Highly sensitive children - 4 tips for parents

Brigitte Küster, psychological counsellor, author and director of the Institute for High Sensitivity in Altstätten SG, gives four specific tips on how parents can deal with highly sensitive children.

1. check activities

Highly sensitive children often come home from school already overstimulated. Time for regeneration must therefore be prioritised. If the child wants to pursue a hobby once or twice a week out of their own deep desire, that's fine. The general rule is: less is more.

2. promote resources

Parents should trust their child and let them feel that they can manage things and overcome challenges on their own. Mothers and fathers can achieve this by taking a close look and recognising and encouraging the resources that the child has. Highly sensitive children are very relationship-orientated. If they feel that you trust them, many things are possible.

3. observe the child closely

It is advisable to keep a mood log for four to six weeks. In it, you can note which moods the child has at which time: During which activity or after which situation is it excited, tired, over-excited or calm? Writing down such observations helps to better understand the child and to obtain tools to fulfil the rhythm of tension and relaxation that is so important for the highly sensitive child.

4. do not «out» the child at school

Parents are well advised to be cautious when confronting teachers with the topic of high sensitivity. The level of knowledge of many teachers on the subject is often still inadequate due to a lack of information, training or awareness. It does the highly sensitive child more harm than good if they have a special status in the classroom. However, if the teacher is familiar with high sensitivity, it is advisable to discuss situational suggestions that can improve the child's situation: the use of headphones during silent work, a single seat, the possibility of writing exams in another room, and opportunities to withdraw during breaks.

Wie gehen Eltern mit einem hochsensiblen oder hochsensitiven Kind um? In diesem
How do parents deal with a highly sensitive or highly sensitive child? In this online dossier you can find out everything you need to know about high sensitivity.

About the author:

Claudia Landolt, leitende Autorin von Fritz+Fränzi, hat erst als Erwachsene Frieden mit ihrer Feinfühligkeit schliessen können. Heute ist sie sehr geerdet. Hochsensitivität ist für sie persönlich kein Leiden, sondern eine zweite Haut, die nur besonders gut geschützt werden muss.
Claudia Landolt, lead author of Fritz+Fränzi, was only able to make peace with her sensitivity as an adult. Today she is very grounded. For her personally, high sensitivity is not an affliction, but a second skin that just needs to be particularly well protected.

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