CHAI Parenting Initiative: Tree of Life by Erin Walton

Tree of Life A Resource for South Asian Parents | chai parenting initiative

Contents Parenting Over the Years 5 Building the Foundation: Strengthening Your Couple Relationship

Health and Well-Being 28 Mental Health in the South Asian Community 30 Parenting Through a Religious Lenses

7 Balancing Your Work and Family

32 Helping Your Child Handle Stress

9 Managing Your Stress and Anger

34 Fostering A Healthy Self-Esteem

Through the Years 11 Parenting Through Your Child’s Development 15 Parenting Tweens 18 Understanding Your Teen’s Social and Developmental 20 Transition to College

36 Building A Strong Relationship: The Importance of Empathy 38 South Asian Immigration Timeline 40

Building A Healthy Relationship with Your Child: Healthy Communication Money Matters

Tree of Life A Resource for South Asian Parents chai parenting initiative A banyan tree, a common symbol throughout many parts of South Asia, is on the cover of this book. Not only was it a center for trading in villages, it has special significance in Hindu and Buddhist beliefs. The ability of the tree to grow and survive for centuries, with branches reaching back down from the original tree, provides the metaphor for this parenting resource.

Specific to School Years 22 Navigating the School System—Advocating for Your Child 24 Barriers in the Early Identification of Learning Problems 26 Bullied Brown

Facing Challenges In Our Community 42 Immigrating and Adjusting to Life in the U.S.

44 Languages and Communication Across the Shores

Printed in the United States of America

46 Managing Two Cultures in Parenting

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Published by: CHAI, Inc., Ellicott City, MD Edited by: Razia Kosi and Neha Navsaria

48 Intergenerational Conflict 50 From Traditions to Gender Equity: Gender Roles in South Asian Families 59 CHAI Focus Group Themes

This publication was made possible through a generous grant from:

Introduction by Razia Kosi and Neha Navsaria

This project was made possible through a generous grant from the Asian American Psychological Associationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Okura Mental Health Leadership Foundation and the American Psychological Foundation. Family portraits of parents and their children are common across the globe. No two family portraits will be the same, whether they smile, appear serious, are dressed formally or dressed identically in jeans and white t-shirts; there are cultural influences within the portrait. While the image of parents and children are captured in that moment in time, the influences of culture live beyond a single portrait. As children of immigrants growing up in countries outside of South Asia, both authors of this project experienced first-hand, the benefits and challenges as their parents negotiated new cultures, societies and expectations. The experiences of their parents and many others, both from the first large wave of South Asian immigration (after the passage of the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act) to todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s post 9/11 climate, their journeys are filled with joy, tears, love, fear, uncertainty and tradition. Learning from the past, researching current trends and creating culturally appropriate resources for the South Asian community in the United States were the goals for the editors of this book. This book was created to help parents navigate the uncertainties and overcome fears with less apprehension and more confidence.

RAZIA KOSI (LOWER LEFT) WITH FAMILY, CIRCA 1977.

The South Asian population has grown 38%, from 1.6 million in 2000 to 2.3 million in 2005 (Le, 2008); this is the highest growth rate among Asian-Americans. Most South Asians living in the U.S. hold ideologies with respect to family relationships and childrearing goals (Joshi, 2005), but little research or formal interventions have been conducted to expand our knowledge of this belief system. This project began by asking South Asian parents about information they wanted to learn about in their role as parents. The authors then put out a call for writers, with different expertise on the topics, to write culturally competent materials on parenting topics. In addition, several focus groups were hosted to hear insights, stories and learnings from the community themselves.

NEHA NAVSARIA (RIGHT) WITH FAMILY, GENERATIONS OF SOUTH ASIAN PARENTS, CIRCA 1990.

This book will be available in print and online for the community. We will continue to hold focus groups and webinars in different areas of the U.S. to continue the conversation on parenting in the South Asian community. As these discussions continue, we hope they will remove the stigma from such taboo topics in the community and promote open dialogue on the complex experience of raising children in the context of many cultures. chaicounselors.org

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THERE ARE TWO GIFTS WE SHOULD GIVE OUR CHILDREN; ONE IS ROOTS AND THE OTHER IS WINGS.

