Ask An Expert
Is my child depressed or just irritable?
Is your child depressed or just irritable? Check out these insights from Child Mind Institute. Children and teenagers who are depressed can also be irritable or angry a lot of the time. They may seem on edge. Some depressed kids are irritable instead of sad. Others are both: they alternate between sad and irritable. To be diagnosed with depression, though, a child would need to meet other criteria for depression, too. Those include losing interest in things they used to enjoy, lacking energy, changes in eating and sleep habits, trouble concentrating and making decisions, among other symptoms. Irritability with high energy could be caused by anxiety. Depression generally comes with low energy levels. So when irritability appears with high energy, or it is accompanied by a lot of worried beh...
Are you an overprotective parent? Why not to bubble wrap your kids
Portions of this article were adapted from Colorado State University Professor Anita Bundy’s presentation, “Bubble wrap is for packages, not for people: Balancing duty of care and dignity of risk.” Bundy was awarded the 2023 Eleanor Clarke Slagle Lectureship Award for contributions to occupational therapy. Bundy gave the presentation at the 2024 American Occupational Therapy Association’s annual conference. A Colorado State University researcher whose groundbreaking study conducted at Australian playgrounds says kids also should find themselves near possibly “risky” play areas such as rocks, trees and other outdoor areas. And the embracing of risk goes for older demographics, as well. “Bubble wrapping children and keeping them a...
Positive parenting: Harmful parenting tools we need to unlearn
We recently stumbled upon the Instagram feed @BigLifeJournal and what a treasure trove of fantastic insights and advice for parents. We especially liked this post on the Four Pillars of positive parenting: Harmful parenting tools we need to unlearn: Unlearn punishing emotions: “Why are you crying over such a small thing? Go to your room.” Instead, relearn setting boundaries on behavior: “I know you are so angry at your brother but hitting is not OK.” Unlearn Shame-based strategies: “You’re so ungrateful. Why didn’t you say thnk you?” Relearn skill-building approaches: “How can you show your gratitude for that gift? Do you want to write a note?” Unlearn making kids feel bad to encourage positive behavior: “Don’t b...
Boulder’s Junkyard Social Club: Win tickets to Adventure Playground for Kids and Adults
Win 3 months membership for a family of 4, a $120 value below. It’s “easy like Sunday morning” at Junkyard Social Club in Boulder. Parents and kids sip coffee and cocoas in the cafe while a local musician strums a guitar and sings family favorites. Some parents are sitting solo, reading the newspaper or working on laptops, while kids bounce back and forth between the cafe and the outdoor “Junkyard,” where there is climbing, creating, digging and dancing. As the kids burn off energy in the Boulder sunshine, a Junkyard employee sits in a lifeguard chair, keeping watch, whistling at the ready. It’s just another day at Junkyard Social Club. Boulder’s Junkyard Social Club bills itself as an “adventure playground and rebel museum” – and the name fits. With an emphasis on ...
Ask the Experts: How Can I Ensure my Baby is Getting Safe Sleep?
Sleep is critical to a baby’s growth and development, but it can also come with some unexpected dangers. Learning about creating the proper sleep environment can help keep your little one safe. Below, Children’s Hospital Colorado pediatricians and neonatologists Stephanie Bourque, MD, Sunah Hwang, MD, PhD, and Aniekan Udoko, MD, share their answers to a few of the most common safe sleep questions they hear from parents and caregivers. Courtesy of the Safe to Sleep® campaign; https://safetosleep.nichd.nih.gov/. How do I reduce the risk of sudden unexpected infant death? While it’s not possible to completely eliminate the possibility of sudden unexpected infant death, creating a safe sleep environment for your baby significantly lowers the risk. This includes placing your infant...
How can I teach my child to share?
Does your child struggle with sharing? The tug of war, the kicking, the shoving, we’ve all seen the perils of children fighting over a toy. Sharing is HARD, especially for little ones who don’t have a full understanding of the concept. This is a normal part of the development process. The growing child develops attachments to things as well as persons. This ability to form strong attachments is important to being an emotionally healthy person. The one-year-old has difficulty sharing her mommy; the two-year-old has difficulty sharing her teddy bear. Some children get so attached to a toy that the raggedy old doll becomes part of the child’s self According to Dr. Sears, true sharing implies empathy, the ability to get into another’s mind and see things from their viewpoint. Children ar...
