Some people say that the richer the material, the farther away from depression is from us, and now the children are living in a well-off society, which is supposed to be the most worry-free and happy generation.
But in fact, not all children have a carefree childhood, and the colorful fairy tale world will also be shrouded in haze, and in the cases of treatment, children with depression are becoming more and more common.
What is the matter with moderate depression in 10-year-old children?
"I don't understand, how can a child who has always been good and decent get depression?" When Qianqian's mother saw the diagnosis report of her 10-year-old daughter's "moderate depression" from the hospital psychology specialist, she was stunned, so she dragged the child into the psychological counseling room.
According to her mother, Qianqian is the only daughter in the family, and her mother only got pregnant with her when she was 38 years old. Shortly after the birth of the child, the father cheated on him due to an extramarital affair, and the parents divorced, and Qianqian was raised by the mother alone.
Although she grew up in a single-parent family, her strong mother attaches great importance to her child's education, and feels that she has been talented and intelligent since she was a child, especially well-behaved and obedient, and has high hopes for her.
But Qianqian has been weak since childhood, it is always difficult to fall asleep, even if it is easy to be awakened, the amount of food is also very small, 3 years old and often wet the bed at night, and later transferred to a full boarding bilingual kindergarten, the problem of bedwetting was solved, but the child became very timid, did not dare to be alone, always suspicious, often because of a little thing to cry.
In order to make the child's personality become cheerful, the mother will often encourage the child, and create more opportunities for the child to exercise and perform, such as allowing the child to actively participate in the class cadre election, assisting the teacher to manage the class, giving the child piano, dance, small host, choir and other quality education training classes, hoping to "practice" the child's courage and tap more talents.
In order to become the teacher's right-hand man and the role model of her classmates, Qianqian is not only very self-disciplined, but also works hard in learning, not allowing herself to be careless, and sometimes she accidentally makes a mistake in the exam, and she will be very remorseful and remorseful for the difference of one and a half points.
Last year's new school year class cadre re-election, Qianqian failed to evaluate the head of the class, she cried for a long time, always felt that the classmates pointed out to her behind her back and said bad things, always wandered in class, or felt that the teacher did not like her, intentionally targeted her, eyes did not dare to look directly at the teacher, in the school like a needle felt, the results fell sharply.
During the holidays, in order to let Qianqian study well, coupled with the epidemic situation, my mother gave up all the outings to play, tutored the children at home all day to complete various homework, arranged additional English speaking online courses, as well as calligraphy practice classes and drawing classes, and various punch cards every day, and the time was full.
I thought that after this holiday chicken baby model, the child would be able to return to school full of blood, but did not expect that on the first day of school, Qianqian was listless, he was still sleepy when he got up in the morning, and he did not want to eat breakfast, and he was not willing to eat, he had to get dressed and ready to go out, but he kept yelling about stomach pain, headache, crying and making trouble, how he refused to go to school.
The mother had to take the child to the hospital to see a doctor, but the pediatrician did not find any problems, so she had to let the child rest at home for a day.
For some time after that, Qianqian was so tossed every day, and her mental state was getting worse and worse. Her mother had to take her to various hospitals, and she was diagnosed with no physical abnormalities.
Eventually, when she visited a child psychology specialist, she was assessed as "moderately depressed," which was why she was bored with school.
"The child at home except for learning, I have not let her bear anything, is learning not the student's duty?" Where did the depression come from at a young age? "The mother is both distressed and confused.
Compared to her mother's impatience and helplessness, the thin Qianqian had a wooden face, her eyes were sluggish, and she said weakly: "I am very tired, I don't want to come, I want to go home and stay." "A lazy, broken can.
Guangzhou listened to the bar psychological counselor Pan Liwen analysis:
Qianqian is a typical case of childhood depression, and from an early age, he is more sensitive and suspicious and insecure.
The mother is anxious and strong, and in the authoritarian education model, the child grows up all the way in accordance with the successful path of "advanced training, highlighting strengths, and squeezing into famous schools".
As a child who grew up in a single family, although she can also understand the difficulty of her mother bringing up herself alone, she will blindly please her mother and work hard towards her mother's expectations.
But in reality, she felt that it was difficult for her to meet her mother's requirements no matter how she paid, and her heart was full of inferiority and despair, and her mood continued to be low, and she became particularly depressed and helpless.
When the mother reported the training class for her, although she would also consult with Qianqian and ask the child's opinion, in fact, even if Qianqian did not like it, she would use various reasons to persuade the child and let the child accept the arrangement.
In Qianqian's heart, she felt that her mother seemed to care more about her studies, and she simply could not understand her inner pain and give comfort, nor did she give her time to play easily.
Gradually, she felt that she was nothing more than a tool for learning, had no interest in everything around her, felt that there was pressure and strange vision around her, and that life was meaningless, so she had behavior of being bored with school and refusing to socialize.
Guangzhou listened to the bar psychological counselor Pan Liwen interpretation:
In psychological diagnosis, depression is a type of mood disorder whose main symptoms are persistent depression and loss of interest in previously enthusiastic activities, sometimes referred to as major depressive disorder.
The World Health Organization estimates that about 350 million people worldwide suffer from depression. In fact, depression has become the world's leading disease affecting human health.
Many people think that depression is a glass heart. People who suffer from depression are "careful with their eyes", "can't think straight", "love to drill the tip of the bull's horn", "fragile", and so on.
In fact, depression is a disease, with the same complete biochemical process as other diseases, the biggest feature is the high suicide rate. Of all those who committed suicide, 70 percent suffered from depression; 1 of the seven people with depression eventually committed suicide.
In recent years, suicides among adolescents have occurred from time to time, and children's depression has gradually attracted public attention.