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Building the Foundation: Strengthening your couple relationship by Mudita Rastogi, PhD, LMFT

When you are traveling on an airplane, the flight attendant (or video) says something like this: “In case of low cabin pressure, wear your own mask first before helping your child with theirs.” The same principle applies to your relationships at home. As a licensed marriage and family therapist, I work with many South Asian couples on parenting challenges. Many of these folks believe that being a good parent means sacrificing couple time. Some of us grew up in families where a couple did not traditionally spend a lot of time together. Indian marriage was about fixed roles, and each gender knew what was expected of her or him. However, through my therapy cases, I find that this has changed. For one, many South Asian couples live in nuclear families. Second, if you are somewhat removed from your extended family, you rely much more on your spouse for support and companionship. Still, many South Asians find that the rigors of parenting leave little free time to focus on the marriage. Research on the other hand tells us that in order to be a good parent, we need to first have a strong relationship with our spouse, partner or child’s caregiver. In the case of married couples, this means focusing on building a strong marriage to serve as a foundation for a strong parenting relationship.

Why? When parents cannot act as a team, their children exploit those differences. They successfully use the “divide and rule” technique. For example, if dad is easy to manipulate for extra allowance, they will approach him for the money. They count on the fact that he may not tell mom about it. On the other hand, a strong parental team works together, is consistent, and more effective. Children are more likely to follow rules when they know that both parents agree on the basic rules. chaicounselors.org

Even very young children can sense when their parents have high levels of conflict. I remember a case in which a 9-month-old baby was in the therapy room when her parents were discussing some tough issues. Each time the parents argued the baby would start to cry. High levels of marital conflict are associated with depression and other mental health concerns.¹ When parents have lower levels of conflict, the stress levels of the entire family are lower. Parents can have more positive relationships with their spouse and their kids, and everyone benefits. See a discussion of this topic here http:// muditarastogi.com/Posts/OurChildUsandI.htm A strong couple relationship can serve as a great role model for your children’s own future relationships. Your kids are closely watching what you do (not what you say). Notice what you and your partner do when you are angry. Do you slam the door? Do you raise your voices with each other? Use harsh, derogatory, or abusive language? Children learn from their parents how women are treated, what people do when they disagree, common ways to solve conflicts, and how to love and nurture each other, etc.

So what should a couple do? Here are some of my favorite parenting suggestions: 1. Plan. Even before you become a parent, spend a lot of time talking with your partner about this decision, your hopes and dreams, values, and relational styles as individuals, as partners and as potential parents. Here is a link that discusses this topic. http://psychcentral.com/lib/2012/what-you-need-toconsider-before-having-kids/ 2. Reach out. Parenthood is hard. Research shows that many couples find the first year with their first child to be the toughest time for their marriage. To counteract this, seek support from your spouse, parents, friends, neighbors. If necessary, talk to a doctor or see a therapist. Remember that this is a Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

OVER THE YEARS

universally difficult transition for couples. You are not alone. 3. Nurture your partnership. No matter how busy your lives, try to carve out time for couple togetherness. Keep the communication lines open. Do an activity as a couple and without the kids. Have fun with your spouse. Here are some additional ideas on how to make love last. http://psychcentral.com/ blog/archives/2013/02/11/relationship-experts-ontrue-love-making-love-last/ 4. No child umpires, please! In my clinical practice I find that the unhappiest kids are the ones who are stuck in the middle of two parents who are playing cricket against each other (so to speak). Keep your arguments and differences between the adults. Your children should not have to choose between the two parents. If you find that your child is getting caught in between your couple conflict, run, don’t walk, to a therapist’s office! A therapist can be a better mediator and help you resolve the issues in your relationship.

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To sum up, many parenting experts recommend that great parenting begins with a strong couple relationship. Some South Asian parents might find that to be a challenge initially, but a strong partnership between co-parents can lead to more effective parenting. The couple can act as a team in tackling parenting concerns, boost each other, experience better relationships within the family, and serve as positive role models. To build and sustain a strong bond, the couple should continue to work at communicating, spending quality time alone, and keeping their children out of their conflicts. Family and couple therapy can be a wonderful resource to assist parents in attaining the above goals. It’s recommended to put on your own mask first! Reference: ¹Finchham, F. D. (2003). Marital conflict: Correlates, structure and conflict. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 23-27.

