Scared of the dark: helping our children through the night
Helping our children through being scared of the dark feels almost like a rite of passage for a parent. But is there a way to not just help our children survive the night, but flourish in the dark?
Our children spend an enormous amount of their life sleeping. If we can empower them to find peace and God-connection in those times of sleep and darkness, we will equip them in such a significant way. Here is a series of videos Rachel made on helping children and young people who are scared of the dark.
When our children call out that they are scared of the dark, do we instantly respond by putting on more light? Some parents start out the night with a night light, hall light, others wait and turn on lights later. But what if we strategically chose to help our children learn to find their peace with God in the dark, instead of in an external light?
Stories are very powerful in the minds of our children, and when they have a scary one running in their head it can be hard to fight. Sometimes it gets there from a scary television programme, movie, or news story. Sometimes it comes purely from their imagination, but our children can sometimes feel very helpless to change them. One way we can equip them is to restore the power of shaping their own stories.
Sometimes our children get stuck on a scary thought and can feel like they can’t control it. Romans 4:8 gives us a tool for empowering our children to get their minds refocused. “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”
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