Helping Children Recover from Upsets & Injuries Faster

Would you like to help your child recover from upsets and injuries quicker?

My wife and I have found a simple but powerful principle from L. Ron Hubbard which we use to great success that I would like to share with you.

This has to do with attention. When a person injures themselves, their attention can get drawn in and stuck on themselves or their injury. Any parent has observed their child injuring themselves and will usually want to help get the child’s attention off of the injury.

But how do you do this? Some people would suggest distracting the child, but let’s face it, all that does is interrupt and invalidate them. How would you feel if you were telling someone about something upsetting to you and instead of listening to you they butted in and said, “Hey, want some chocolate?”  Others would tell the child to “knock it off,” or even to evaluate for them and tell them that “it’s not so bad,” or “you’re OK.” Others will just ignore them and hope it goes away, or worse, drown the child in sympathy.

Of course the first thing to do is to be quiet. Then when appropriate, properly acknowledge the child’s upset.
The next step that I have found to work miracles is to give the child an assist, a simple Scientology auditing procedure. There are many that are designed to gently directs a person’s attention outwards. My two-year-old boy’s favourite is one we call “where is.”

Let’s say he comes tearing around the corner, slips and grazes his knee. He cries. I hold him quietly. He shows me his knee and where he fell. I acknowledge him. He is still crying. I tell him that we are going to play “Where is,” and get his agreement to do this. I then say, “Start of assist. Where is the green chair?” He points to it. “Good.” I say, “Go over and touch it.” He does.”Thank you,” I say. “Where is the scooter?” He points it out. “Good. Go over and touch it,” and so on.
I can guarantee you that within two or three commands of this, he will be out of the upset. It normally takes about ten commands to make him properly bubbly and cheerful again, at which point he usually tells me he wants to go and do something else. This is so effective, and he knows it so well that if he is ever upset or hurt he will come sit on my lap and say,”Play where is?”

It even works on very young children. My eight-month old bumped her chin on the coffee table today and without saying anything I simply walked around with her and gently offered her things to touch. Almost immediately she snapped out of her upset.

There is a little bit to learn about assists in order to do them properly. You can do a free course on them here where you can learn the exact procedures. But if in doubt, don’t stand there talking about the upset and getting them further and further mired in it, especially if they don’t have the language skills to properly express themselves.

Just get them to look at something. Or touch something. And don’t forget to acknowledge them when they do.