OVER THE YEARS

Balancing Your Work and Family by Preet Dhillon Today, there are increasing numbers of households with two working parents and they are also working longer hours. This creates a challenge for many to achieve work-life balance. Working parents are having to juggle increasing job responsibilities with seemingly endless family responsibilities, such as household errands, meal preparation and providing transportation for children around their activities. Managing multiple demands, such as balancing work and family life, can take a toll on a person’s physical and mental health and potentially lead to burnout. Achieving “work-life balance” can feel like an impossible goal, especially for people who strive to give everything 100 percent. The best work-life balance for an individual will change over time with shifting priorities.

Some common difficulties associated with maintaining work-life balance: • Managing home and work-life balance can be hard especially since many South Asian individuals feel the pressure to work long hours and keep up with career demands to maintain a high sense of achievement. Assess whether it’s more valuable to your children for you to be at home or for you to achieve more financial or career success. At different times in your life, the priorities may change. • When work starts to consume your life, you start to feel disconnected from your family and friends. • The sense of disconnection can extend further to a feeling of disconnection from one’s personal values, beliefs and purpose. • When the demands feel overwhelming, it is easy to neglect taking care of oneself or maintaining healthy habits which can then result in poor diets, lack of time for exercise and trouble sleeping. Thus perpetuating further cycles of fatigue and being inefficient in their daily work and in their daily activities.

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Some helpful things you can do to maintain more control over your work-life balance: • Be realistic about your time and about what can be accomplished within that time. You can’t get everything done in a day and so it is important to prioritize what is most important and build a realistic schedule around that. • Having a schedule is critical for South Asian parents as children need routines to help them transition. Parents also need schedules to help them with time management but it is important to remember to schedule in some down time to take care of yourself. • Learn to say no — learn to recognize your limits and prioritize your time. It might be crucial to your well-being to say no, even at work. It might mean a slower career progression but a more improved sense of emotional and physical health and well-being. These decisions need to be made from an honest appraisal of your values and interests. For instance, if your work is organizing a fundraiser, it might be the right decision for you to not take on any additional commitments with this but if you feel you still need to be involved, offering to help at a minimal level might be a good way to go. The same goes for commitments through children’s activities or their schools. It is very common for parents to overextend themselves and get involved in too many things. • Schedule time for self-care. Make exercise a part of your life (even 20-30 minutes a day will suffice) as this will help you feel more efficient in your daily activities and better able to cope with the multiple stressors in your life. Similarly, it is very important to schedule time with your family and friends. • To be able to be more present for the different commitments in your life, it is important to improve your focus on whatever you are involved in at the present moment. There are meditation and mindfulness techniques that have been proven to have immense benefits on people’s physical and

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mental health. Consider trying out a meditation class to help you learn some of these techniques. The idea is to be present for whatever is going on in your life at that moment—so when you are at work, work but when you are at home, be fully at home, with your family members. Children have an innate ability to be fully present in their activities and they are very intuitive in sensing when others around them are distracted. So improving your ability to be more present in your interactions with your children, will greatly improve your relationship with them.

can delegate some household chores and food preparation to their spouse or their children. This has the added benefit of providing children a sense of responsibility and teaching them important survival skills.

• Ask for help—the myth of the “Super Parent” is just a myth. You do not have to do everything yourself. Try to build a strong supportive network of family members and friends who you can rely on in times of stress. This also includes being able to delegate tasks to other family members—e.g. working moms

Seislove, E. B. (2011). Pure and simple: work-life balance. Journal of Trauma Nursing: the Official Journal of the Society of Trauma Nurses, 18, 4.

References: Mayo Clinic (2012). Work-life balance: Tips to reclaim control. Retrieved from http://www.mayoclinic.com/ health/work-life-balance/WL00056

Uscher, J. (2013). WebMD Feature. Retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/balance/guide/5-strategiesfor-life-balance

CHAI FOCUS GROUP, MARYLAND.

