How to calm a person who is afraid of losing his mother. Providing effective support is the true art of empathy.

Various unpleasant and even tragic situations happen in our lives. And man, first of all, is a social being. Therefore, the easiest and most accessible way to find support is in your environment. Sometimes one gives up because it is unclear what to do, how to help a person. Psychologists say that when a person is in any kind of altered emotional state, first you need to calm him down. So how to calm someone down?

In order to help a person calm down, it is important to follow the following rules:

No need to be intrusive. If you see that a person needs to calm down, you should not immediately rush and help him. When he needs your help, you will notice it yourself.
There is no need to put pressure on a person. Try to be as careful as possible when asking him about troubles, because the condition can be aggravated by unnecessary exposure.
There is no need to teach or give instructions. The person himself knows what and how it will be better for him. Your advice should not be in the nature of teaching.
You cannot compare a person's problem with others. Each of us has our own characteristics and character. If for some the problem seems trivial, then for others it may be the end of the world.

How to calm someone down in a difficult situation

So, if a person is not in a state of emotional explosion and is ready to talk, you can calm him down in the following way:

Ask the person to talk about what happened. It is important to listen to him carefully and not interrupt. You cannot remain silent, so nod your head and insert rare words into the dialogue. If the conversation is not going well, ask clarifying questions.
Be patient and resilient. You cannot be offended by a person if he is rude, swears, or even insults you. It is important to understand that all emotions are directed not at you, but at the problem.
Give the person as much time as he needs. Under no circumstances should the narrator be rushed.
Ask him what you can do to help him. You don’t need to immediately offer your options; sometimes the person himself will ask you to do something.
Try to support the person. Some need a friendly hug, others need a walk outdoors. Support him as best you can.

How to calm someone down in an emergency situation

If an extreme situation occurs, and there are no specialists who can help, then you will have to calm the person down yourself. There are two types of reactions under stressful conditions - an emotional storm (when a person reacts sharply, screams, swears, cries, etc.) and emotional stupor (when a person cannot say anything; looks at one point; does not make contact).

If he screams and swears, you need to emotionally talk to him until the person gets tired. Sometimes you can hug the person tightly and hold them until they stop overreacting. Only then try to calm down as described above.

If a person is in a state of stupor, then you need to “revive” him. To do this, you can shake him by the shoulders, pour cold water, pinch. And only then calm down.

For many people, the difficulty arises in how to calm someone down with words. Psychologists advise that you need to carefully monitor what you say. Moreover, you need to monitor both words and emotions. You can't swear or get angry at a person. Need to talk specific facts, diluted with soothing words. It is also important that the person responds to your words. To do this, you can ask questions like “do you agree?”, “can you hear me?”, “what do you think about this?”

We all know how difficult it is to be in a situation where you need to comfort someone, and the right words is not located.

Fortunately, most often people do not expect specific advice from us. It is important for them to feel that someone understands them, that they are not alone. So first, just describe how you feel. For example, using the following phrases: “I know that it’s very difficult for you now,” “I’m sorry that it’s so difficult for you.” This will make it clear that you really see what it’s like now. to a loved one.

2. Confirm that you understand these feelings.

But be careful, don’t draw all the attention to yourself, don’t try to prove that it was even worse for you. Briefly mention that you have been in a similar position before, and ask more about the condition of the person you are comforting.

3. Help your loved one understand the problem

Even if a person is looking for ways to resolve a difficult situation, first he just needs to talk it out. This especially applies to women.

So wait to offer solutions to the problem and listen. This will help the person you are comforting understand their feelings. After all, sometimes it is easier to understand your own experiences by telling others about them. By answering your questions, the interlocutor can find some solutions himself, understand that everything is not as bad as it seems, and simply feel relieved.

Here are some phrases and questions that can be used in this case:

Tell me what happened.
Tell me what's bothering you.
What led to this?
Help me understand how you feel.
What scares you the most?

At the same time, try to avoid questions with the word “why”; they are too similar to judgment and will only anger the interlocutor.

4. Do not minimize the suffering of your interlocutor and do not try to make him laugh.

When we encounter the tears of a loved one, we, quite naturally, want to cheer him up or convince him that his problems are not so terrible. But what seems trivial to us can often upset others. So don't minimize another person's suffering.

