Stress in Early Childhood

There are many stresses when a child is in the early childhood stage. From a community where I am from, stressors are not prevalent. There are many middle class to higher class families living in my town and the school district where I teach. Growing up I do not remember having stress. I remember stressing about friend issues, getting homework done, winning my softball game, or what clothes to put on my new Barbie. I never had to deal with something totally stressful and I am very thankful for that! I never really reflect on the stressors that some children are put on in such an early age. These stressors could consist of poverty, racism, natural disasters, diseases, pollution, and violence.

I asked my childhood friends if their families ever had a stressful time with any of the issues that I listed above or any issues like that. Most of my friends said no, but one of my friends said yes. Growing up she said that her family and her stressed about poverty and hunger. When she said this, I was very shocked. By looking at her family and reflecting on her family at that time- I would have never guessed. She always had new clothes, toys, was never dirty, and never seemed upset. She said that everything that she received was a donation from the church where she belongs. When she was growing up her mother and father both lost their jobs. They were both teachers in the same district and both lost their jobs from budget cuts in the same year. Her parents had so many years of experience that they could not find jobs anywhere else. By working other places they would lose their health care and unemployment and would be making less. She said that food was tight and she was on free lunches at school. She said that her family almost lost their house 2 times when she was in elementary school. One time she even had to pack up all her things because the family thought they were going to get evicted. But thanks to those people at the church, they helped this family a lot. I would have never guessed that this was happening to this family. She said to cope with the stress she would go to church surrounded by people that new their situation and loved them anyways. She said that she always made sure she ate all of her lunch just in case dinner was slim. She said that her mother and father who were both out of work for 2 years, went to support groups for families that were unemployed. She said it was a tough time, and I could only imagine what she went through.

After hearing her story I thought that more people than just her have to deal with these issues. Someone in my home town dealing with this was shocking enough, but what about the children now that are suffering from a major stress in their lives? I decided to research what countries had a lot of stress. Some I already knew about, but I found some countries that all had the same stressor that I was unaware of. The countries are: Bahrain, Qatar, and Yemen.  They are all under the stress of lack of water. I never thought of this as a stressor – but it is a pretty big one! I use water for everything, as most people do. I could not imagine not knowing if I was going to have water or not. I could not imagine living off of the weather for survival. This affects all the people in these countries. There is an organization and United Nations action to help these countries. The campaign is called “Water for Life”. Their goal is to get water to all of the countries of the world so that scare water will never be an issue again. Please log onto to this website for more information: http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/scarcity.shtml.

Stress in early childhood will always happen. I hope that as educators, we can find a way to help lessen the stress for these little kids.