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OVER THE YEARS

Managing Your Stress and Anger by Preet Dhillon

Managing multiple demands, such as balancing work and family life, can take a toll on a person’s physical and mental health. Stress can affect people in different ways, some of which include feeling tired, sad, angry and tearful. It may also lead to loss of sleep, depression, anxiety or panic attacks. Stress may also impact your physical health. Additionally, stress can affect your relationship with your child. South Asian parents spend a lot time being very closely attuned and attentive to their children’s needs and while this is an important part of being a good parent, it is not sufficient. It is very important for parents to take care of themselves. Parental stress has an impact on the family and takes a significant toll on children. Children are quick to pick up on parental and family stress and this affects their physical and emotional health and well-being. Some common effects of parental stress on children includes susceptibility to infections, increased behavior problems, a decline in academic performance, an increase in negative emotions such as depression and anxiety, and over-reactivity. Suffering from stress for extended periods of time can sometimes lead to anger. Parenting is hard work, with multiple demands and imperfect situations and this can at times lead to parents sometimes feeling overwhelmed, out of control and angry. Anger is a normal emotion but it is also an emotion that can be expressed in ways that could be harmful to your child.

Some common difficulties which could lead to stress and anger and affect your parenting are: • Relationship difficulties—problems with your spouse and other family members / friends can be a major source of stress. It is important to take some time to focus on building healthy relationships so that patterns of unhealthy relationships do not negatively affect your relationship with your child. • Managing home and work-life balance can be hard especially since many South Asians individuals feel the pressure to work long hours and keep up chaicounselors.org

with career demands to maintain a high sense of achievement. Assess whether it’s more valuable to your children for you to be at home or for you to achieve more financial or career success. At different times in your life, the priorities may change. • Financial concerns and difficulties can make you feel short-tempered and you might become so involved in these worries that you may neglect your child’s needs. Remember to refocus on the things that matter the most, such as your child’s needs to receive love and care, not material things. Many communities do have support groups and programs to help with financial planning and job advice and support. These are some positive steps you can take to help manage your anxiety related to your finances. • Dealing with different stages of your child’s development can be difficult. As children grow, there are some behaviors associated with their stages of growth which can test your patience and leave you feeling helpless. It is important to understand whether their behaviors are considered normal for that age and stage of development and then to educate yourself on ways to deal with that problem behavior. This will help you not take their problem behaviors personally. It is also important to remember that testing limits is a normal part of development and this is how children learn rules. The solution is not punishment because punishment only creates resentment and might actually make the problem worse. In these situations, it is okay to be firm and enforce limits but to do so in a calm manner as anger will intensify the problem. • Children’s temperaments differ and some children may have personality characteristics that are challenging, causing parents to become frustrated and angry. It is important to remember that these very characteristics are also sometimes your child’s greatest strengths and that it always helps to view your child’s uniqueness in a positive way.

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Some helpful things you can do about stress include: • Talk and listen—communication is the key to all good relationships and open communication about your needs and expectations is important. • Get yourself organized and plan ahead of time. • Take time off and treat yourself to something special. • Find ways to relax and make this an important part of your life—e.g. exercise, listening to music or taking a slow walk. • Try to find something positive to focus on and when you have coped with something difficult, give yourself permission to feel proud of yourself. • Ask for help—the myth of the “Super Parent” is just a myth. You do not have to do everything yourself. Try to build a strong network of people you can rely on in times of stress. • Learn to say no—learn to recognize your limits and prioritize your time.

Some helpful things you can do about anger include:

Anger is a normal emotion but it is also an emotion that can be expressed in ways that could be harmful to your child.

your room” not “You have not cleaned your room just because you want to make me angry” and be specific and to the point.

• Stop! Pause and take some time to cool off. Remember this is not the time to discipline a child. Step away, be silent, breathe slowly and count to 10. Talk about the situation to a helpful adult e.g. your spouse, friend or relative.

References:

• Reevaluate the situation and try to distinguish between unacceptable behavior and behavior you find hard to cope with. Try to find out what is really causing your child to behave this way.

