The article is from New Oriental Family Education, author: Little Tomato, the main creative group.
Before my son went to junior high school, I thought I was a parenting genius. Because my son has been motivated since he was a child, his grades are among the best, and he rarely worries about people, which has always been my greatest pride. But who would have thought that since his son entered the second year of junior high school, everything has been developing in an uncontrollable direction. At first, it was very difficult to write homework, and it often stayed late;The whole person became silent, and he only cared about eating at the dinner table;Even the teacher called me **, saying that my son has been distracted in class recently, does not pay attention to lectures, and does not complete his homework seriously;I thought that the second year of junior high school was too difficult, and the child was tired of learning, so I didn't take it too seriously, but kept telling him to study more Xi. Unexpectedly, this situation is getting worse. 
In the midterm exam last semester, he fell from the fixed top 10 to the top 30 for the first time. I can't accept this result!Not to mention the prestigious school I expected, even an ordinary high school is enough. I was furious and asked him loudly what was going onI saw my son glance at me with a tired face, and then went straight into his room and slammed the door shut. What kind of attitude is this?I was half angry, and every night after that day I had to move a small bench to supervise his studies. I thought that my son would understand my good intentions and put away his heart to study Xi. Who would have thought that in exchange for only my son's deeper and deeper dislike for me, and an increasingly rotten attitude. Later, people simply found various reasons to refuse to go to school. I was furious and shocked:How can you do it without going to school?I can't keep up in the first place, and if I don't go to school anymore, isn't it a complete waste?However, whenever I forced him to open the door of his room and force him to go to school, he stared at me fiercely, saying that if he forced him to go to school, he would die. I was physically and mentally exhausted, so I had to help him and the school apply for a period of leave. After taking a leave of absence, he didn't get up in the morning during the day, slept until noon, usually nestled in bed and played games, and never went out of the room half a step except for eating. To tell you the truth, this period of time is also the darkest moment in my life. I looked at my son who was completely ruined, and every day I was so anxious and anxious that I couldn't sleep well at night and couldn't eat. I can't figure out how the sensible and self-disciplined child before became like this. 
Desperate, I decided to seek help from a professional. That day, I was grinding hard and hard to get my son to reluctantly agree to go to a psychiatrist with me. After a series of tests on my son and a long face-to-face conversation, the doctor came to an unbelievable conclusion: my son was suffering from moderate depression!The doctor also told me that my son was in great pain and was in a very dangerous state of low energy. Seeing that I was puzzled, the doctor went on to explain that everyone has their own energy level, just like the battery level of a mobile phone. 
Children with high energy levels are like a little sun, full of energy in everything they do, and most of their emotions are optimistic, positive, and happyChildren with low energy levels are like a train that can't be pulled, they feel bored and bored doing anything, and most of their emotions are pessimistic, depressed, and inferior. Children in a low-energy state not only have difficulty perceiving happiness, but also have great mood swings, which is very detrimental to physical health. A normal person's energy level is around 200, but my son's energy level is between 40-50, which is very dangerous. My face was full of shock, and I subconsciously asked:"But my son was still good before, why did it become like this?”The doctor pondered for a moment and said to me, "The cause may be more complex, and there are internal and external causes. Do you usually focus on your child's Xi, what he likes and what troubles he has?I was speechless. The doctor continued: "As far as I know, this child has been growing up in a relatively high-pressure environment since he was a child, and he has high requirements for himself. However, since he entered junior high school, the courses have become more difficult, and the level of his classmates has improved, and he has become more and more difficult to learn, and the pressure is very great. But as a parent, he did not pay attention to the psychological changes of his children in time, and only knew to force his children to learn Xi, which made his heart more and more painful, coupled with his more restrained personality, it was easy to consume himself inward. ”Yes, my son actually mentioned it to me a long time ago, saying that he found it a bit difficult to learn Xi. But at that time, I didn't think so, and said that it was difficult for you and everyone, and I just cared about urging him to work harder. Even because of the decline in grades, he constantly criticized, hit him, and humiliated him. It turned out that I was unknowingly consuming his inner energy bit by bit. Such a low-energy child is like a scrapped battery, what energy does he have to talk about self-improvement and self-control?Thinking of this, I urgently asked the doctor what I could do to save my son who was in danger. The doctor told me that the top priority is not to force the child to learn Xi, but only to devote himself to one thing: to help the child replenish life energy. 