What if someone is really worried about a trifle? Ask if there is any information that conflicts with his view of the situation. Then offer your opinion and share an alternative way out. It is very important here to clarify whether they want to hear your opinion, otherwise it may seem too aggressive.

5. Offer physical support if appropriate.

Sometimes people don’t want to talk at all, they just need to feel that there is a loved one nearby. In such cases, it is not always easy to decide how to behave.

Your actions must be consistent normal behavior with this or that person. If you are not too close, putting your hand on your shoulder or giving him a light hug will suffice. Also look at the behavior of the other person, perhaps he himself will make it clear what he needs.

Remember that you should not be too zealous when you console: your partner may take it for flirting and be offended.

6. Suggest ways to solve the problem

If a person only needs your support and not specific advice, the above steps may be sufficient. By sharing your experiences, your interlocutor will feel relieved.

Ask if there is anything else you can do. If the conversation takes place in the evening, and most often this happens, suggest going to bed. As you know, the morning is wiser than the evening.

If your advice is needed, ask first if the interlocutor himself has any ideas. Decisions are made more readily when they come from someone who is themselves in a controversial situation. If the person you are comforting is unclear about what can be done in their situation, help develop specific steps. If he doesn’t know what to do at all, offer your options.

If a person is sad not because of a specific event, but because he has a problem, immediately move on to discussing specific actions that can help. Or suggest doing something, like going for a walk together. Unnecessary thinking will not only not help get rid of depression, but, on the contrary, will aggravate it.

7. Promise to continue to support

At the end of the conversation, be sure to mention again that you understand how difficult it is for your loved one right now, and that you are ready to continue to support him in everything.

Situations in life are completely different, and the psyche cannot always calmly cope with what is happening, then the help of those who are nearby is necessary. Confusion from the need to somehow stabilize the state of another person is quite understandable, especially when it is not clear how to calm a person down with words at a distance, because removing the cause of the experience may not only be overwhelming, but possibly also an unnecessary task.

Most of all I want to calm down crying man, since everyone’s own psyche is structured in such a way that the sight of other people’s tears is unbearable. However, we do not take into account those reactions where strong feelings and destructive mental processes can occur without tears or loud laments.

In difficult times

You can help a person overcome difficult experiences without making special arrangements. rescue operations and without completing the courses crisis psychology– the main thing is to show attentiveness and sensitivity. Don’t rush to take active steps and give advice on how to calm down, but listen to the situation. How more people speaks out, the more the emotional intensity decreases; there are situations when, having told your problem to several friends in a row, negative emotions go away, the significance of bad events decreases or the relevance of what is happening is completely lost.

Even if the situation is more complex and requires real intervention, then after your attentive and active listening, with supporting statements and clarifying questions, a plan for getting out of this situation may emerge or a certain rethinking will come. But you shouldn’t dwell on problems either - it’s one thing to tell your friends what’s happening in order to throw out burning emotions, and the situation develops completely differently if you allow a person to constantly wind himself up with retellings of what happened. As soon as you notice that mentioning a painful situation causes deterioration of the condition rather than emotional relief, gently change the topic of conversation, distracting from the discussion on the established topic. It is even better to distract and calm the person with activities.

Participation and an offer to help, expressed in a direct form, helps to calm a person down during a panic attack. You can ask how to help or offer your options for the person right now, even little things (bring water, wrap them in a blanket, give them a ride home, etc.).

And don't forget about physical contact - a hug, a friendly pat on the shoulder, a touch on the arm can do much more than any words. If the problem arises of how to calm a person at a distance, then contact techniques are not available, but you can influence emotional background a person using his own voice, namely volume and intonation. Try to speak measuredly, a little drawn out, bringing your voice closer to that of someone falling asleep, both in volume and intonation. Instinctive mechanisms of the psyche are triggered that it is impossible to sleep in danger, and if you fall asleep, it means it is safe, then the other person has a subconscious perception of what is happening as less threatening.

In an extreme situation

Issues extreme situations the fact that people who have known each other for a long time in different event scenarios give completely unpredictable reactions. The most common reactions are panic and hysteria. You need to work with them in different ways.

If a person is covered, then focusing on breathing and nearby objects will help to calm down. Initially, you will need to control his breathing, i.e. talk about the need to take breaths, make sure that they are not very deep (hyperventilation leads to loss of consciousness, which is already narrowed in panic) or too frequent (small amplitude of breaths can increase anxiety).

