How to Manage Child's Cry?

'Don't cry, it's nothing!' 'Don't cry, you don't have a reason!' How often do we say that to our children? How often do you hear those words from others when they talk to their children when they are crying?

Why are we sometimes so afraid when the child is crying? Why are we sometimes angry? And why do we sometimes feel completely lost? What it does in us that sometimes we just want to stop it immediately?

We understand crying when a child is physically hurt; he fell from the bike, she ran and stumbled. But why is it so hard to feel and understand psychical and emotional pain? Or why we expect that the child will quickly process his feelings? Some of the crying we can manage, some of the crying seems logical to us and we can offer our empathy, love, and understanding. But what is going on when we can't bear a second more of crying? Why is it so hard?

It is because good healthy child's cry opens our inner young human. Unknowingly it leads us to our depths, exactly where we have not clarified our own feelings from our childhood.

It is painful for us also. There are so many hidden feelings inside of us that we are not aware of. And having children and watching and absorbing their sad and not so pleasant feelings is hard for adults also. Because in a child's meltdown there you stand all rough and naked and at the same time also very complex, subjected to your and child's emotions. And in this way we don't feel pleasant, we feel fear, sadness, anger, emptiness, disappointment. A whole range of emotions we sometimes even can not describe. That is why sometimes we just want to get rid of this emotions, we want them to stop, to hide again. We want the child to stop crying, so we can forget about all this hidden storage. We will never say a smiling child to stop smiling or that there is no reason for him or her to smile. No. A smile warms our hearts, it makes us feel pleasant. But cry, a cry is something different.

Now imagine all these big feelings that you can hardly control, all those big feelings inside the child. Inside the small body of your child. How strange and how intense this must feel. Such a big emotions in such a small body. And with little experiences what all this even is. It's their big struggle also. Even bigger, because they are smaller, they are still at the beginning of their world exploration. And with an adult who adopts the whole child's world, with all the ups and downs, his exploration will be more pleasant, his journey more joyful and in the end self-awareness and self-understanding will be child's biggest gift.

So what to do? As a parent try. Try harder. Try all of these:

• help yourself understand what is going on inside of you. What remains that has to be recovered? Observe yourself, find you trigger and try to resolve it.
• give, give unconditional love, understanding, and empathy. To yourself. To the child.
• remember that this is her struggle, not yours, try to keep a distance so you can calmly help her with her big emotions.
• be there for him, never try to make his problems less worth than yours. These are big and real fights that your child is going through.
• let them cry, let them get all these terrifying feelings out. You are helping them become healthy adults.

Empathy. A Little word with great meaning. This is all we need. To feel, to understand others. And it is the most our children need. They need to know that someone understands them. They need to know that someone loves them, all of them when they laugh when they cry. They need to feel secure with all the feelings inside of them. Empathy. Be there with your child. Let them cry, let them be little and feel big. Because in that way we are building adults who won't' be terrified with child's cry.