NSPCC (2013). Keeping Your Cool: Advice for parents on managing stress and anger. Retrieved from http://www.ncl.ac.uk/students/wellbeing/assets/ documents/keepingyourcool_wdf48060.pdf

• Think and form a plan. After evaluating the problem, think of a purpose for this situation (e.g. what do you want your child to learn from the way you react in this situation?), set goals and consider alternative ways to respond to this problem

mySahana (2011). South Asian Parents: Tips to Reduce Stress. Retrieved from http://www.mysahana. org/2012/03/south-asian-parents-tips-to-reducestress/

• Act. After considering the above, carry out your decision. When talking to your child, use “I” statements (e.g. “I am very disappointed with what you just this” not “You are a bad girl!”), talk about the current issue only and not past mistakes, focus on the behavior and not your guesses of what might be causing the behavior (e.g. “I need you to clean 10

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Kurcinka, M. S. (1991). Raising your spirited child: A guide for parents whose child is more intense, sensitive, perceptive, persistent, energetic. New York, NY: HarperCollins.

Samalin, N., & Whitney, C. (1991). Love and anger: The parental dilemma. New York, N.Y., U.S.A: Viking.

THROUGH THE YEARS

Parenting Through your Child’s Development by Salmaan Toor, PhD

Before I begin, it is important for the readers to know that this section won’t focus much on “South Asian” culture. That is for one reason: parenting children is a universal theme; it’s a part of every culture. Every culture and ethnicity can relate to what it is like to be a parent and the same themes happen in every culture. Your child starts as a baby completely dependent on you and eventually becomes an independent, young adult. Everything that you do is within the context of your environment. The way you dress is dependent on the weather. What you eat is influenced by what food is around you. What you buy is impacted by what stores are in your proximity. The same rule applies to parenting. Parenting is challenging because the rules are always changing. Your parenting approach is based on where your child is at in life; whether he/ she is an infant, toddler, child, teenager, or young adult. At least your approach should be. The goal of this section is to address your role as a parent at each stage of your child’s development. There are a number of theories on child development. Our purpose here is to give you a general guideline of the developmental stages. If you would like to read a more in depth analysis of theories of child development, there are many resources available. A few of the more notable thinkers include Erik Erikson, Jean Piaget, John Bowlby, and Mary Ainsworth. Again, these names are only a few of the many who have provided meaningful insight into child development. For the sake of brevity and simplicity, the stages of development will be categorized based on chronological age. The categories are 0-2 years of age, 2–6 years of age, 7–12 years of age, and 13–18 years of age. Now some might read this and think, “There is a big difference between a 2-year-old and a 6-year-old or a 13-year-old and an 18-year-old.”

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You are absolutely right. For that reason as you read the following sections, it is important to remember these are general guidelines. If this review was more specific to each year of life, this would be a book and not a booklet.

Parenting during the first two years of life The first two years of life includes the most rapid development of any of the stages. Your child develops from a newborn into a walking, talking, doing toddler. During these first two years, the parent has a number of responsibilities. The primary responsibility is providing a safe, loving environment for your baby. This does not just mean putting a roof over your baby’s head and providing food. These are certainly important. A safe, loving environment refers to the parents being emotionally available and nurturing of the baby. If the baby cries, you attend to their needs. Whatever the baby needs, you do your best to provide. Erik Erikson theorized that during the first year of life the baby learns to either trust or not trust the caregiver (i.e., the parent). Trust is determined based on whether the parent is readily available for the baby, and if the parent meets the baby’s needs and wants. The more the parent is available and loving to the baby, the stronger the bond and trust between parent and baby. If the parent is passive and neglectful, the less likely trust will develop. Here are some behaviors to develop trust: ∙ Hold your baby, even if not crying. Simply holding your baby can strengthen the connection between the two of you. The closeness provides comfort and warmth to your baby. ∙ Interact with your baby. Play with your baby. Make eye contact, silly faces, have conversations. This may seem silly but these types of positive interactions stimulate your baby’s mind.