Transfer the person's attention from abstract concepts or attempts to assess a general assessment of his well-being - warmth in the limbs, comfort of posture, ask him to do some minor work(fold things, type a message).

You'll have to get out of your stupor by physical methods by lightly shaking or rocking the person. Immediately after being brought out of the stupor, all pent-up feelings may pour out, and hysteria will come. Here you need to silently listen to any text spoken, even with threats and insults addressed to you (you will hear an apology later, when the person has stabilized emotionally). If the hysteria becomes threatening motor activity, then the task is solely to restrain destructive impulses - perhaps with your hands, you can pour water on it.

During extreme events, the question of how to calm a drunk person is especially important, because harm from his rash and over-emotional reactions can lead to catastrophic consequences. Methods of dealing with hysteria are suitable - listen or pour water on you when you notice that a person is completely losing control of his behavior. Control your own behavior - you need to remain calm and speak only to the point. Choose neutral phrases to calm the person down, in which it is impossible to provoke a new emotional outburst. And there is also a secret way - to pretend that you don’t notice the drunk, so you deprive him of the emotional feedback and the person either calms down or moves away further in search of those who will support his wave.

When you lose a loved one

The death of a loved one from illness, at predictable dates or due to extreme situations when it happens unexpectedly, always has a strong frustrating effect on those left to live. In addition to the immediate loved ones of the victims, those who will try to help them and somehow calm them down are also subject to secondary traumatization. This is what explains the stupor of many and the inability to pick up the right words to calm a person down.

There is no recipe that can, in one magic phrase or action, remove the pain of loss and calm a person who has lost a loved one, but you can help someone else experience grief and return to their life by forming new patterns of interaction. Do not try to distract the person from what happened with other conversations or proposals for activities - in the first period, all thoughts will still be devoted only to death, and your attempts can lead to withdrawal. If there are no words, then it is better to sit next to you and be silent, and you can start talking only when the person experiencing grief turns to you, and it is better to listen to what he tells you.

Your task is to show that you are nearby and can provide support. It is important not to say this phrase, but to make it clear on completely different levels - maintain constant contact. You can call on the phone and ask if the person has food, if they need help in closing accounts and filling out the papers of the deceased, stop by and give them a ride where necessary. Those. you do not focus attention on what happened with questions about your well-being and how difficult it is after the loss. Perhaps one day, when the person himself is ready to talk, he will call and ask for a meeting. Then be prepared for tears and difficult experiences, with which you do not need to do anything, just listen, but listen carefully.

What not to do

Since the suffering of others is unbearable for those nearby, and the desire to calm the person increases to the maximum and requires any decisive action, many stop worrying about who really needs reassurance now and make mistakes. Remember how a mother shouts at a crying child, trying to calm him down in this way, as a result, all participants in the situation become agitated. It’s worth listening to your feelings and walking away; if you find yourself unstable, let others calm you down.

You cannot devalue the cause of a person’s disorder, because this can greatly hurt. Those. those who mourn the dead do not need to be told that they are better now or that this should have happened, and a woman going through a divorce should not be told about her beauty and unworthiness of a man, because self-esteem is now at the lowest level, and the suffering from his absence is painful.

If you are going to help, then stay, and do not leave with the phrase that you will come on the first call. When a person needs reassurance, he cannot always adequately test reality in order to understand what help he needs, and he can also fall into such a deep depression, pick up the phone and not remember the phone number.

When you compare a person’s suffering with others (starving children in Africa, the disabled, the homeless), in an attempt to show that someone is now much worse off, then best case scenario they won't hear you. By reacting more adequately, you can train an aggressive reaction or provoke a desire to emotionally shut down. When you personally are already fed up with the suffering or hysterics of another, then exclude yourself from the situation, and do not start ordering the person to calm down or switch. Believe me, if a person could do this, he would have done it long ago.

Sample phrases on how to calm someone down with words

The right words can be a truly healing force. The first thing to remember is that all wording should convey a positive aspect, but without going too far. You can remember positive stories about the deceased person instead of advice to quickly distract yourself.

For example:

“I can’t live through this pain instead of you, but I can live through this pain with you, together we will endure everything.”

“I'm sorry about what happened. How can I help?"

