How Families Can Deal with Stressful Times

Q:  Our family seems to be tolerating the new stresses of living so far, but I can tell that things just still aren’t quite the same. What are some ways that we can prepare ourselves for the future?

A:  I believe very strongly in the potential therapeutic value of stress. No one sets out to enter athletic competition or on a course for a new career without first engaging in a significant amount of preparation. The same holds true for life in the 21st century in the face of new and unanticipated challenges.

Despite the encouragement of our leaders, Americans are just not yet ready to re-enter life in the way we did before September 11th. There is an understandable desire to stay closer to home and to want to be together as a family. Unfortunately for many of us, home may not be the peaceful place that many of us would like it to be. The hectic nature of the 90’s left many households fragmented and frenetic that served more as a way station than a place of rest and re-invigoration. To add to that, many of us are at home involuntarily due to layoffs as a consequence of the slowing economy.

One concept to deal with this is that of “cocooning” as a family. I think of this as an organized, but temporary retreat leading to a reconfiguration and a transformation in family dynamics and preparedness. I suggest that we build on the cocoon analogy and think of this as an opportunity to huddle as though we were playing a game of football. The huddle is a time of structured togetherness that produces a plan for the offensive squad on a football team. It’s a brief retreat before getting right back in the game with a new plan. As families, it’s an opportunity to defy the opposition and re-assert ourselves in the field of play that is our nation and the world.

Here are a few suggestions:

• Come together as a family, preferably over meals at home.
• Ask each person to make a statement regarding the family and its style of functioning and what might be done as a remedy– these are to be general statements not directed at any one individual.
• Ask people to be specific about what they would want to change.
• Adolescents might view this as intrusive – explain why you’re doing it and if you’re being reasonable, don’t be afraid to exert a little parental authority.
• Without some preplanning – it might be easy to revert to more time in front of the computer or renting more movies, but that won’t work.
• This is a great time to attend worship services together as well.

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