How to end your toxic relationship with food and body image
How are you doing with your New Year’s resolution to eat healthier and respect your body? If you’re like the majority of Americans, those health-conscious resolutions have fallen to the wayside and you’ve returned to your bad habits. But how do you get on a healthier track that isn’t so much about food but rather, eliminating your toxic relationship with your body and food? Today, our health expert talks about how Intuitive Eating and what happened when she stopped obsessing about food. === This year I ended a very negative relationship and started a beautiful one. I dropped my love-hate, ‘food is the enemy,’ constant battle with diet, weight and body image and made peace with food instead. I decided that since we’re in this together we might...
Why Kids Lie and How to Handle It
We’ve all experienced it. That moment when our innocent and obedient child looks us square in the eye and lies to us for the first time. I remember it well. I was snuggled next to my twelve-year-old daughter, Jordan, watching Frozen for the fifty-seventh time. Suddenly, right as Prince Hans was about to reveal that he was not a handsome Prince at all, but a psychopath with sideburns, Jordan yawned and excused herself, saying she was “really tired.” I didn’t think anything of it and continued to watch with rapt attention, when my husband who has Spidey senses came over to me and whispered, “She took her phone up to her room.” We checked the charging station to find that the phone was gone, we discussed our plan of action, then went up to her room to confront her. As I peeked int...
How can I expand my picky eater’s palate?
Dear Mama Drama: My two-year-old won’t eat anything, but macaroni and cheese. I’m afraid to give him other things because if he doesn’t eat it he’ll be hungry. I see other children, even younger than him, eating a wide variety of foods. I am amazed that they will eat things like tofu and vegetables. How can I get my son to eat a wider variety of foods? ~Scared of starving Dear Scared: Many children have difficulty expanding their food choices once they have found a favorite food. Macaroni and cheese, PB & J, and mashed potatoes are common favorites. They may like the texture, smell, or associate a positive experience with that food. However, we have to offer them other foods on a regular basis if we want them to make other choices. Our job as parents is to provide healthy options for o...
My husband’s affair: How I’m doing seven years later
In 2018, I turned 40. For my birthday, I hiked myself to the top of Courthouse Peak. I paddled Silver Jack Reservoir. I took myself out to dinner and then I camped in my truck near Yankee Boy Basin. The next day, I joined several friends for an adventurous hike to the Opus Hut. We ended up lost, scrambled down a scree slope and collapsed at the hut with wine and birthday celebrations. I just knew that 40 was going to be freaking fantastic. I am now on the cusp of turning 43. I can attest that every year of my 40s, not just the first one, has been freaking fantastic. My 40s have been full of adventure and career changes and leaps of faith. Mostly though, as cheesy as this sounds, my 40s have been full of gratitude. From 2014, when I discovered my husband’s affair until 2017, when I finally ...
4 Tips to Help Denver Children Cope with Hard Things
The prolonged nature of the pandemic and hard things has brought chronic levels of stress and anxiety to many families. Though there appears to be an end in sight, we have a long way to go before things are back to normal. In these confusing times, we must be cognizant of how heightened stress and loss can impact the children in our lives. As the Program Director for the Kempe Center’s Trauma-Responsive Implementation and Practice, I have spent much of my career helping children, families and childcare professionals respond to these sorts of high-stress, traumatic situations. Helping Kids Cope with Hard Things If your child is impacted by this adversity, here are some tips on how you should support and respond to your child’s needs in these difficult times: Be calm and speak ca...
Do different parenting styles cause problems? What you can do to help your relationship
Disagreements and parenting – two things that seem to hit just about every parent. The question is does it have to cripple your relationship? Does believing in time-out vs. sticker chore chart really need to be something that after years of not being resolved causes divorce? Nope. It doesn’t. Let’s talk about why disagreements in parenting style happen in the first place. As parents from totally separate families, the first thing that happens is we get raised by our parent’s values, their discipline styles, and their temperaments which then in turn shape us. If it worked for us….we tend to duplicate it. If it didn’t we tend to avoid it. Another thing that impacts our parenting styles is our own temperament. Can you listen to your toddler sc...
