Stories for children with fear
Until 6 or 7 years old the child starts to fear insects, animals, darkness, unknown people, loud noises, unknown toys, thunder and storms, death, etc. . Most will be fleeting fears. With the stories for children with fear they will be able to overcome each of them in each stage.
Our children may be afraid to sleep with the lights off, thunder or going to a new school. Maybe until now we have not managed to convince them of the no sense of these fears and it's time to turn to stories for children with fear. The objective of creating the custom storiess according to the particular fear of each child is to help him overcome it. Living the fear in the third person helps the child to feel it differently and to lose weight.
What is fear?
Imagine for a moment our son, without fear, next to a precipice ... No, better not to visualize the disastrous end. Fearing situations of that kind is important, since, in the same way that physical pain acts as a warning signal, fear is a psychological wake-up call that alerts us if we can compromise the physical and emotional well-being of the person. Fear fulfills an adaptive function, preventing us from taking risks in situations in which we could be damaged.
From natural fear to phobia
So far more than a problem is a help. But there are times when what feels "is so big, so big" and "so scary, so much", as our children would say, that conditions the emotional well-being of the little ones and also our own. That's when they have and we have a problem, the fear has turned into phobia. In this moment, in those moments of emotional anguish, life stops being wonderful, becoming dark.
Fear causes us to experience very intense physical sensations (muscle stiffness, sweating, drowning ...) and also causes us very painful images (fear of losing control, going crazy, dying ...). Children feel uninterpreted and before these sensations provoke images close to their childhood world, full of fantasy and imagination to express their fear.
In this way, when they fear being abandoned, not being loved, in the dark, choking ... they will imagine ghosts, monsters, dinosaurs or "the baddest bad guy" that is there waiting for them. And it will happen that they will continue to be afraid even if we explain to them that nothing happens. And it is that emotions do not understand reasons, however many we give.
Create our own therapeutic stories
The stories, which are life translated into fantasy, help them to eliminate their anguish. They are short stories full of magic, which begin and end, and are told at one time. They transmit easily and quickly, but calmly and rhythmically. They maintain tension and trap the listener. It is a direct way of accessing the emotional system, in which emotions are born and in which fears also grow.
There are stories in literature that, in general, present a shield against various childhood fears. Other stories, with minor modifications, can become excellent tools to help children with fears. And, finally, it is also available to all fathers and mothers, knowing some simple resources, create our own therapeutic stories. We can adapt the stories to fit the children so that, when they leave them, our children have the courage and the necessary tools to make their fears disappear, thus feeling the heroes of their own history.
How to be a great storyteller
But of course, as in any good story, it is essential that the storyteller reach the emotional state necessary to tell his story in the appropriate way. Therefore, it is important that adults -models to be followed by our children- learn to relax and relax, to calm down and to calm down; to empower, with small and daily behaviors and attitudes, the happiness and well-being of our children. Otherwise, even if our intention is good, it is likely that, unwittingly, we provoke the opposite of what we would like.
Ana Gutiérrez and Pedro Moreno, clinical psychologists
