Some people say that the richer the material, the farther away depression is from us, and today's children are living in a moderately prosperous society, which is logically 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 children suffering from depression are becoming more and more common in the cases received.
What happened to a 10-year-old child with moderate depression?
"I don't understand, how can a child who has always been good get depression?" When Qianqian's mother saw the diagnosis report of her 10-year-old daughter's "moderate depression" from the hospital's psychological department, she was stunned, so she pulled the child into the psychological counseling room.
According to her mother, Qianqian is the only daughter in the family, and her mother finally conceived her when she was 38 years old. Shortly after the birth of the child, the father cheated on her due to an extramarital affair, and her parents divorced, and Qianqian was raised by her mother alone.
Although she grew up in a single-parent family, her mother with a strong temperament attaches great importance to her children's education, feeling that she has been gifted 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, always difficult to fall asleep, even if she falls asleep, it is easy to be woken up, eat very little, and often wet the bed at night at the age of 3, 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, and often cried because of a little thing.
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 election of class leaders, assisting the teacher to manage the class affairs, and enrolling the child in piano, dance, small host, choir and other quality education training courses, hoping to "grow" the child's courage and explore more talents.
In order to become the teacher's right-hand man and the role model for her classmates, Qianqian is not only very self-disciplined, but also works hard in her studies, not allowing herself to have carelessness, sometimes accidentally wrong in the exam, for the difference of one and a half points will be very self-blame, regret.
Last year, the class was re-elected, Qianqian failed to evaluate the class president, she cried for a long time because of this, always felt that the classmates pointed at her behind her back and said bad things, and always lost her mind during class, or felt that the teacher did not like her, deliberately targeted her, her eyes did not dare to look directly at the teacher, and she was like sitting on pins and needles in school, and her grades plummeted.
During the holiday, in order to make up for Qianqian, coupled with the epidemic, her mother gave up all going out to play, tutored her 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 clocked in every day, with a full schedule.
I thought that after the chicken baby mode of this holiday, the child would be able to return to school full of blood, but I didn't expect that Qianqian was listless on the first day of school, she was still drowsy when she got up in the morning, and she didn't want to eat breakfast, and finally got dressed and ready to go out, but she kept shouting about stomachaches, headaches, crying and making trouble, and refused to go to school.
The mother had to take the child to the hospital, but the pediatrician did not find any problems, so she had to let the child temporarily rest at home for a day.
For a period of time after that, Qianqian was so tormented every day, and her mental state became worse and worse. Her mother kept taking her to various hospitals, and all of them were diagnosed with no physical abnormalities.
When she eventually visited the child psychiatrist, she was assessed as "moderately depressed," which is why she was tired of school.
"I haven't let my child take on anything but studying at home, isn't learning a student's duty?" Where did depression come from at a young age? "The mother feels sorry for the child and is also confused.
Compared with her mother's anxious helplessness, the thin Qianqian looked wooden, her eyes were dull, and she said weakly: "I'm tired, I don't want to come, I want to go home and stay." "A lazy, broken look.
Psychological counselor analysis:
Qianqian is a typical case of childhood depression, and she has been more sensitive and suspicious since she was a child, and she lacks security.
The mother is anxious and strong, and in the authoritarian education model, the child grows up all the way according to the planned "chicken baby" success path of "advanced training, highlighting specialties, and squeezing into prestigious schools".
As a child who grew up in a single-parent family, although she can also understand that it is not easy for her mother to bring up her alone, she will blindly please her mother and work hard towards her mother's expectations.
But in reality, she felt that no matter how much she paid, it was difficult to meet her mother's requirements, her heart was full of inferiority, despair, and her mood continued to be low, becoming particularly depressed and helpless.
When her mother signs up for a training course for her, although she will also consult with Qianqian and ask her child's opinion, in fact, even if Qianqian does not like it very much, she will use various reasons to persuade the child to accept the arrangement.
In Qianqian's heart, she felt that her mother seemed to care more about her studies, and she couldn't understand her inner pain and give comfort at all, nor did she give her time to play easily.
Gradually, she felt that she was nothing more than a tool for learning, not interested in everything around her, feeling that all around her were under pressure and strange eyes, and life was meaningless, so she became tired of school and refused to socialize.
Psychological counselor's interpretation:
In psychological diagnosis, depression is a type of mood disorder whose main symptoms are persistent low sadness and loss of interest in activities that were previously passionate, 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 number one disease affecting human health worldwide.
Many people think of depression as a glass heart. People with depression are "careful eyes", "can't think about it", "love to drill the horns", "fragile", and so on.
In fact, depression is a disease, with a complete biochemical process like other diseases, and the biggest feature is a high suicide rate. 70% of all suicides suffer from depression; Of the 7 people with depression, 1 eventually committed suicide.
In recent years, teenage suicides have occurred from time to time, and childhood depression has gradually attracted public attention.
