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The holiday season can be a stressful time for everyone. If you’re traveling, you might be anxious about how your child will handle being in a new place and whether there will be enough space in your suitcase for all of their presents. If you’re staying home, you might worry about keeping the peace while hosting an extended family dinner or navigating the crowds at the mall on Black Friday. And if your young children are experiencing these new events for the first time, they’ll need some extra help to adjust and cope with all of these changes! Luckily, with a little preparation on both sides, we can make this season one that’s filled with joy rather than tears:
Preventing meltdowns among your little ones during the holidays is an important part of keeping your stress levels low. So how do you ensure smooth sailing?
Explain changes early.
If you know that what normally happens on Wednesday nights will be different this week because of Christmas Eve dinner plans—or if Grandma’s coming for Thanksgiving instead of Saturday night—make sure everyone knows about these changes before Monday rolls around! Letting kids pick out costumes for school or even letting them know what time bedtime will be helps them get used to change before it happens (and makes it less likely that they’ll feel upset).
Try to maintain some sense of routine and order in your house, even if it’s not always possible.
It’s easier to have a low-stress holiday when you have a tidy house, and children will be much less agitated if they don’t have to deal with all the chaos that comes along with having guests over who are staying with them for several days.
Don’t overschedule things during the holidays or try to do too many things in one day.
This is especially true if many people are visiting from out of town and want to do something fun together as a group. You’ll end up getting so flustered trying to get everyone from point A to point B on time that you’ll forget about having fun yourself! Try instead setting aside specific days where everyone does something different than usual—for instance, organizing activities based around each individual child’s interests rather than relying on general consensus (or lack thereof).
Prepare your child for a break in routine
If you’re staying home, talk about how things will be different from a normal day, when you might have more visitors than usual or have to spend more time doing things that your child doesn’t usually take part in. Try out some new activities together so they can learn what to expect.
Explain why you are doing this (for example, “we want to make sure we have enough food for all of our friends and family who celebrate the holidays with us”). If there’s anything about your child’s routine that will change because of the lack of visitors (for example, waking up earlier), explain why this might happen as well (“because so many people are coming over”).
Be ready for things to go wrong
If your child has a meltdown after something happens (which is a normal reaction for young children), don’t try to get them to stop or punish them for it. Instead, help them calm down and talk about it with them afterwards—so they can learn how to handle it next time. This is especially important if you’re in public.
Young kids thrive when they know what to expect and how they are expected to behave in different situations.
Young kids thrive when they know what to expect and how they are expected to behave in different situations. So give them a chance to practice before the event, and talk with them about how you want them to behave. If they don’t behave the way you’d like on the day of the event, talk about it afterwards.
If you’re feeling overwhelmed, remember that it’s OK to ask for help. It can feel like a lot of pressure to try and keep everything running smoothly at home while also having fun with your family and friends during the holidays. If there’s anything that needs doing around the house or yard work needs tending to, make sure you have some extra hands on deck!
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