are directly related to an individual (child or adult) having difficulty expressing his or her emotions. Think about it. If you have nobody to talk to, you will have difficulty expressing your emotions.

Don't confuse "spending time" with your children with taking them to and from after school activities (although this is very important too). Spending time with your children means being with them one on one, listening to them, and caring about what they have to say. Spending time with the family as a whole is also very important for your child. Eating dinner and engaging in family activities together will not only bring your family closer, it will send the message that they are all important not only to you, but to each other as well. It's important to keep in mind that the time you spend with your children shouldn't be spent only doing the things you enjoy. Find out what your children are interested in and do these things with them. It takes work and may not be the thing that you are really looking forward to doing on your time off, but we guarantee that if you do this, you will be much more likely to have happy and healthy children.

It can be truly amazing in therapy that after a few weeks of engaging in activities or games with a child in session and after listening to them talk about the latest drama with friends that they will all of a sudden just open up and say what they are feeling and what is troubling them. Some teens have to talk about how they are struggling to have sex with their partners, or that they may be pregnant, but can't even tell their parents because they don't feel safe. If they had a good connection and relationship with their parents, they would be able to talk with them and wouldn't need counselors.

The reason children and teens talk to counselors about these things is that they have learned that they feel cared for and safe as we will not judge or condemn them for their feelings or what their predicaments are. Even though we talk with them about the potential consequences of their actions, they consistently feel like they can trust us and we will be there for them no matter what. It is even more important for your children to receive this message from you as their parents.