Talking to the children of the humanitarian wars and emergencies that see on television is useful for helping them to manage fear and nourish compassion
It is impossible to prevent children, even very small ones, see the images of violence and death that come from the places of war. Many of us are looking with apprehension, precisely in these hours, photos and videos of the conflict between Russia and Ukrainian who are traveling around the world, or will have read the news of the Ukrainian mothers who discuss on Facebook on the event of affixing a adhesive of their children with their children with their blood group on Facebook. These are news that communicates a feeling of horror, of profound injustice.
Always avoid censorship
What happens to a child in front of images and news that talk about other children attacked with weapons while trying to escape with their parents? Of children killed, drowned, of terrified children, hungry, alone?
The most frequent emotional reactions are anguish and safety loss: The comforting certainty that adults will always know how to protect them, that there are safe places, the house first of all, clashes with a reality of injured children, impotent parents, destroyed houses.
Should we protect them from contact with that reality, from raw images, distressing news?
Caution – not censorship – is certainly advisable, especially with younger children: never leave them alone in front of television and, in the periods of greater insistence of the media on critical situations – in these days, in fact, that in Ukraine -, reduce as far as possible the occasions when children are exposed to news and comments of events. In any case, the goal is not that children do not know what happens, but that the information and above all the images they receive are not too many and too distressing to be able to elaborate and bear them.
Welcome pain
A mother tells that in the face of images of that type her 7 -year -old boy sometimes cries, even for a long time. She is worried, but we should think that Pain and compassion for something that happens to others are not negative emotions: indeed they are the most “noble” and human way to respond to evil, to injustice. It would not be educational to try to protect children from that pain with phrases like “but these are things that happen very far from here”, “you don’t have to worry, you will never happen to you”; And moreover, phrases of the genre are not at all effective to help our children face fear, anguish, insecurity.
Help elaborate fear
If the child appears frightened, or if he says he is afraid, it is better to tell him that it is logical that he feels like this, because these things are very ugly and it is afraid to think that children like him are in danger and that they are sick; Fortunately, this is not happening here, but that it is very important to try to help those children and parents.
To help the child tolerate and elaborate the fear and anguish related to situations bigger than him – war, epidemics, violence – we must make sure that it does not feel totally passive and impotent: who see the ability and commitment to the great ones to face those situations, not to suffer them. The way adults talk about it is already an educational toolfor this we must pay attention to what we say, and take on ourselves an active, and not indifferent or fatalistic attitude: the indifference or guilty of the victims (“if they were at home they would not endanger their children”) are neither educational nor reassuring for children, indeed they make them feel exposed to the randomness and unpredictability of adults.
It is important to tell the child: “There are many people who are trying to do something to help them, we hope they will succeed, if there is something we can do too, we will do it.”
Cultivate empathy
In short, We cannot prevent our children from coming into contact with the ugliest and most violent aspects of reality; However, we can help them transform the pain and anguish that this contact produces into empathy, compassion, commitment and desire for justice. Let’s tell them that they are hope, using fairy tales or stories with the little ones and keeping the speeches open on these themes with the older ones: “The fact that this news tries to you is important, if you are children today you will keep the ability to feel pain for those suffering, you will be better than us, and perhaps things of this kind will happen less”.