Especially in some big 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, childhood 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 age.
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 a child has a loved one suffering from depression, the child will also be prone to depression;
In physiological terms, the child's depression is related to dopamine receptors in the brain and the secretion of dopamine;
Children who have experienced major traumatic events are also prone to depression, and emotional-related psychological disorders are very related to the environment;
The most likely to produce depressed mood is learned helplessness, 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 children's illness. In the family, if parents often quarrel or often punish the child harshly, interfere too much with the child, and overprotect the child, it will cause or aggravate the child's depressive symptoms.
How to recognize depression in children?
Some children have depressive symptoms in infancy, such as disturbed sleep, refusal to eat, always have stomach pain or headache, often have aggressive behaviors such as hitting and biting, are overly afraid of people around them, or do not let others touch them, look in a trance, often cry, etc.
Young children may exhibit low mood, bad mood, easy anger, clinginess, refusal to go to school, frequent pain, and difficulty gaining weight as expected.
Adolescents may exhibit: insomnia, frequent nightmares, reversal of work and rest, irritability, sensitivity, depression or anger, low self-evaluation, loss of hobbies; Poor school performance, or low attendance, social avoidance, substance or alcohol abuse and self-injurious behavior.
These symptoms must last at least two weeks to be considered depressed and should be ruled out by medication use or other physical conditions.
On average, a depressive episode lasts 6 to 8 months without counselling. If the first attack is not intervened in a timely and effective manner, the chance of recurrence is higher, and some will even be difficult to get out for life.
It is particularly worth noting that children similar to Qianqian in this case, who have the characteristics of simplicity, sensitivity, self-esteem, stubbornness, strength, competitiveness, habit of self-denial, guilt, self-blame, self-reflection, and self-sin, are more likely to get depression.
What should parents do?
Parents should master the relevant knowledge of depression, learn the correct parenting concept, and first solve their own anxiety problems.
Many parents' anxiety stems from comparison, satisfying the parents' own needs of hoping for their children to become dragons and daughters to become phoenixes, and "chicken baby" parents should avoid getting together to exchange training and tutoring 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.
◎ Accompaniment: The company of parents can undoubtedly enhance the child's sense of security, usually care more about the child, communicate frequently, and relieve the child's anxiety and emotions.
Explaining to your child that depression is actually a disease, not a defect or weakness, can be the first step to effective help.
◎ Correct guidance: listen to children's problems more, allow them to express their true feelings, and try to listen as much as possible and talk less.
Do not be reasonable or give simple advice to the child, such as "how should you do...", but stand in the child's point of view, truly feel the difficulties faced by the child, give the child support and understanding, do not be too strict, do not judge at will, you can face the difficulties with the child and find solutions to the problem.
◎ Social Participation:
Invite your child to social activities, but don't force them to go and offer to join your child in family activities if possible.
◎ Pay attention to the behavior of suicide and self-harm:
Taking suicidal and self-injurious behaviors shows that the child has not found a suitable way to vent his painful emotions, and parents should pay attention to these suicide self-harm words of their children! It should not be taken lightly, thinking that the child is only scaring the parents and losing vigilance, and the child's negative emotions should be taken seriously.
◎ Timely medical practice:
If the child shows symptoms of depression, parents should take the child to seek professional psychologists in time and cooperate with counseling and intervention under the guidance of psychologists.
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 psychological counselors carry out 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 worked with parents and children to clarify the counseling goals and formulated a long-term counseling plan to alleviate the child's depression.
On the one hand, through the interview with the mother, the counselor can change her cognition, relieve anxiety, and understand that the child's growth is a "marathon" process, and a sound personality and continuous learning motivation are much more important than short-term report cards.
At the same time, it also allows mothers to let go of 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 a relaxed learning and living environment.
On the other hand, through sand game therapy with Qianqian, the counselor allows the child to gain understanding, support and tolerance in a free and protected space, and slowly presents different game themes on the sand table, releasing internal pressure, smoothing out the trauma in the subconscious, re-feeling the safe state of being cared for and protected, and gradually accepting oneself in a game similar to returning to childhood.
Counseling is 1~2 hours a week, and after a period of treatment, the mentality of mother and daughter has been significantly improved.
The mother let the child suspend all online classes, often accompanied 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 long-lost smile on her face.
(In this case, the consent of the visitor has been obtained and part of the real information has been blurred)
* This article is the original article of Ms. Pan Liwen, and the company reserves the right to pursue it according to law without permission.
Liwen Pan
· Hear about it, Senior Counselor of the Counseling Center
· National second-level psychological counselor
· Sandbox game consultant
· Family education psychological instructor
· Member of Guangdong Psychological Association
· Member of the Psychoanalytic Professional Committee
· Member of the Standing Committee of the Health Communication Self-media Alliance of Guangdong Medical Association