Alexandra from Big Life Journal says, “growing up, we never really talked about mental health and it took me a long time to appreciate the value of calm, quiet moments”.    She also says that she heard her son tell his friend, “my mum likes to recharge her batteries”, so she has obviously taught her children about the importance of making sure they look after their mental health through mindfulness and other ‘battery charging’, ‘tank filling’ exercises.

She also says, “taking care of our mental health is really important, especially when stress starts to affect how we feel and how we parent.  It’s comforting to think that our kids can learn about self- care from an early age – something that many of us didn’t learn growing up”.

I have to agree with her, I didn’t learn much about self-care when I was growing up.  Mental health was never talked about.  Many of you possibly have the same experience.  I think it’s really positive and healthy that children are learning to look after their mental health today and it’s not such a taboo subject anymore.

The page below gives some simple ideas that we can use to teach our children these essential self- care tips.

Julie Maxwell,
Pastoral Care Worker