“Please accept our sincere condolences for the loss, we remember with the warmest words ___!”

“We sympathize with your loss! The news of ___'s death shocked our entire family."

“Words cannot express all the pain and sadness. We sincerely sympathize with your entire family!”

“We are shocked by the sad news and share the pain of loss. Golden man ___, of which there are few! We will always remember ___!”

If a person is simply in a difficult situation, and you understand that he will overcome it, then words of support about holding on or not giving up are quite appropriate - they will be in place here. IN complex options You can encourage them with questions about your participation and help, or you can help the person clarify the situation for himself.

For example:

"You can count on me"

"Your failure is a springboard to success"

"I'm here to help"

“I believe in you, you will survive everything”

“The finish line is the start of something new”

“One stage has ended, a new one will begin”

When you see that your friend has withdrawn into himself and can only talk about the problem that is tormenting him, then change the topic - talk about butterflies and plans for the weekend. If the conversation with you is not supported independently, then engage with questions - ask for an opinion regarding your new suit and the planned conference, ask to tell you something related professional sphere friend.

It is not so much semantic, but rather affectively rich phrases that help calm a person in hysterics. Those. Quietly and calmly asking a person to think about his behavior may be useless, but a terrible scream with an order to shut up can easily bring him to his senses.

If a person is sane, his actions are adequate to what is happening, but it is difficult for him, then discuss his feelings with him more. What is valuable here is not your advice and words, but the opportunity for a person to be in the spotlight, to feel true support when all the time and space is devoted to him.

Remember that not only words will help calm a person, but silence and hugs can share and reduce sadness, calm, and return the vivid experience of emotions.

Instructions

Talk to a nervous person, distract him from the causes of stress. For example, if he is afraid of an upcoming speech in front of an audience, talk about rare butterflies, rules for decorating bouquets, interesting facts about cats, etc. Switch your attention person to another, more pleasant subject. This way he can calm down faster.

Talk about something funny, get involved person into a cheerful conversation or exchange of witticisms and jokes. Bring a couple funny incidents from life. Try to achieve a smile, even if it is weak. When a person smiles, or even more so laughs, fear and excitement fade into the background and gradually weaken.

Convince the Nervous person take a little walk with you. Don't force him to sit still: as a rule, stress causes a surge of adrenaline, and the person feels a strong need to move. It is best to organize a short walk in a quiet, peaceful place, preferably on fresh air. The less irritants there are around, the better.

Play soft soothing music. If possible, convince the anxious person dance with you a little. Fast, energetic dances in in this case will be inappropriate. Preference should be given to slow dancing, smooth, calm movements.

Offer a nervous person a sedative. Do not get carried away with pills; it is better to prepare a decoction of medicinal herbs. Tea with chamomile or a decoction of coriander fruits are excellent. You can also offer warm milk with honey: not everyone likes this drink, but it helps to calm down and relieve stress. nervous tension.

Prepare a decoction using a herbal tea for depression and depression purchased at a pharmacy. nervous disorders. This remedy is usually quite safe and helps to quickly calm down. You should first check to see if you have person for which the decoction is intended, allergies to its components.

Anyone has had to worry difficult situations, but it is much harder not to experience your own misfortune, but to see a suffering friend. To avoid feeling powerless in your friend's grief, be prepared to provide him with a little psychological support.

Instructions

Offer your help if you can provide it. But don’t insist if he refuses support.

Take the person for a walk. Don't leave him alone.

Video on the topic

Helpful advice

If you decide to listen to your friend, don’t rush him, let him finish. It’s better not to help at all than to make the situation worse.

Visit to the vet - stressful situation for any cat, which means you may also experience tension.

If she does, leaving the house to go to the vet may make her agitated. If you do this beforehand, the trip to the clinic will seem more enjoyable for both you and your pet. Your veterinarian may prescribe a sedative that is needed before your appointment.

Wrap the cat in a towel so that only the head is exposed. If possible, have someone hold the cat while you wrap it. This will help immobilize the cat so that it will not run away.

Place your index finger at the corner of the mouth. Pull it up and press lightly with your fingers until the cat opens its mouth slightly.

Using the index finger of your other hand, open the cat's mouth wider by pressing lower jaw near the tongue.

