Help Kids Overcome Discomfort Through Nature
If you’ve already watched the above video from our Inquiring Minds – Inspiring Finds series, then you know the theme is about teaching kids to persevere when things get tough. This is something we discuss often, including within our most recent post on how to teach kids to overcome challenges through nature. However, the quote used to preface the featured video is an attention grabber itself:
“Your body can stand almost anything. It’s your mind that you have to convince.”
In this article, we tackle the quote in the most literal sense.
It is absolutely true that physical endurance limits are often much higher than children realize, and the real challenge is overcoming preconceptions, mental doubts, and fears. The saying emphasizes that their mind, not their body, is often the primary obstacle to achieving their goals, with a strong mindset being what allows them to push through discomfort and achieve things they didn’t believe were possible. It’s important to recognize this because physical feelings of discomfort, or fear of discomfort, along with seasonal coughs, colds, and flus (et cetera) frequently get in the way of a child reaching both short and long-term ambitions and goals.
Let’s consider one very basic example. If a key part of a child’s desire to make friends after moving to a new coastal town requires that they spend more time at the area’s popular beach, but they are averse to cold lake or ocean water, they may miss out on a key opportunity to connect to local kids. An additional example relates to kids who frequently come down with colds and flus, which equates numerous missed school days and a backlog of projects that were supposed to be completed prior to moving on to the next. Another common example goes out to parents with kids who abstain from sports and other physical activities because of their child’s fear about not having the strength, stamina, agility or other requisite facilities to be competitive. As a parent, you can probably identify preconceptions, mental doubts, and fears in addition to physical manifestations that have held your child back from academic, athletic, creative, or social endeavors.
So how can you help your child overcome real and/or an aversion to discomfort? True to form, the Plant a Seed & See What Grows Foundation once again draws attention to how immersion in nature can help children overcome challenges. Let’s explore!
Direct Ways Increased Immersion in Nature Can Help Children Overcome Physical Discomfort and Fear of Discomfort
Cold Feet? Use Nature to Acclimatize
Do your kids get “cold feet” prior to participating in something because they are averse to literal cold feet, or other form of physical discomfort related to climate? It’s a very common occurrence that families struggle with when attempting to enjoy adventurous outdoor activities on family vacations, when signing-up their kids up for outdoor education camps, or other outdoor scenario that would be beneficial if only they could lose their fear of discomfort relating to temperature, sun exposure, humidity, or precipitation.
The solution to this, is to spend more time outdoors through all four season, not just so that they become mentally accustomed to it, but so that they can acclimatize to their seasonal surroundings. Acclimatization is a scientific term used to describe the gradual process by which an organism’s body adjusts to a new or changed environment. This change in environment may be in altitude, temperature, or humidity. The brain and body work together to acclimatize through gradual exposure to cold, heat, altitude, and humidity, which triggers physiological and neuronal adaptations over time. This physiological adjustment allows the body to maintain fitness and function despite environmental stressors. Below is a summary of how long it takes a generally healthy child to acclimatize according to weather category:
- Acclimatizing to Cold and Altitude: A generally healthy adolescent’s body can take approximately 10 to 14 days to acclimatize to cold weather, although up to three weeks may be required for full adjustment to particularly cold outdoor environments in Canada.
- Acclimatizing to Heat and Humidity: Research confirms that an adolescent’s body requires a gradual adjustment period between 10 to 14 days to acclimatize to hot weather and humidity.
To safely and effectively acclimatize your generally healthy child in nature, practice the following:
- Gradual exposure: Start with short, light-to-moderate activities on warm/hot and cool/cold days (as applicable) and gradually increase the duration and intensity over several days or weeks.
- Frequent exposure: Aim for daily exposure, ideally at the same time of day, to reinforce the adaptation process.
- Stay hydrated: Drink plenty of water, especially when acclimating to heat. For altitudes, beverages with electrolytes can be beneficial.
- Dress appropriately: Ensure that your child is dressed appropriately for the conditions.
- Monitor symptoms: Pay attention to signs of heat, humidity, or altitude related issues like dizziness, nausea, or excessive fatigue. If evident, head back indoors and scale back on length of exposure slightly, without reducing frequency.
- Listen to your child: As their parent, you know the difference between them exerting independence through complaints, and problematic discomfort. Ultimately, acclimatization is a personal experience, so monitor and respect your child’s limits and adjust their outdoor exposure accordingly.
Sources: University of Iowa Health Care, Nationwide Children’s Hospital
Nature Prescribed for Aches and Pains
From small boo-boos to broken bones, your child will experience all sorts of aches and pains associated with, well, being a kid. While they must be taught to exercise caution at all times, they must not be locked away in the home to hide from the outside world. This strategy backfires because whatever short-term physical injuries they avoid from staying indoors, they lose out in, in the longterm through compromised cognitive, emotional, and mental wellbeing. The reactive strategy also teaches them to live in fear, which isn’t really living at all.
The good news, is that immersion in nature teaches and fosters an environment conducive to pain management. How? By influencing adolescent brain activity to reduce pain perception, and through natural compounds that have pain-relieving properties. A wide body have research shows that simply viewing nature scenes can lead to lower reported discomfort intensity and decreased activity in pain-processing areas of the brain. Furthermore, natural elements like sunlight for vitamin D production along with physical activity and social interaction facilitated by nature are also associated with reports of decreased acute pain from prior injury, and even an injury (i.e. scraped knee) that was just sustained at the playground or on a hiking trail with friends or family. Additionally, certain plant-based remedies like those we have covered in relation to treating and preventing colds and flus, also help manage discomfort.
Here is a more detailed look at how nature influences the brain and positively impacts otherwise disruptive discomfort:
- Reduces pain perception: Exposure to nature reduces how intense and unpleasant a person (adolescents included) perceives their pain to be.
- Changes brain activity: When people (adolescents included) frequently observe nature, their brain activity in regions associated with pain processing decreases. This is not a placebo effect, but a genuine physiological response, according to Nature.com and other notable resources.
- Reduces stress and restores attention: Exposure to nature can reduce adolescent stress and improve attention, which helps in managing pain by calming the nervous system and shifting focus away from discomfort.
Ultimately, spending more time in nature can ease existing discomfort and anxiety/fear of discomfort. And by joining your child/children outdoors more often you too will experience the same benefits. Meanwhile, please note that the Plant a Seed & See What Grows Foundation inspires and promotes healthy living and learning for kids across Canada. You can help us help the next generation by pledging your support too! View more on how you can get involved.
