Category — Stress

1. Will my parents stay together?
2. What if my parents die or get in an accident?
3. How can I keep my mom or dad from getting angry with me?
4. Will people at school like me?
5. Will I be able to do well at school?
6. What if my friends don’t want to be my friends anymore?
7. Will my parents be able to pay all our bills?
8. Will I be safe today?
9. Do I look okay?
10. What if I get embarassed?
11. What if someone hurts me or my family?
12. What does the future hold for me?

Recent research is confirming the fact that we can live longer, and be sharper, if we keep our brain stimulated with enjoyable mental, physical, and social activities.  Work & Family Life (February 2009) shared these research-based brain-boosting tips:

Breathe deeply. Before you tackle any mental chore, take a few deep breaths.  This will send oxygen to your brain and will also have a valuable calming effect.

Try new things. Do something different every day.  Introduce yourself to someone and start a conversation.  Make a mundane change in your routine such as taking a different route to work.  Or even do something silly like eating di nner with your non-dominant hand.

Eat fish rich in omega-3. A diet that includes regular servings of baked or broiled fish is great for the brain.  Many studies have identified the omega-3 fatty acid in fish as uniquely helpful in slowing age-related mental decline.

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.

If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.

If children live with ridicule, they learn to be shy.

If children live with shame, they learn to be guilty.

If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.

If children live with tolerance, they learn to be patient.

If children live with praise, they learn to appreciate.

If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.

If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.

If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.

If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and others.

If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

By Dorothy Law Nolte - Author of Children Learn What They Live

1. The Wake-Up

It is important for a child to have some parent-love in the first conscious moment of his or her day.

2. The Send-Off

Horses, Olympians, and children run a good race when they get off to a good start.  As often as possible, you should be there for breakfast and for your child’s departure to school.

3. The Reception

If you want to get a real reading on how the “game” went, you have to be there when the “player” comes off the field.  Your presence when your child comes in the door says “I love you.” Your responsibility at the reception is mostly to hug, to listen without judgment, to notice your child is home, and to be available.

4. The Debriefing

This may come right after the reception.  Kids need to debrief their day–not to be interrogated but to report, celebrate, evaluate, or explode.  Again, your role is to listen.  Your undivided attention communicates that you care.

5. The Happy Ending

If “all’s well that ends well,” it’s good for a parent to be there at the end of the day.  It’s a time for an “I love you,” an “I’m sorry,” or a “thank you.” It puts a period on the end of the day.

By Ronald Hutchcraft from Five Needs Your Child Must Have Met at Home

• Hold hands during mealtime prayers.
• Walk one-on-one with each child.  Swing hands and talk.  Tell jokes.  Sing.
• Bad day?  Sigh dramatically and say, “I sure could use a great big hug from someone special.”
• Wonderful day?  Shout, “Hey, everybody!  Come hug me!  I had the best day!”
• Make Hug Sandwiches.  With your spouse, gently surprise unsuspecting children–no matter what age!
• Declare a 100 Hugs Day among your family.  Count them as you go.
• Do four-direction kisses: north (foreheads), south (chins), east/west (cheeks).
• Wrap your arms around your children during church and while waiting together or watching TV.
• APply the Pat Principle: “When in doubt, pat.” God made lots of patting places–heads, cheeks, knees, hands, shoulders, backs.

–By Lorri Cardwell-Casey, From HomeLife Magazine

Determination.  ”Stick with it, regardless.”

Honesty.  “Speak and live the truth–always.”

Responsibility. “Be dependable, be trustworthy.”

Thoughtfulness. “Think of others before yourself.”

Confidentiality. “Don’t tell secrets.  Seal your lips.”

Punctuality. “Be on time.”

Self-control. “When under stress, stay calm.”

Patience. “Fight irritability.  Be willing to wait.”

Purity. “Reject anything that lowers your standards.”

Compassion. “When another hurts, feel it with him”

Diligence. “Work hard.  Tough it out.”

by Charles R. Swindoll from Growing Strong in the Seasons of Life

How often do you hug?  Do you like to sit close and hold each other’s hands?  Recent research shows it’s good for your health.  Between loving partners, between parents and children, or even between close friends, physical affection can help the brain, the heart and other body systems you might never have imagined.

