How to rekindle love? (2)

[SH_]

Yes. Patience. Trying to "strew" helpful materials. Talking.

I've tried all of these with mixed success.

Keep at it.....
I started my process with d18 when she was in the 8th grade.
Thats when I noticed the manifestations that were going to challenge her.
I did not give up.
Trial and error.
Much patience, love and sometimes simple sitting through the tears and struggles.
Much like DB, much validation, some teaching, more validation and lots of patience.

One recent example was not wanting to go to a party for a school activity. It's a largish group (for our area). Teen has social anxiety about parties. I never know whether to encourage going, or how hard to encourage. Gentle encouragement was not working, and then kid got sick.

Encourage, but respect the choice....
He wants to go, it will just have to be on his terms.
I just read n article today about the science behind the introvert mind.
Science as in proven research, not simply theory.
Very interesting and continues to evolve my thoughts on this matter.
I'll find it again and share some of what I got from it.

Another example is trying to reframe negative thoughts around stress or school or interactions with friends. If there are two ways to frame things, one that makes it not about him and one that makes him feel bad about himself, he always chooses the second.

Continue to ask questions gently....let him lead and select what he needs. He will discover it on his time.

I did have one success last week. He came to me upset about an issue at school, and I found myself trying to fix it, and he was getting frustrated with me. Then I caught myself and switched to validating, and he quickly returned to a calmer state.

And this sounds like DBing... crazy how it can apply in other aspects of life.
Great job.
Marke it down as success, try again, monitor and move forward.

Have you read MWD other book, Change Your Life and everyone in it?

Some good info in there. Still reading it myself, but some good things.

i will swing by again and be more regular.
I am planning to narrow my list of folks for my sanity and to help those in areas that I can lend support.