Does your mental health condition make it more challenging to complete tasks throughout your day-to-day life? Do you sometimes feel like the extra struggle of coping with mental illness affects your parenting style? Though some days can be more challenging than others, successfully parenting while managing a mental health condition is possible. It may just take some extra help and resources, depending on the day.
If you are struggling with successfully parenting while managing a mental health condition, consider professional treatment. Alter San Diego Crisis Intervention can help on the road to healing, improved mental health, and successful parenting.
Stabilizing a Mental Health Condition
Millions of Americans struggle with mental illness and, of those millions, thousands upon thousands of people are parents. When we discuss mental illness, we talk about how people are affected, but we sometimes neglect the impact on families.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicate that children’s mental health is strongly connected to the mental health of the parent. A study they reference indicated that “1 in 14 children has a caregiver with poor mental health.” When mental illness is involved, parents require help and support, especially if they hope to maintain their child’s mental health.
There are additional resources available, but more often than not, parents are unable to access these resources. That could be for any number of reasons. Perhaps depression or anxiety prevents a parent from seeking additional help or prevents them from entirely seeking any help. A mental health condition may also lead you to experience a mental health crisis.
Professional services can help stabilize a mental health crisis. Our 6-step crisis stabilization plan allows us to help you by:
- Defining the problem
- Ensuring safety
- Providing support
- Examining alternatives
- Making a plan
- Obtaining commitment
It is vital to understand that having a mental health condition does not make you a bad parent. The will to seek treatment and get better is more important than the areas of parenting hindered by a mental health condition. It is also vital to talk to your children about their mental health.
Talking To Your Children About Your Mental Health
Depending on the age and maturity of a child, you may want to discuss your mental health with your children. You must acknowledge the difficulty of having a mental health condition. If your child is older, they may hold some complex feelings about how your mental health has impacted them. You must recognize and address those feelings and educate them on the effects of mental illness.
Some may also have to spend time reconnecting with their children. Experiencing a mental illness can sometimes make you feel in a fog. Getting to know your child all over again can be emotionally challenging, but is a unique opportunity to rekindle your relationship with them. You may also benefit from family counseling. At Alter San Diego Crisis Intervention, we emphasize the importance of connecting to family and community in a way that helps you manage your mental health.
How Mental Illness Can Hinder Your Parenting
We can all afford to improve our parenting skills from time to time. That aside, mental illness affects our behaviors. This means that when behavior is influenced by our symptoms, we may not be able to fulfill some of our parenting responsibilities. For example, depression makes it hard to simply get out of bed in the morning. If we can not get out of bed to take care of ourselves, how can we get out of bed to take care of our children?
These behaviors can cause social, emotional, or behavioral problems within children. However, mental illness may also affect communication, cause problems within a marriage, or lead to job loss, which may ultimately lead to poverty. So many of these situations are out of our control. However, the right treatment services can help you improve your mental health and help you fulfill your parental responsibilities.
Successfully Parenting With a Mental Health Condition
The best way to learn how to successfully parent while managing a mental health condition is to seek professional treatment. Medications, behavioral therapies, family counseling, and support groups can help you improve your mental health.
As you continue this journey of improved wellness, you will slowly see progress. For example, getting out of bed will become something you want to do. You will also begin wanting to spend more time with family and friends and get back to participating in activities you once enjoyed.
How You Can Start Successfully Parenting Today
Alter San Diego Crisis Intervention can help you start successfully parenting while managing your mental health today. Our services aid your mental health and overall wellness, which can ultimately improve your parenting skills. We can also help you learn valuable life lessons in communication, time management, and emotional regulation, all of which are vital to parenting.
Call us at Alter San Diego Crisis Intervention to seek professional mental health treatment today.
Mental illness affects millions of Americans, but what we do not always realize is how every area of our life is impacted. Unfortunately, mental illness can severely hinder your ability to parent. Mental health conditions like depression and anxiety are so crippling that simply getting out of bed in the morning becomes an impossible feat. These conditions can influence children, cause emotional and behavioral issues, and even lead them to develop mental illness later in life. The best way to combat the negative effect mental illness has on your parenting is to seek treatment. To do so, call Alter San Diego Crisis Intervention at (866) 986-1481. We can help you start successfully parenting while managing mental health today.