Especially in some large cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, the "chicken baby" education method is popular in middle-class families, constantly giving children chicken blood, arranging learning and activities, and constantly urging children to fight.
As a result, in some schools, children's depression is even "contagious" between "chicken babies" like influenza.
Therefore, parents and teachers should pay more attention to children's mental health, establish a correct view of parenting, understand children's feelings, and channel children's negative emotions from an early stage.
What are the causes of depression in children?
◎The causes of depression in children include genetic factors, physiological factors, psychological trauma and environmental stress.
If the child's closest relatives suffer from depression, the child will also be prone to depression;
Physiologically, the child's depression is associated with receptors of dopamine in the brain and the secretion of dopamine;
Children who have experienced major traumatic events are also prone to depression, and emotion-related psychological disorders are very much related to the environment;
The most prone to depression is learned helplessness, and when children often feel unable to change their troubles, it is easy to produce depression.
In addition, the family environment and parenting style are also important factors affecting the child's illness. In the family, if parents often quarrel or often punish their children severely, excessive interference with children, and excessive protection of children, it will cause or aggravate the child's depressive symptoms.
How to identify depression in children?
Some children have depressive symptoms in infancy, such as restless sleep, refusal to eat, always have stomach pain or headache, often have aggressive behaviors such as hitting and biting people, excessive fear of people around them, or not letting others touch themselves, trance, often crying, etc.
Young children may show low emotions, bad mood, easy to get angry, become clingy, refuse to go to school, often feel pain, and it is difficult to gain weight as expected.
Adolescents may exhibit insomnia, frequent nightmares, reversed schedules, irritability, sensitivity, frustration or anger, low self-esteem, loss of interests and hobbies, poor school performance, or low attendance, social avoidance, and substance or alcohol abuse.
These symptoms must persist for at least two weeks to be considered depression and should be excluded from medication or other physical illness.
On average, a depressive episode lasts 6 to 8 months without counseling intervention. If you do not get timely and effective intervention at the time of the first attack, the probability of recurrence is high, and some will even be difficult to get out of for life.
It is particularly noteworthy that children who, like Qianqian in this case, have simple, sensitive, self-esteem, stubbornness, strength, competitiveness, self-denial, guilt, self-blame, self-examination, self-sin, etc., are more likely to suffer from depression.
What do parents do?
Parents should master the relevant knowledge of depression, learn the correct concept of parenting, and first solve their own anxiety problems.
Many parents' anxiety stems from comparison, meeting the needs of parents themselves to hope for jackie chan and daughter into phoenix, "chicken baby" parents should avoid exchanging training and remedial experience, otherwise it is easy to aggravate the spread of anxiety.
Secondly, the most important thing for parents is to give their children enough companionship and support, listen more and talk less, and slowly guide their children out of depression.
◎ Companionship: The companionship of parents can undoubtedly enhance the child's sense of security, usually pay more attention to the child, communicate frequently, and soothe the child's uneasiness and emotions.
Explaining to your child that depression is actually a disease, not a defect or weakness, is the first step to effective help.
◎ Correct guidance: Listen to your child's questions more, allow them to express their true feelings, and try to listen as much as possible and talk less.
Do not give the child a big reason or simple advice, such as "how should you do...", but stand in the child's point of view, really feel the difficulties faced by the child, give the child support and understanding, do not be too strict, do not judge arbitrarily, you can face the difficulties with the child and find a solution to the problem.
◎Social Participation:
Invite your child to social events, but don't force them to do so, and offer to involve your child in family activities if possible.
◎Pay attention to suicidal self-harm behavior:
Taking suicidal and self-injurious behavior shows that the child has not found a suitable way to vent his painful emotions, and parents should pay attention to the child's suicidal self-harm words! We should not take it lightly, thinking that the child only scares the parents and loses the vigilance, and the child's negative emotions should be taken seriously.
◎Timely practice of medicine:
If the child shows symptoms of depression, parents should promptly take the child to seek a professional psychologist and cooperate with counseling intervention under the guidance of a psychologist.
If the depression is more serious, or even has shown auditory hallucinations, visual hallucinations, delusions, mania and other psychotic symptoms, it is necessary to cooperate with professional drug treatment immediately.
How do counselors do parent-child work?
After learning more about the child's growth experience and the situation of the original family from Qianqian's mother, the counselor, parents and children jointly clarified the counseling goals and formulated a long-term counseling plan to alleviate the child's depression.
On the one hand, through interviews with mothers, counselors can change their cognition, relieve anxiety, and understand that children's growth is a "marathon" process, and sound personality and continuous learning motivation are much more important than short-term report cards.
At the same time, it also allows mothers to put down the mentality centered on their own needs, learn to "squat" to understand their feelings from the perspective of children, start from changing the parent-child relationship, and give children an easy learning and living environment.
On the other hand, through sandplay therapy with Qianqian, the counselor allows children to gain understanding, support and inclusion in a free and protected space, and slowly releases inner pressure, soothes the trauma in the subconscious, re-feels the safe state of being cared for and protected, and gradually accepts the self by presenting different game themes on the sand table, in a game similar to returning to childhood.
The consultation is 1 to 2 hours a week, and after a period of treatment, the mother and daughter's mentality has been significantly improved.
The mother let the child suspend all the online classes, often accompanied by the child, and Qianqian's mood slowly improved, talked more, and was willing to return to school, every day when she came home from school, she would take the initiative to tell her mother about the school, and there was a smile on her face that had been missing for a long time.
(In this case, the consent of the visitor has been obtained and some of the true information has been blurred)
* This article is the original article of Teacher Pan Liwen, unauthorized user, the company reserves the right to pursue according to law.
Pan Liwen
· Senior Counselor of The Psychological Counseling Center
· National second-level psychological counselor
· Sandbox Game Consultant