Insert or syringe liquid onto far part language. Close the cat's mouth with the hand you used to hold its lower jaw and massage its throat until it swallows the medicine.

Give your cat a treat to counteract the unpleasant taste of the sedative. Place her in her carrier and let her rest before leaving the house for her appointment.

Delirium delirium, popularly known as “delirium tremens,” is a dangerous mental illness to which people who are addicted to alcohol are prone. Patients in the acute stage can harm not only themselves, but also those around them.

“White tremens”: reasons

It is believed that fever or delirium tremens occurs very rarely and only in severe cases of alcoholism. However, in reality this phenomenon mental disorder, which every person coming out of .

Alcohol delirium (“delirium tremens”) is a severe mental illness, which necessarily requires hospital treatment.

Usually the disease manifests itself a few days after leaving the binge, and in a severe stage of the disease it can occur before binge drinking. This happens due to the fact that the liver, pancreas and stomach are accustomed to releasing into the body a certain amount of enzymes that are required to digest alcohol. If a person abruptly stops drinking alcohol, especially after a long binge, and the body does not stop releasing enzymes, poisoning with these same enzymes occurs - this leads to delirium tremens. Typically, a patient with delirium is calm during the day, but severe exacerbations occur.

Signs

Trembling arms and legs, poor sleep, nightmares, sudden changes in mood during the day, sudden aversion to alcohol, vomiting - these are just some of the signs of delirium tremens. A person with such a disease cannot sit in one place, he is very restless, after waking up from sleep, he may have terrible hallucinations that he perceives as reality, and he may also hear sounds that are not really there.

Treatment

Treatment is carried out in specialized clinics and in intensive care wards. Usually, patients with delirium tremens are treated with diuretics that support the liver; if necessary, they are given cardiac and sedatives. Recovery occurs in 3-8 days, it is different for everyone. Such patients cannot be treated. Delaying hospitalization is dangerous not only for themselves, but also for society.

First aid for delirium tremens

At inappropriate behavior a person prone to binge drinking (suspiciousness, hallucinations, aggressiveness, motor restlessness), you should immediately call a drug treatment or psychiatric emergency assistance.

The right way To avoid “delirium tremens” - stop drinking. If this cannot be done, narcologists advise not to abruptly leave the state of binge drinking.

Before her arrival, the patient must be put to bed, preferably even tied to the bed. For symptoms of delirium tremens, drinking plenty of fluids is recommended. Applying ice usually helps to calm the patient. If you have sedatives or sleeping pills at home, they can also be used for pacification. In this state, a person poses a danger to others, so he must be under strict supervision.

It happens that we are looking for complex recipes to improve the quality of life. We think: “If I go to yoga, I’ll immediately become calmer.” And of course, we don’t go to yoga. And we have a heartfelt excuse - why do we feel so bad? There is no good yoga in the area! Sadly...

Nevertheless, there are primitive quick-fix self-help remedies that have been used for centuries in cases of stress, irritation, frustration, in a situation where someone or something is eating your brain out.

They were used for recommendations by general practitioners (and not only) old school. One of those who took the patient by the hand, and this already made him feel better. Self-help tips were taught by physical therapists, massage therapists, and athletic trainers. Now advice is more expensive and more difficult to formulate. Self-help is suppressed, this is not a market approach.

And we'll go back to the good old days when self-help was encouraged.

Method 1: Get distracted by something

This way to remove emotional stress suitable in cases where you are trapped, driven into a corner and cannot escape anywhere. For example, sit at a planning meeting and listen to your boss, internally boiling. You can’t escape, but... Being distracted by the contemplation of something extraneous, neutral and being carried away by this extraneous thing - The best way Don’t beat yourself up over trifles.

For example: “However, what is Masha’s manicure like... I wonder how she did it?”

This only works if you yourself understand the benefits of such a strategy - don’t look at the nasty, don’t listen to the nasty. If you like to fume and get into arguments, that’s your right.

Method 2 Leave an annoying situation (aka emotional zone)

Did something make you sad at someone else's birthday? On a picnic? You can’t stand some group, public page, page social network? Do you dream of removing an unpleasant person from your friends list?

So, we quickly left the group forever. They banned an argumentative provocateur, a troll, a boor, a fool. Deleted your profile, if that happens.

