At the beginning of February the state of Victoria was overwhelmed with fires. These fires destroyed countless homes and properties, killed hundreds of people, and changed lives. The news was all over and apparently it was a bit overwhelming for Madi. Ever since she can't go to sleep at night because she is afraid of the fires - she is afraid that they will get our house. We have tried everything we can think of...including a FHE all about fire safety and our escape routes. The FHE made her feel better for a night, but then we had scared Cooper for a night. Kevin even bought a fire extinguisher and made her a CD full of happy songs to listen to at night. So this is what she is to do before she goes to bed now - write in her happy book (a book I made for her to write her feelings in) about all the things that made her happy that day, read her scriptures, say her prayers, and listen to her happy music. It takes her hours to settle down and she is driving me crazy. Some of it I believe is because she is scared, but she works her self up and then it is hard to get her to calm down (this is typical Madi). Any suggestions?
Friday, March 6, 2009
FIRES!!
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5 comments:
Our school newsletter had a really good article in it about this, I will email it to you.
Oh poor little Madi! The only thing I can suggest is Prayer! With Oaklee's battles with anxiety over the weather, Prayer has been the #1 thing that has helped! When she's scared we've taught her to pray which brings her some comfort and peace so that shes able to sleep.
Adiel was afraid of all sorts of catastrophies for a while. Every night he prayed: "Please don't let there be a fire in our house or an earthquake or electric shocks or anything that could kill us". And all this was just out of nowhere. No news, no incident's, nothing! Only thing that helped with him was time.
When Eric was 6 Robert took him to scout camp, which was great. He let him listen to the ghost stories, which was bad. The idea of "the goat-man" plagued our home every night for months.
When Robert and I started treating the fear mater-of-factly it seemed to lessen. I felt kind of mean saying "you are safe, I don't want to hear about the "goat-man" any more tonight. We'll talk about it in the morning." but it did help.
I think our children watch our reaction to events and fears and sometimes putting on a tough face can help them learn to deal with scary ideas. Sometimes there is nothing we can do to change this world and we have to tough-it-out. Talking about how you deal with your fears can help Madi understand that everyone gets scared at times but you get through it. If you think she can handle it tell her about Great Grandma and Grandpa Cooper's house fire. Terrible thing but they got through it.
i was going to ask you about these fires they were terrible. i heard about them for days on my fox news. did they ever catch anyone for arson? i don't know for madi. this is not a new thing for her so it is probably normal and i am guessing by all you and kevin have done for her she is getting a lot of attention, which could carry it out even longer good luck i have no real advice sorry. your always in my thoughts!!!
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