Young Single Parents & Cognitive Coping Strategies
Single parents perform a 24-hour, seven-day a week job that two parents can trade off in shifts. There is no one there to take over when a single parent is too tired to deal with a note sent home by a teacher or has a child with disciplinary problems. Psychologists have come up with cognitive coping strategies to help parents manage stress so that it doesn't burn the parent out or have a negative impact on the children. The coping is active instead of passive.
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Cognitive Coping Theory and Stress
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Cognitive coping strategies arose out of the theory that dealing with stress is primarily determined by the individual's understanding of the events or problems at the core of his stress. It determines whether the parent's reactions will be irrational or rational. Cognitive coping strategies are designed to explore the parent's resources in dealing with stress, the family unit's understanding of the events that have caused the stress and their desire to correct the problems.
Positive Reappraisal
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Positive reappraisal is the technical term for finding the bright side of any situation. It can be achieved by the parent taking a break from stressful situations and dedicating time to meditation. The meditation, even if for only five or 10 minutes, will give the parent a moment to reflect on the positive aspects of the situation before reacting. As an only parent, there is the added stress of not having another parent there to point out things aren't as bad as they seem when a teen gets into trouble for hanging out with the wrong crowd or talking back to a teacher. The positive could be recognizing a correctable problem coupled with positive reframing.
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Positive Reframing
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As positive reappraisal focuses on acknowledging the good in bad situations, positive reframing is the active process of turning those bad situations into challenges to overcome. The parent works with the child to find ways to overcome the problems of doing poorly in school or learning how to identify negative influences in friends. Sharon Price writes in "Families & Change" that "such 'active' coping strategies are more successful in reducing stress and restoring constructive parental behaviors than are 'passive' approaches involving acceptance as an outgrowth of fatalism."
Using Your Social Environment
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When a parent looks to her social support system for education and advice, she is using the social network resources available to her such as parents, siblings, co-workers, psychologists and friends. Through their social support system, they learn of reality-based methods of informed parenting, child development and managing the stress that they face from those who've already gone through it. In this strategy, information empowers the single parent. What they expect from their child is more realistic, and they are able to put what they've learned to use to be a more competent parent.
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