Quickly call a taxi (don’t squeeze, don’t squeeze), kiss the hostess and rush home - away from the party, away from the barbecue, away from the irritating, emotional zone.

Method 3 Drink some water

This is already the signature recipe of all brilliant therapists who do not sell dietary supplements from pharmaceutical corporations.

A glass of water, drunk slowly, stops everything famous sciences seizures. The first thing they offer a person who has suffered something terrible is a glass of water. Drinking water triggers the body's self-rehabilitation mechanism. Most often, people feel ill for two reasons:

hysteria (sympatho-adrenal crisis in another way),
dehydration of the body that was not noticed in time.

Since we don’t listen to our body and don’t teach healthy lifestyle, we drink tea, coffee and soda all day - we all have dehydration, and you have it too. Go drink a glass of water right now, and then read on.

Method 4 Get involved in an exciting, interesting activity

This method is suitable in a situation where you cannot be “let go.” You need to break the stuckness of chewing “And they, And I, And fuck them all” with something cool, even if it’s stupid and tasteless. Reading a detective story. Computer game. Hunting and gathering. Surveillance and tracking. An attempt to reveal someone's secret. Even by spying and eavesdropping, damn it.

You must be involved in the intrigue, in the detective story, in the rapid development of events, in the hunt, in the game, in courage, in flight.

Your ears should lift and your tail should twitch.

You yourself know what can captivate and amuse you. Everyone has their own, individual thing. Just don't get carried away with this surveillance. Don't harm anyone.

Method 5 Physical discharge

Everyone is familiar with this method firsthand, but, as usual, no one cares. And I remind you once again that rapid physical discharge, which includes:

walking,
swim,
general cleaning of the apartment (possibly someone else’s),
sex,
destruction of trash,
work in the garden,
dance,
mopping floors and washing by hand

relaxes twisted muscles and relieves stress and frustration fantastically effectively. General washing by hand even helps to cope with grief - again the advice of the old doctor, which I share with you.

Method 6 Come into contact with water

Washing dishes is a free session of hypno-psychotherapy. The sound of clean running running water relieves our fatigue and takes away with it all the “dirt,” not just household dirt.

In addition to washing dishes, there is a well-known classic: take a bath, take a shower, go to the sauna, go early in the morning or in the evening - swim in the sea, in the river, in the lake, in the spring. Refresh yourself, in short.

Method 7 Positive reframing of a stressful event

ABOUT positive reframing So much has been written (including by me) that I don’t want to repeat myself. I'll just give an example:

“It’s so good that it turned out that I won’t go anywhere this summer! I'm finally taking classes in English, for fitness and also for self-development courses! When else would I allow myself such a “useless” luxury? And in the summer there is low season everywhere and there are only discounts around. So I’ll save money too!”

Method 8 It could have been worse, it was even harder for others

Are you not satisfied with the outcome of the event? Imagine that there could have been a worse outcome. Imagine how bad it is for some people around you. If you master this art and stop turning your nose up at this strategy, then you will not need any psychotherapy at all.

Method 9 Laughter kills everything scary and terribly important

Ridiculing, reducing, vulgarizing something inflated and important is an ancient recipe of human culture, dating back to the Neolithic. Thanks to grandfather Bakhtin for his term “carnival-laughter culture.” Read it, take an interest.

Or watch one episode about the adventures of SpongeBob SquarePants. When he was terrified of speaking at a school seminar, a smart squirrel gave him super glasses. Wearing these glasses, SpongeBob saw all the students and the teacher... in their underpants. That was funny! True, out of laughter, he never read out his report. And what kind of panties did the teacher have... Mmm...

Method 10 Counting to 10

Just read until ten. Slowly. Controlling your inhalations and exhalations. To myself, not out loud. This is the recommendation of doctors and sports trainers.

Method 11 Cry

Crying relieves stress. Those that leave the body with tear fluid toxic substances, which are formed under the influence of stress hormones. If you can’t cry about your own things, come up with a pitiful topic and specifically cry over it.

Method 12 Verbalization of everything that is on your soul

Pronunciation or verbalization is putting a vague “something” into clear words. However, great thing. Or better yet, write it all down on paper, write a long letter.

Just don’t send it anywhere!

Here are 12 tips for dealing with stress and the diseases that stress then causes.

These 12 are those that help us and do not require money for it. And the rest is expensive and from charlatans.