Alison Curtis: Always good to check in with the kids at times of change

Hopefully most of us have developed ways in which to cope and adapt. But we must remember children don't have those skills yet. 

Alison Curtis: We moved out of our home into a rental property and my twin sister has moved in with us for three months. File picture

Our family has been through a lot of changes recently and although they are all positive, at our core I think people struggle with change.

We moved out of our home into a rental property and my twin sister has moved in with us for three months.

Even though there was huge excitement about these two developments, I think after a few weeks of settling into our new environment, it has caught up with my daughter Joan.

She has only ever known one “home”, one neighbourhood, and has only ever been with my sister for three weeks at a time. So all of these things are adjustments.

I took for granted that although I was sick of our house and the wait to improve it, Joan loved it. It was her base and all that she has ever known.

Not only has our space changed but her routine has too. For the past four years, we have shared the journey to and from school with her best friend. But now we are making our own way in and I am sure she, on some level, is missing that familiarity and those morning chats.

She has also had to get used to having another person in her home. I can’t express in words how much she adores her aunt and how close they are, but it is still a change to have her here all the time.

We had struggled getting Joan to bed early as it was, but, over the past few weeks, the excitement of having my sister Karen here has created an even bigger distraction and it is even harder to get Joan to part with Karen at bedtime.

Routines have been unsettled in adjusting to a different house, along with the moving, unpacking, and all the extras that are involved. So I am sure that has had an impact on Joan as well.

I think, if I am honest, I took for granted that as adults we react to change differently than children. We have had time to develop coping skills and can rationalise it better.

Although for us adults, in many cases, especially if the change in our lives is out of our control, it feels really uncomfortable and can be overwhelming. But as we are older, hopefully most of us have developed ways in which to cope and adapt.

For children, it is totally different as most decisions aren’t made by themselves and they have little or no control of changes that involve them. We, as their parents, have to really get a “buy-in” from them and make transitions as comfortable as possible for our kids.

We spoke a lot to Joan about the house we were moving into, how it is now so close to her pals and she can ride her bike to school! And we talked for months about Aunt Karen’s arrival date.

With those very basic questions, we all ask our kids when we collect them from school or just before they nod off at night.

But since we have moved in and Karen has arrived, it has been so whirlwind I don’t think I have checked in enough with Joan. 

How I know it has all caught up with Joan is her moods are swinging like mad. One minute she is delirious with giggles the next in tears.

So I have now made a point of doing “intense” check-ins daily like I would have done before the chaos of the move.

I feel it is not only about the kinds of questions we ask our kids but about making space in the day isn’t rushed for them to answer those questions.

I am making a point of picking a place in the day where it is just the two of us, and she isn’t distracted, to ask her how she is. If anything is bothering her? What is making her happy and what is making her sad? And on top of that suggesting to her ways she can react to the changes.

After all, thankfully the new things in our lives are good, but I still need to be making a point of checking in and making sure Joan is OK.