How to establish the connection with your kids?
“It’s not enough to love the children, it is necessary that they are aware that they are loved.” — St. John Bosco
The most important thing we have to offer our children is our ability to make them feel loved, respected, wanted and welcome. The primary caregiver is a child’s emotional reservoir, a place to start from and return to, in between explorations. Through play, parents can “fill the emotional cup” of the child. One good way to do this is to use the “Love cup” game. Before the child goes to school, ask them how filled up with love they are, and if not 100%, give them a huge hug and then say “Now you are 100% filled with mummy/daddy love”.
Playful parenting works best when the adult provides the insistence on connecting, but the child sets the terms of how the two are going to connect. Concretely, this may mean the parent may offer a few ideas of games they could play together, and lets the child chose which one he/she feels like doing. When you see that the child is laughing and smiling a lot, you know that you are doing things right! Follow your child’s lead: Just say yes, do whatever they want to do, and make it silly.
Set aside a specific playtime in their weekly/daily routine to build a closer relationship (see blogpost: When to play with your children). Ensure you have a playful moment with your children and at a laugh at least once a day. A specific time that is regular allows for the child to look forward to and plan for it. It can be as little as ten minutes to an hour. You can say: “it’s your special time, what do you want to do?”
Establishing a connection as the basis for play can be done at all ages. Newborns need eye-love, that deep gaze into each other’s eye, which create a profound sense of belonging. From a very young age mirroring what they do works to establish a connection (e.g. make silly faces with baby), but mirroring doesn’t have to stop when children get older. Some other ways to establish a playful connection include:
o Talk in a funny voice, sing, make the stuffed animal say silly things, pretend to cry, all in order to make the child laugh
o Play chase with a young child and fake stumble when trying to catch him. When you catch the child, say “you will never get away” and then let them run away and say “how did you do that! This time I’ll really get you”
o Instead of telling a teenager to clean the room, pretend to be the tee-shirt and ask to be put into the laundry.
o Even small things work: Do a play-by-play commentary of your children’s action (including routine moments like brushing their teeth), be silly, shout “And now we dance!”, thumb wrestle.
o Boredom is a sign you and your child are not connected. Be physically close and become a great playmate.
Note: Many of these ideas come from Dr Lawrence Cohen, and they have worked great for us, challenging us as parents to be more connected to our kids.
