When children reach the age of three, they have new needs related to the development of their skills and self-awareness. Accordingly, experienced fears also change.
The age from three to five years is characterized by the emotional content of the child's personality. Feelings are no longer just lived through, but they begin to be called and spoken out loud. Children are no longer just looking for themselves in the hierarchy of relationships, but they themselves strive to build these relationships. And here we are talking not only about the family, but also about just acquaintances and peers. On this experience, the formation of such categories as guilt, conscience, experience occurs. Children learn to express their feelings, talk about them, and seek to hear about the feelings of others towards themselves. Therefore, the question “Do you love me?” Is often asked, and they themselves show tenderness, sympathy, compassion.
In addition to building relationships with others, children also learn to build relationships with themselves. At this age, they are able to occupy themselves for a long time, play alone in role-playing games, and fantasize. This is a natural and normal process, but with an unfavorable course of life, it becomes a factor that enhances fantasies and negative experiences.
Fairy-tale characters in children's fears appear even earlier than three years old, but now they appear in the daytime. In addition to the well-known characters, the fantasies of a child can give birth to fictional monsters. Also, this age period is characterized by a fairly stable triad of fears: loneliness (loss of love), darkness and confined space.
Despite affection for both parents (provided there is even and friendly relations in the family), children closer to four years old single out a parent of the opposite sex. This is the so-called "Electra complex" for girls, and the "Oedipus complex" for boys. With insufficient emotional closeness with a parent of the opposite sex, the child may develop fears of Baba Yaga or the Wolf, Barmaley - as an experience of lack of attention and warmth. Male and female characters are respectively identified with dad and mom.
Practical advice
1. The most important prevention of fears in this age period still remains emotional stability and calmness in the family, equal relationships. This is the very resource that helps the child to independently cope with age-related characteristics, with new experiences, this is a state of protection and support in life.
2. In addition, it is important to remember that the ability of family members to express their love for each other and for the child itself becomes important for the baby. And there is also the ability to accept this love. Do not disregard the fiftieth mention of the baby about the tenderness felt towards you: hug, kiss, thank, admit the reciprocal feeling. The more our children hear how they are loved, the stronger and bolder they become.
3. Never let your child understand with your behavior and words that you may not love him. The worst thing that a child can hear: "I do not love you" or "If you behave this way, I will not love you." After all, the same phrase can be pronounced in a completely different way: “I get upset when you misbehave because I love you” - the meaning is the same, but it is perceived in a completely different way.
4. The fear of the dark comes from the times when it harbored hidden predators and other danger. The survivor was the one who knew how to predict these dangers and react to them in time. One way or another, all children go through the fear of the dark, and this is normal. You need to experience when this fear becomes obsessive. And the right actions also depend on how deep this fear is rooted inside. For some children, just a night light nearby and permission to turn it on and off at their discretion may be enough - just the ability to control darkness and light sometimes solves the problem. And other children may need much more help and support in this matter. Do not be afraid to lie down next to the child or invite him to your bed, allow the door to be left ajar, make sure there is no one in the closet ten times in the evening, tell for the three hundredth time that you will not give your little son or daughter an insult to anyone. It can be difficult for adults to endure all these rituals, but it is much more difficult for children to cope with their horrors in front of darkness and defenselessness - this is always worth remembering.
5. Parents should have a clear rule - never punish a child by locking him or her in a dark room or closet. And even the well-known time-outs in a separate room should be ruled out at this age. Adults quickly see the strength of the impact of such punishments, but they do not always understand the strength of its consequences: aggravation of fears, panic, stuttering, and nervous tics.
6. The age from three to five years is the period when work with fears can be done through images and creativity. Children at this time are responsive to any games. Draw fears together, sculpt with plasticine, give them names, play with them, tame them, take care of them with your child. Come up with your own fairy tales instead of the "scary" ones - let the child have options for various developments of events.