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∙ Comfort your baby. Comforting is both communicative and non-communicative. If your baby is hungry, has fallen, or has general discomfort, then pick the baby up and reassure with a comforting sentence (“It’s okay, daddy/mama has you”). Laying a foundation is important for trust between you and your baby. In the second year of life, a healthy sense of trust allows for the baby to have confidence to explore the surrounding environment. Your baby is now more mobile and is either crawling or walking into all the corners and crevices of your home. A trusting baby will leave the mother or father’s side and will explore because there is confidence that if the baby falls or is scared, the mother or father will be there to make everything better. Your baby is experiencing the world through its senses (touch, taste, smell, see, and hear). They grab everything, put things in their mouth, look everywhere, and are distracted by noises. This is all normal. Jean Piaget describes this stage as the sensorimotor stage.

Parenting, ages 2-6 A lot is still happening during this stage. Rapid physical, emotional, and developmental change are the norm. Your child says a few words at age 2; by age 6, your child is having full conversations with a number of people. The period of life is all about accomplishment, being able to do things. Erikson referred to this time as autonomy and purpose. Autonomy refers to being able to do things on your own (e.g., using the toilet, eating with a utensil). Purpose refers to doing things with a sense of clarity and direction (e.g., building with blocks, putting on clothes). This is a very important period, and your parenting can greatly impact how your child moves to the next developmental stage. Between the ages of 2-6, your child’s brain development is very active. Your child is becoming more creative, thoughtful, and intuitive. This does not mean that your child is an adult. They are still children so be patient, supportive, and loving. When they make a mistake, gently correct them or inquire why they did what they did. A supportive approach during this stage can lead to long-term benefits like a positive self-concept, self-confidence, and healthy peer relationships. A critical approach can lead to a pessimistic world view, feelings of inadequacy, and anxiety. 12

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During this time, children learn about relationships, emotions, and how to cope with stress from their parents. Children observe their parents’ behavior, even when you think they aren’t paying attention. So it is very important to model prosocial behavior for your children. You are your child’s resource for learning how to understand and navigate the surroundings. Here are a few tips of how to teach your children healthy behaviors: ∙ Praise the positive, correct the negative. If your child does something good or gives a good effort, praise them. As for negative behavior, gently correct your child. This does not mean to say “no” or “stop”, go further. Explain why they shouldn’t touch the hot stove or why it’s not good to eat crayons. ∙ Encourage prosocial behaviors like sharing, patience, and empathy. Encouraging does not mean that your child will share all the time or they won’t have a tantrum, but it lays the foundation for these abilities when they are older. If your child is having a tantrum, don’t try to have an in depth conversation. ∙ Think about yourself when you are in a grumpy mood (yes, parents have tantrums too), do you want someone telling you what to do or why you were wrong when you are already upset? Probably not. So before you attempt to use the tantrum as a teaching experience, wait until your child is calm and is able to listen. ∙ Teach by showing. When (not if) you are upset, sad, happy, or angry, show your child how you cope with your emotions. For example, “I’m really angry right now, I’m going to take some deep breaths to calm down,” or “I’m sad, but going for a walk always makes me feel better so I’m going to do that.” This will teach your child that it’s okay to feel their emotions and that we can do things to manage our feelings. Your child’s sense of awareness of his surroundings, himself, and other people is growing rapidly during the 2-6 year stage. Self-centeredness emerges as your child wants things with little regard for others at times. This is where teaching your child about sharing, other’s feelings, and fairness are vital. Parents have to be more mindful of your own behaviors as well as those around you. It has a profound impact on your children.

