Andrew, Cat and I are very much looking forward to meeting together in 2023, and are working to build our community between now and then. It seems a long time in the future, but we are looking forward to it already! One of the things we are doing is running a series of online ‘In Conversation’ events with Positive Psychology Practitioners. As this is emerging technology for us, we decided the first event should be ‘in house’ so that if we experienced any teething problems, it would not impact negatively on our guest speakers. Thus, I was the first speaker, facilitated by Cat, with Andrew behind the scenes ensuring that our It worked correctly.

Our aim with the ‘In Conversation’ events is that our guests talk about what their current ‘hot topic’ is within their area of Positive Psychology. For me, this has been how the Corona Virus Pandemic has impacted on us as parents and carers. I wanted to explore how Positive Psychology could help us deal with these challenges; not just how our work lives, income, and routines have changed, but how we have also had to juggle on-line schooling, reduced social activities for the children in our care. Also the reduced access to our wider network of friends and family – the village that we depend upon to help raise our children.

As parents and carers, we are often told, ‘put your oxygen mask on first’* and ‘you can’t pour from an empty cup’**. I wanted to look for the science-based evidence for suggestions of how to resource ourselves to be resilient and to support our wellbeing. How to find our oxygen masks, and how to fill our cups.

I found two very interesting pieces of research, and used them as the backbone of my ‘In Conversation’ session, and would like to introduce them here.

Firstly, Lea Waters, Sara B. Algoe, Jane Dutton, Robert Emmons, Barbara L. Fredrickson, Emily Heaphy, Judith T. Moskowitz, Kristin Neff, Ryan Niemiec, Cynthia Pury & Michael Steger (2021) Positive psychology in a pandemic: buffering, bolstering, and building mental health, The Journal of Positive Psychology. I really enjoyed reading this as it was a very clear article, written in easy-to-understand language that made its findings easy to apply. They suggest focussing on the following areas to build wellbeing and resilience:

Character strengths
Coping
Courage
Gratitude
High Quality Connections
Meaning
Positive Emotions
Positive Relationships and
Self-compassion.***

Two of these; character strengths and gratitude are also the top two most effective Positive Psychology Interventions for boosting and maintaining wellbeing. I took each of these in turn, and explored how we could use these in our roles as parents and carers. I also explained how this helps us model the behaviours we want to see in the children in our care. Children do what we do, and if we are using our character strengths, building and affirming healthy relationships, and practising gratitude, this will become part of their emotional landscape too. This helps them build their own toolkit of what works for their wellbeing.

One of the ways the pandemic has impacted our family is that we have become more insular. Restrictions on travel and local lockdowns, coupled with school and college going online for parts of two academic years, have reduced the social interactions we have been able to have. There have been discussions about how this is a global traumatic event, and that it will have a negative impact on the mental health of our children and young people. Many of us will be familiar with the ACES model; Adverse Childhood Experiences. These have an impact on the physical and mental health of the children as they progress into adulthood, and also on the coping strategies and access to social support.

The second piece of research I talked about ‘In Conversation’ was conducted by Christina Bethell, PhD, MBA, MPH; Jennifer Jones, MSW; Narangerel Gombojav, MD, PhD; Jeff Linkenbach, EdD; Robert Sege, MD, PhD (2019) Positive Childhood Experiences and Adult Mental and Relational Health in a Statewide Sample, JAMA Pedriatrics. I particularly love it because the focus is on how to promote wellbeing and resilience for the children on our care. What is also interesting, for me, is that the relationship between positive childhood experiences and good mental health is ‘dose responsive’, that means, the more positive childhood experiences a child gets, the better their mental health, into adulthood. The seven areas it highlighted as Positive Childhood Experiences are:

Felt able to talk with family about feelings
Felt their family stood by them in difficult times
Enjoyed participating in community traditions
Felt a sense of belonging in High School
Felt supported by their friends
Had at least two non-parent adults who took a genuine interest in them
Felt safe and protected in their home.

I really loved this positive focus. A lot of the time as parents and carers we can feel that we are failing the children in our care, and that they cannot recover from ACEs. This research suggests that positive childhood experiences help undo trauma, and the more, the better! These are ‘dose respondent’ events, so the more they are experienced by the children in our care, the higher the impact.

My summary from these two pieces of research, for how to boost wellbeing and resilience as a parent or carer in a pandemic is this:

Identify and use your character strengths
Find your tribe
Positive relationships and high quality connections strengthen and support us
Have a sense of meaning and purpose
Be grateful, brave and have self-compassion
Our children’s Adverse Childhood Experiences can be mitigated by Positive Childhood Experiences
These are ‘dose respondent’; the more, the better!
The ‘village’ of trusted grown-ups need only be two people
Being ‘present’ and encouraging our children to talk about their emotions helps them cope with difficult times
These benefits last into adulthood and help build resilient adults with a good support network.

I hope this has been useful to you, and hope you will be able to join in with our ‘In Conversation’ events coming up.

*A reference to airline safety procedures: adults are asked to put their oxygen mask on first, then attend to the children in their care and their oxygen masks.

**This one puzzles me; who pours from cups?! Aren’t jugs better-designed for pouring?

***My first career was as a Librarian, so I am afraid I put these into alphabetical order. J