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If you have a child who is easily stressed out, you will benefit from learning stress relief tips for kids. Use these suggestions to come up with ideas as to how to help your child deal with stress.

Try dancing. If your child had a bad day, it will help if he can do something that is silly and active. Try putting on dance music and getting the family dancing. Get truly aerobic with it, helping your child work out any stress from the day.

Squeeze it out. Squeezing a stress ball may help your child deal with immediate sources of pressure. Buy your child a squishy stress ball and teach him to squeeze it when he’s upset or angry.

Give your child a massage. Just like adults benefit from massages, kids relax when touched affectionately as well. Give your child a hug. Tuck them into bed and give them a back massage, listening to them talk about their day.

Talk with the lights out. When stress is intense, your child may not be able to tell you how she feels while looking at you, but she may be able to talk once the lights are out and you’re sitting at the foot of her bed. Learn how to ask questions that open your child’s heart. Aim to become your child’s “safe place” emotionally.

Try using music. Play soothing music in the background as your child does homework or reads. Our bodies are affected by music; even our heart rates and blood pressure change when we listen to calming music.

Laugh it out. There’s even such a thing as laughter therapy! Make jokes, or if you aren’t funny, buy a joke book. Find ways to laugh with your child, even if you have to get creative.

Don’t give up; you are helping your child learn how to find stress relief in difficult situations.

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Although every parent has a desire to get along with their children, many parents end up going about this in the completely wrong manner. After all – on the surface – it can seem as though getting along with your children is as simple as simply being nice to them. But many parents who try to get along with their children simply by being nice to them find that this is often a failed experiment!

There are two particular difficulties parents run into when they try to establish a relationship – a “friendship” – with their children simply by being nice to them. The first difficulty these parents run into is the fact that, as children develop, they go through a number of various, distinct stages.

Several of these stages lead the children to feel rebellious toward authority; as these children go through this phase, the parents who simply “try to be nice” end up making concessions. And the more concessions the parents make, the more advantage of these concessions the children take – putting the dynamics of the relationship in precarious territory!

The second difficulty goes hand-in-hand with the first one, and it is the fact that parents are supposed to be the form of authority in the child’s life. If parents try to simply “get along” with their children, it will result in resentment on both sides when the parent actually makes an attempt to exercise their authority.

In the long run – as difficult as this can be at times – the best way to actually get along with your children is to first establish authority, even before you aim for friendship. By establishing your authority in the proper manner – that is, being respectful toward your children, but helping them to understand that you are in charge and that the decisions you are making are in their best interests – you will find that the relationship follows.

Check out the Parental Toolkit - an amazing resource!

Of course, every parent must walk the tightrope of establishing authority and being too heavy-handed with this authority. But if you are going to have to walk this tightrope at one point or another, you may as well walk it first – as this will at least enable you to also have a strong, healthy relationship with your children.