| Family Crises and the Miracle of Change | |||||||||||||||
| Steps Parents Can Take | |||||||||||||||
Stay in communication
with your spouse, children, and support network . . . Use family meetings to allow everyone to
express their feelings about the crisis and to support each other
through a difficult and confusing time in your family life.
Maintain close contact with your spouse, recognizing that strong
emotions are a natural response to crisis. Use good
listening skills with your spouse
and children. Recognize that
Grieving Loss is Part of the Process . . . The stages of crises are remarkably similar
to the stages of grief. Your life is no longer what it was and
the loss of that old life must be grieved in order to move
forward. Here are some resources for dealing with the grief you
feel. Recognize and
communicate individual and family strengths . . . Peter McWilliams recommends getting a stack of 3x5 cards to write down all of
your individual strengths. You can
do the same thing for each family member and the family as a
whole in a family meeting. Focus on Your Dreams
and Goals
. . . These are your clues to the way out of the wilderness of family crises. In the chapter on Discovering and Choosing our Dreams, Peter McWilliams guides you to your dreams. Analyze the Problem . . . Identify and clarify the problem(s) you are facing. Communicate with others about the problem to gain feedback. Generate a list of possible solutions. Analyze the benefits, obstacles, and consequences of each solution. What information and resources do you need to carry out the solutions you are considering? Decide on a solution, and then list the steps you need to take to accomplish it. Break the steps down until you come up with at least one action step you can take this week. Follow your action plan, starting with small steps that build upon each other to move you forward to the resolution of the problem. Follow these steps to analyze your problem from Psychological Self-Help at Mental Health Net. Learn New Skills . . . By reading this article you have begun the process of learning a new skill - the skill of coping with crises and handling transitions of life. Perhaps you have decided you need to learn other new skills - job skills, parenting skills, communication skills, or emotion management. The Internet is a great place to start but you should also seek out support and learning in your community. How You Can Handle Change Better by William Bridges, an organizational transition expert. His recommendations for organizations can be applied to your family transitions as well. This article discusses coping successfully with the middle phase of crises and change, when negative emotions are high and the way out is not yet perceived. A Plan for New Beginnings by William Bridges. During the resolution phase of a crisis you can communicate the four P’s to your family members to help them move forward successfully. Next Page > Sources for this Article > Page 1, 2, 3, 4
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