So, in the next 3 months, I followed the doctor's advice and made the following changes to help my son boost his energy. 1. Parents maintain positive emotionsIn a home, emotions are contagious. That is, if parents often have negative emotions such as irritability, frustration, and anxiety. This kind of negative emotion will imperceptibly affect the child, making him depressed, suffocated, and gray inside. Ever since my son was tired of school, I was always sighing and frowning at home. In fact, this anxiety also invisibly affected the son, strengthened the son's guilt, and became more and more painful in his heart. So, from that day on, I made up my mind to adjust my emotional state at home and keep myself calm and optimistic. Since it is already a fact that my child is suspended from school, I might as well accept it calmly and face it with a smile. My child can do whatever he wants at home every day, and I never complain and I fully support it. 2. Help children find their self-worthBehind many of his son's seemingly "rotten" behaviors is confusion and fear of the future. He has been working hard before, and there is nothing else in life except learning Xi, and all his self-worth is obtained through learning Xi. Therefore, when he couldn't achieve Xi from his studies, his life suddenly fell into darkness, and later he could only escape from himself through games. So, the most important thing for me at the moment is to inject love and strength into his heart. For this reason, I deliberately found my son and sincerely apologized to him: "Son, it was my mother who was wrong before, making you think that grades are everything in life, but in fact they are not." In the eyes of your mother, you are very good, you are righteous, kind, knowledgeable, and you play basketball very well, and there must be infinite possibilities in the future. You have to remember that no matter what you want to do, success or failure, your mother will always support you and love you. When the son heard this, he nodded vigorously, his eyes full of tears. 
3. Jump out of the original environmentThe doctor told me that my son was in an anxious and depressing environment for a long time, day after day, year after year. The best way to get your child out of this low-energy state is to jump out of the old environment and wash the tired body with a new environment. So, my teammates and I decided to take a leave of absence to take our son on a long-distance trip, to Xinjiang, which he had longed for before. From the Taklamakan Desert to the Karajun Steppe, I saw a long-lost smile on his face, a yearning for life and the future. After a trip, our parent-child relationship has improved a lot. Together, we lament the magic of nature, talk about life and ideals. When I got home, I could feel that the energy magnetic field of the whole house had changed. He started to be willing to get out of the room, talk to us easily, and even start to read books and do homework, which gave me a lot of confidence. 4. Change the language patternTo be honest, my son grew up under my strict discipline from childhood to adulthood. As long as my homework does not meet my expectations, I Xi inertly accuse him: not careful, not serious, not working hard......During the period when his grades dropped, I also sneered at him: "How did you do it?".You can get such a simple question wrong!I was so disappointed. Now I know that "the essence of human nature is the desire to appreciate, especially children." Appreciating can make a child grow into a towering tree, and belittling can make a child wither and deform. So, I decided to change my language pattern. With my son's help, I helped him analyze the strengths and weaknesses of each subject, and suggested that he start with the best mathematics. When he tackled a difficult problem, I encouraged him on the side, "Mom can't understand such a difficult question, son, you are awesome!.""Whenever he's made a certain stage of progress, I praise him from the bottom of my heart. In this way, my son slowly regained his self-confidence, and the smile on his face became more and more. Yes, positive language cues can influence a person's mood and make them positive and energetic. 5. Take your children to outdoor sportsThe doctor also told me that sweat helps reduce stress and anxiety, which in turn shifts emotions in a positive direction. During exercise, dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine are produced, important neurotransmitters that can improve your child's life. Therefore, my teammates and I unanimously decided to take our son to outdoor sports such as hiking, running, and hiking every weekend. After each exercise, my son's face was full of refreshment and energy. The more you exercise, the faster the flow of life energy, the renewal of body functions, and the improvement of the energy and confidence of the whole person. 
In this way, after a few months of adjustment, my son's state has improved greatly. He is no longer addicted to games, but began to arrange his daily time reasonably: reading, Xi, exercising every day, occasionally going out with us on weekends, outings, and experiencing life with his heart. That day, my son knocked on my door and said softly, "Mom, I want to try to go to school, is that okay?"At that moment, I almost burst into tears of excitement. I think that all the hard work and changes I have made in the past few months have been worth it, and no matter what the future holds for my son, I will stand firmly behind him and be a gas station for him to move forward. After leading my son out of the darkness and regaining his life, I would like to share a sentence with you:We parents should be the base of our children's sense of security, the source of self-confidence, and the source of life energy. Finally, I also hope that all parents can use my lessons to improve their parenting style and create a warm, positive and energetic family atmosphere for their children. Lit"Looking",Let's encourage together.