This is because parents do not care about children's emotions

Family is the first social environment for someone who can influence their growth and development and have an impact that continues until they are adults. Unfortunately, nowadays there are more and more parents who are only concerned with physical development and academic intelligence, without paying attention to the emotional development of their children. So, what happens if the child grows up without mature emotional development?

What happens when parents ignore children's emotional development

The tendency of parents to ignore the emotional development of children at the age of development can trigger a mental health condition known as c hildhood emotional neglect (CEN). CEN is an emotional disorder that is difficult for parents or immediate family to recognize. However, this can be more easily recognized as the child grows older, which is characterized by difficulty understanding emotions, expressing feelings, difficulty communicating, and establishing social relationships with other people. CEN is actually more recognizable by third parties outside of the child's social environment, because this person perceives a contrasting difference in how to behave and communicate from someone who has CEN.

Parenting style is closely related to neglect of children's emotional development

A clinical psychologist, Dr. Jonice Webb describes CEN as an impact of parents failing to meet children's emotional needs. This occurs when a parent does not show an appropriate response when a child is angry or sad, and instead scolds him when he is trying to get parental attention.

CEN does not always arise from harsh / abusive parenting, or indifferent parents, but rather from parenting with poor parent-child communication relationships. Parenting styles that are authoritarian, perfectionist, and seem selfish that only focus on the parents' desire for the child will tend to suppress the child's emotional development so that he isolates himself too much - by not showing his emotions to both parents and even to other people.

Stagnation of children's emotional maturity can also be caused by a lack of closeness to their parents, either because the parents are too busy, divorced, sick, or (one or both of them) have died. Even if viewed from a material standpoint and a child's academic intelligence has got everything he needs and wants, without the emotional closeness that comes from spending time together, children will still learn to suppress their emotions as they grow older because they feel they don't have someone to share with.

What are the consequences if parents ignore the child's emotional development?

Although everyone who experiences CEN has different backgrounds and problems, they have the same characteristic patterns, including:

• Too hard on yourself - is characterized by always feeling angry and disappointed in himself or having too high a standard to meet in his life. They also tend to feel inferior and criticize themselves endlessly in comparison to others.
• Lack of ownership - a child with CEN is more likely to feel that he or she does not fit in any social circle, be it family or friends. They also tend to be uncomfortable in social situations and tend to distance themselves from those they are closest to.
• Feel proud to do things by yourself - as a result they find it difficult to accept or ask for help from others.
• Often feel dissatisfied - they tend to feel something wrong with themselves all the time, as a result they also have trouble recognizing what they really need and planning for their lives.
• Difficulty understanding your own feelings - they often feel angry or sad without knowing the cause and have difficulty calming themselves down when they are angry or sad.
• Depression - depression in CEN children arises from the accumulation of his inability to express his emotions well so that he feels lonely and also constantly blames himself. However, by harboring negative feelings alone, this means that children do not have the ability to adapt effectively to solve problems and get social support to overcome the problems they are facing.

What can parents do to prevent childhood emotional neglect ?

Here are some things parents can do to maintain emotional health and build children's emotional abilities, including:

1. When your child is feeling sad or angry, don't convince the child that everything will be all right. Help them understand their feelings by asking what happened and help them deal with feelings of anger or sadness by showing them what to do.
2. Help the child get in the habit of conveying what makes him upset or sad, so that you as a parent can more easily provide assistance to children.
3. Show sympathy by asking about problems he is experiencing and making sure that you will always be there to help him.
4. Help the child to accept the situation and try to let go of events and other people's behavior that make him upset or angry.

How to minimize the impact of childhood emotional neglect

The first step to take in reducing the impact of CEN on your life and emotional state is to become fully aware of the problems you are experiencing. Apart from that, understand that you are not alone. Experiencing confusion in expressing emotions can happen to anyone.

Get to know your true nature. For example, recognizing what you like, don't like, things that you fear or make you angry with, etc. Do this objectively and not assess the situation that causes it to go deeper. Then identify what you need to calm down in certain stressful situations.

Reset your beliefs and views about what makes you feel anxious, angry, sad or afraid. This is necessary to improve the way you respond to these emotions by doing better problem solving.

Help yourself to build emotional intelligence by always understanding your emotional state and being aware of what to do. And remember that minimizing the impact of CEN is a process of self-improvement and one's emotional state that takes time and effort.

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