Handling the chaos of kids when you’re an HSP introvert

One topic that I have put off writing about in this blog is kids.

It’s because it scares me. I often think about how difficult it must be to be a introverted HSP parent.

Babies need you, like 24-7. They deprive you of sleep and constantly, constantly need you, and show it by screaming and crying. Loudly. All night. All the time. And for breast-feeding moms, you are basically attached to the baby for what feels like the entire day. Your body doesn’t even feel like your own. Plus, you worry about your kids. 18+ years of feeling worried.

All these things give me the shivers. I know the ridiculously large amounts of quiet alone time I require, and I wonder how introverted parents can handle it.

A reader named Mike R., who has 5 young children, volunteered the tactics he and his family use to help him when he’s feeling overstimulated and needing peace. He realized that past outbursts of anger were due to neglecting his introvert needs. Now, his wife and kids know they need to help Dad stay level.

Here are his tips on staying calm as an introverted HSP when you’ve got kids:

• Every 3 months, I go on a half-day “retreat,” just me by myself doing quiet things. Last time, I spent an hour at church then the rest of the afternoon at the library with my headphones (SimplyNoise.com pink noise!) and my laptop and the novel I’m working on.
• Every night, after everyone else is asleep, I take 30-60 minutes to work on my writing or do something else quietly.
• If it’s a Saturday and we’re all doing chores and it is especially loud, I’ll put on my headphones and listen to a mountain stream or pink noise while I do mine.
• I leave the room and take a break when I need it.
• My children often hear me ask, “Kids, could you please keep the noise down? Thank you!”
• When we plan outings and family events, I’m careful to look at the schedule for the week before and after. Do we have too much scheduled? Since my wife is an ambivert and can’t stand sitting around all day doing nothing-which is my ideal weekend every weekend-we use “free trait” theory as outlined in Susan Cain’s book Quiet. If we have a day of chores, or a day of a lot of socializing, we compensate with a day of nothing. Like all of marriage, it’s all about compromise, because if we always just sat around doing nothing, I’d be in Nirvana, and she’d be miserable.
• I have two 15-minute breaks scheduled on my work calendar with a pop-up reminder. During that time, I kick back in my chair, I don’t think about work at all, and usually I read.
• I’ve talked to my manager about being an introvert and what that means and he is highly supportive.
• I’ve encouraged my children to get into things that I’m into, so we can enjoy time together in ways I like. I read books to them or we watch movies together.
• I’ve instituted a simple rule at the dinner table that-while not always followed-has made life bearable: only one person speaks at a time. I cannot follow multiple conversations at once, though my HSP brain makes me want to. So if multiple people are talking, I just eat, or stare lazily out the window, until it stops. Then I’ll ask each person who was speaking to repeat themselves, in turn. If I want to say something, I raise my hand. The kids actually call on me: “Yes, Daddy, what would you like to say?” And they do the same thing.
• As outlined in Dr. Marti Olsen Laney’s book, The Introvert Advantage, I take my “temperament temperature” daily, sometimes multiple times per day. I have it as a daily recurring task on my task list. If I see the signs that I’ve been an “outie” too long, I make immediate adjustments. I might say to my wife, “I’m going to be up several hours late reading tonight, I really need the quiet time.”

Perhaps the best part of realizing all of this about myself is that it has helped me to see it in my children. Two of my children are introverts/HSP. As I’ve learned how to thrive, I’m helping them to thrive.

The introverted son would often have huge anger blow-ups, we thought, for no reason. Now, when we see them coming, I can ask him, “Do you want to go to your room and take a break?” He’ll say yes, disappear for 15-30 minutes, and come back a new kid.

We recently had a party at my house and all of the people in our private space was hard on my introvert/HSP daughter. So she and I went upstairs, leaving all the company downstairs, and we ate in my office and we talked and watched cartoons together. It gave us both a break from the crowds and we were both better off for it.

Are you an introvert or HSP parent? What tactics do you use?

Thanks to Mike R. for these awesome tips!

Further reading: Recharge, reset: How introverted moms cope with family chaos

photo credit: Odenosuke via photopin cc

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