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Parenting, ages 6-12 By now your child is fairly independent. Your child can sleep through the night (most nights), eat independently, get ready in the morning, and a number of other things. There is a shift that is happening though, your child still relies on the family for most things, but social prospects are emerging. With this, there is good and some challenges. The good is that socialization is occurring with peers, your child is spending more time with friends and shows an interest in socializing with others. On the other side, there is a sense of peer comparison and competition. Your child might say this friend is the best at basketball, this one is the best at math, this one makes the best pictures, etc. Piaget referred to this time as the concrete operational stage. Your child is no longer completely self-centered; there is an ability to think logically. Piaget theorized there was still rigidity to your child’s thinking (also referred to black-and-white thinking) but children are more reasonable during this stage. As mentioned earlier, this time period is marked by comparison of your child with the peer group. As a parent, it is important to stress to your child that no one is perfect. Everyone has strengths, and everyone has challenges. We should be respectful of each other and treat each other well. Your child still looks to the parents for how to understand the world; however, children are being introduced to other perspectives and views through school and peers. Parents tend to feel like they are “losing” their child to culture or friends; this is a normal feeling and a part of your child’s process of becoming an individual with independent thoughts and life views. A lot of parents are focused on school performance during this time, specifically achieving good grades. For some this may be surprising, but research shows it is more important to praise the effort of your child and not the actual achievement or outcome (Marzano, Pickering & Pollock, 20111). So if your child studied hard for a test, praise the child’s effort regardless of the outcome. Your child will learn to do their best in the quest for achievement. During this stage, parents be aware of the following: ∙ Be consistent. A major issue for kids is when parents change the rules because “I’m the parent and I say so”. Many kids feel confused and consequently have no idea what the parents want. Even worse, chaicounselors.org

they may feel angry and resentful. If you do change the rules, talk with your child so that everyone is on the same page. Give them an opportunity to express their thoughts and feelings. In two-parent households, be sure that both parents are on the same page. The analogy I use for adults is imagine what your work experience would be like if you had two bosses telling you two different things. Not fun. ∙ Keep promises. If you promise something to your child, keep the promise. If you can’t keep the promise (it will happen—no one is perfect), apologize. Breaking a promise does not have to become a trust issue between the two of you. Acknowledge your child’s feelings and come up with a plan for how you can make it up to your child at a later time. ∙ Share the power. Kids are dynamic. In one moment you may think they don’t need you anymore, and in the next moment they are looking for your love and support. As children mature, they want independence. At the same time, you are the parent and responsible for their well-being. Find balance between being the decision-maker and allowing your child to make some decisions. This balance involves trusting your child. If your child has made good decisions in the past, give them a chance to make another one. This can be scary for some parents, but showing confidence in your child’s ability to make the right choice can be a valuable life lesson and confidence booster.

Parenting, ages 13-17 Parents overwhelmingly describe the teenage years as the most challenging years of parenting. In the same breath, parents marvel at the transformation their kids go through from a pre-teen to a teenager. During the teenage years, your child is thinking abstractly, considering multiple perspectives, questioning the rules and beliefs they have lived by for years. This period of time is marked by excitement and confusion for both parents and teens. Piaget describes this time as the formal operations period, where the teen is considering multiple perspectives and questions ideas that were once believed to be unquestionable truths. Erikson highlights the formation of an identity at this time; identity referring to how your child sees him/herself. Parenting can help your teen in determining their identity or it can cause your teen to experience Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

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identity confusion (e.g., feeling lost, unaware, unsure). The parents’ main role at this time is to be supportive. This does not mean to allow your teen to do whatever they want, whenever they want. Continue being a parent but more in an advisory role. Hopefully, your parenting from earlier years has laid a stable foundation of right vs. wrong and how to treat others with care and respect. In many instances, parents feel that their teen is a disconnected from the family: out with friends, in their bedroom with the door closed, or wearing headphones all the time. One way to remain connected is to have a set time where all family members are together. What comes to mind is dinner time. Dinner works well because it is something we all do, it’s usually a casual environment, and it is toward the end of the day. Sometimes all members of the family can’t be present but an effort should be made by all members. Again, support and love are key during the teenage years. For every experience of being critical, a parent should praise their teen at least twice. Also know that your teen may not want to share things with “mom and dad.” If your teen feels comfortable talking to a family friend or other adult member of the family, be OK with that. Pressuring your teen to talk to you usually results in your teen pulling even further away. Give your teen space and if your teen says they would rather not talk right now, respect their wishes. Here are some common teen issues and what to do as a parent: ∙ Sex. If you have a teen, your teen is thinking about sex. They aren’t necessarily thinking about having sex, but they are thinking about sexual things. Have a conversation, it doesn’t have to be a lecture, and the conversation can be short. If you don’t then more than likely they’ll learn about sex from somewhere else, probably the internet or their peers. What would you prefer? ∙ Alcohol and drugs. Unfortunately, alcohol and drugs are all too common with teens. Talk to your teens about the risks and the statistics. Give them strategies for if they find themselves in a situation with drugs or alcohol. Educate your teens and don’t shy away from this topic. ∙ Peer pressure. Similarly to alcohol and drugs, have a conversation about peer pressure and how it’s normal to “want to fit in” with friends. At the same 14