For centuries, artists have examined love through poetry, painting, music and countless other arts.  In the past few years, scientists supported by NIH have begun to understand the chemistry and biology of love.

At the center of how our bodies respond to love and affection is a hormone called oxytocin.  Most of our oxytocin is made in the area of the brain called the hypothalamus.  Some is released into our bloodstream, but much of its effect is thought to reside in the brain.

Oxytocin makes us feel good when we’re close to family and other loved ones, including pets.  It does this by acting through what scientists call the dopamine reward system.  Dopamine is a brain chemical that plays a crucial part in how we perceive pleasure.  Many drugs of abuse act through this system.  Problems with the system can lead to serious depression and other mental illness.

Oxytocin does more than make us feel good.  It lowers the levels of stress hormones in the body, reducing blood pressure, improving mood, increasing tolerance for pain and perhaps even speeding how fast wounds heal.  It also seems to play an important role in our relationships.  It’s been linked, for example, to how much we trust others.

Dr. Kathleen C. Light of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill studies oxytocin in married couples and those permanently living together.  She and her colleagues invite couples into the laboratory and ask them to spend at least 10 minutes holding hands and talking together about a happy memory, usually about how they met and fell in love.

“What we’re trying to do in a lab situation,” Light explains, “is recreate some of the experiences in real life where they felt close.”

The couples then get their blood drawn and fill out a questionnaire about the quality of their relationship.  When the researchers compared their responses to the levels of oxytocin in their blood, they found that people who have a more positive relationship with their partner have higher levels of oxytocin.

Light and her colleagues are now trying to understand how conflict and other factors in relationships affect a couple’s oxytocin levels.  The results of those studies aren’t yet in.

One thing researchers can say with certainty is that physical contact affects oxytocin levels.  Light says that the people who get lots of hugs and other warm contact at home tend to have the highest levels of oxytocin in the laboratory.  She believes that frequent warm contact may somehow prime the oxytocin system and make it quicker to turn on whenever there’s warm contact, even in a laboratory.

The same holds true for mothers and infants:  they both produce higher levels of oxytocin when they have lots of warm contact with each other.  “Those women who hold their babies more at home have higher responses when they hold their baby in the lab,” Light says.

Much of what we know about oxytocin has come from research in animals.  Mother rats, for instance, can stimulate oxytocin in their pups by licking and grooming them.  This loving care has long-term effects.

When researchers separate pups from their mothers for 10-15 minutes a day and then reunite them, many mothers are so glad to see their pups that they lick and groom them intensively.  If the separation lasts for several hours, however, it can have the opposite effect; the mother won’t lick and groom her pups.  Some mothers just never lick and groom their pups when they come back.

Pups that are groomed a lot when they’re reunited with their mothers become more comfortable exploring new environments.  The ignored ones develop more anxiety disorders, produce higher levels of stress hormones and have higher blood pressure.

Research from other animals, including monkeys, confirms that the quality of care a mother gives her offspring can have long-term effects on their personality characteristics and mental health as well as physical problems like heart disease.

Animal research is also shedding light on oxytocin’s role in other social bonds.  Mice that lack oxytocin can’t recognize other mice, even after repeated encounters.  When they’re given oxytocin, however, they can recognize other mice again.

Dr. C. Sue Carter, co-director of the Brain Body Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago, has been studying oxytocin in prairie voles, which form strong bonds with their mates.  When the researchers block oxytocin, the voles don’t form such bonds.  Oxytocin is especially important for females to form bonds with their mates.  In males, a related hormone called vasopressin also plays a role.

Oxytocin and vasopressin aren’t miracle compounds, however.  Giving these hormones to other animals—even other types of voles that don’t normally form social bonds—doesn’t suddenly cause them to form loving bonds.  Animals must have the proper genes to respond to these hormones in the first place.

“Most of us are genetically programmed to form social bonds,” Carter explains, relating the results back to people.  But the ability to form close bonds, she says, is shaped by early experiences.  In the end, a complex interaction of genes and experience makes some people form social bonds more easily than others.

We may not yet fully understand how love and affection develop between people—or how love affects our health—but research is giving us some guidance.  Give those you love all the affection you can.  It can’t hurt, and it may bring a bounty of health benefits.

Information taken from www.nih.gov