One simple step to help your child feel safe and loved during separation

Una Archer GMBPsS is a psychologist, Circle of Security Parenting Facilitator and Brainspotting therapist

Member of the Compass Resolution Family Mediation Team of Experts

Separating parents often worry about the impact the separation will have on their children. Will it impact their sense of self-worth? Were they affected by what they saw and heard before the separation? Will they be able to create healthy and lasting relationships in the future?

While separation is a significant event that will always be a part of their story, there are many things parents can do to support their children and soften the long-term impact of separation.

Today I want to share some tips based on attachment research because it outlines what children need to feel safe and loved by their parents. I’ll invite you to think about the basic, immediate needs that sometimes can be overshadowed by all the changes that come with separation.

Why do I believe this approach is effective?

Understanding your child’s attachment needs can help you stop worrying about what happened in the past and what will happen in the future (at least for a bit) and help you to take simple steps to support your child in the present.

Meeting our child’s attachment needs helps to create security, overwrite some of the experiences in the past, and strengthen your relationship and your confidence to navigate whatever the future might bring.

We know from attachment research that children have three primary emotional needs:

• Secure base
• Exploration
• Comfort

We don’t need to be perfect. We just need to be willing and consistent enough.

Circle of Security International (2018) summarised those needs into this simple graphic:

The first need is a secure base, an attachment figure they can trust (the hands on the left). When children know who is their secure base, they move in a circle – they go out to explore, experience something new, and master a new skill (top of the circle). After a while, they might get overwhelmed or tired, and then they look to come back for comfort, and protection, to make sense of what they just experienced, and to fill up their cup (bottom of the circle). Once their cup is full, they return for another round on the circle. Those three elements – secure base, exploration and comfort work together.

We know that intuitively, we experienced our version of it growing up, and we continue to provide that to our children. Being able to picture it as a simple image can help you think about what your child needs more clearly.

Going through separation can impact every part of the circle. I shared my observation about what might happen and some tips based on what other parents and I found helpful during this time. Please don’t feel you have to implement all of them. You don’t need to overdo it. You know your child best. Use it as a guide, a springboard for your thinking. If just one thing jumps out and inspires you to start a conversation or do something – that’s good enough.

 Secure base

You can’t pour from an empty cup. It’s challenging to be the secure base for your child when your world is changing. Remember to be kind, accepting, forgiving and patient with yourself. Things will get easier.

• Think about that person who was your secure base, who had your back when you were growing up. It could have been a family member, a teacher, or a coach. What was it about them that you appreciated so much? How can you bring more of that to how you are with your child?
• Look after your nervous system – lack of sleep or exercise, poor diet can impact our ability to be present with our child.
• Can you take care of some practicalities (like shopping for groceries, cooking or planning an activity) before seeing your child? It will help you to be more present when you are with them.

Exploration

You might have felt distracted from supporting your child’s exploration because you are dealing with so much internally and externally. Or maybe it was more of another parent’s remit, and it is new for you as well? If you are moving to a different area, it will require extra thought. It’s easy for things can fall through the cracks. Here are a few questions to help you think about it:

• Can they still see their extended family members and friends and attend after-school clubs?
• Do you know what they are interested in and how you could support those interests?
• What do they like doing for fun? Can you try something new together?

Comfort

Seeing your child upset (for whatever reason) can bring up a lot of feelings – guilt, shame, overwhelm. You might feel an acute need for your child to be ok, which makes it harder to offer comfort to your children when they need it.

• Having emotional support for you, a person you can go to with your emotional needs, will help enormously to be there for your child when they need you.
• Think of different emotions as different colours of the rainbow or the changing weather – there are no good or bad emotions. Fair enough, some of them are uncomfortable. When they come up, breathe, stay in your body, stay listening, and stay available if your child wants you close.
• Talk less, listen more. You might feel the pressure to come up with that perfect explanation when your child brings up something about separation. Ask some open questions first: “Could you tell me more?”, “What’s that like for you?” It will invite them to share more about what is happening in their world and what they really want to know.

If you were to choose one step from the list above, which would you choose?

Una Archer GMBPsS is a psychologist, Circle of Security Parenting Facilitator and Brainspotting therapist offering attachment and trauma informed parenting support. For more information, visit https://www.helpyourchildthrive.co.uk/