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time, let your teen know if they don’t feel comfortable then don’t participate and that they should never have to compromise their morals or beliefs for a true friend. ∙ Remind your teen about how proud you are as a parent because of them. This may give them the confidence and security to walk away from peer pressure. ∙ “Nagging” Parents. Yes, I’m talking about you. Teens always complain about their parents always telling them what to do. Reinforce in your teen that you love and care about them and that is why you are interested in their life and what they are doing. It’s not that the teen is untrustworthy, it’s more the parent is worried and cares about them. This won’t solve the “nagging” problem, but it might make what feels like a parental intrusion more bearable. ∙ Parental support. For many parents, especially South Asian, there is embarrassment and shame if their teen is having issues. Parents are always surprised when they finally gain the courage to share with other parents, that other parents are having the same issues with their teens. Feeling alone as a parent of a teenager can be scary and confusing. Reach out to other parents and share stories about your teens and advise one another. Even if the strategies don’t work, it feels better to know that you aren’t alone in your struggles. Reference: 1Marzano, R. J., Pickering, D., & Pollock, J. E. (2001). Classroom instruction that works: Research-based strategies for increasing student achievement. Alexandria, Va: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Parenting is challenging because the rules are always changing. Your parenting approach is based on where your child is in life. At least your approach should be.

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Parenting Tweens by Hena Zuberi

She is curled up next to me reading A Wrinkle in Time, when she suddenly turns around and says “Mama, you know the difference between you and my friends’ mothers?” “What?” I ask, “that I am a little crazzzyy!” as I try to tickle her. “No, seriously, I can talk to you and you don’t freak out and you don’t try to control me. You have rules but you don’t make every choice in my life.” My eldest is a tween (a pre-teen)—an awkward stage where she is not a child but not quite a woman yet. Hormones are kicking in, tastes are altering, and everything from her body to her attitude is changing. She feels more intensely and is bombarded with sexuality, smoking and other temptations all around. At this stage I have to work harder on my relationship with her so she can resist the pressure when she is a teenager. Mr. Raza (*name changed) sits in my office at the Islamic Center; he is here to enroll his 13-year-old son into a class. As he is filling out the registration form, he suddenly holds his head and says in a shaky voice, “I have failed as a father!” His elder son is 18, involved with drugs, mouthing off, running with the wrong crowd. He didn’t know where his 22-year-old daughter is, as she didn’t talk to him anymore. “Where did I go wrong? What could I have done differently?” I get asked these questions so many times. Most parents want a mutually respectful and loving relationship with their children, but often do not know how to achieve it. I really think parenting teens means giving in to their harmless pleasures; saying yes to the little things, so when you do say no to things that are absolutely unacceptable, they trust that you are not trying to control them but are ‘raising’ them. It is hard work to parent teenagers, so start early. Parents need to know that kids are hitting puberty earlier, but we do not let them become adults until

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much later in life. We do not give them responsibility or teach them how to make choices. As parents, we have to remember that we were their age once. We made similar mistakes. Sometimes they are testing their limits and our boundaries, but often they are just trying to get our attention. I say what I say after working as a youth group leader for years. Psychologists tell us that the reward centers of the adolescent brain are much more active than those of either children or adults. Think about the incomparable intensity of the first crush, the neverto-be-recaptured euphoria of the school cricket club championship; compare this to our relatively sedated adult emotions. Here are tips to help foster a strong bond with your tween: • Don’t treat children like possessions. One thing parents often do is treat children like they are their possessions, and the children feel it. We need to take care of our babies not because they are ours— because they really don’t belong to us, they belong to their Creator—but we need to take care of them because they are a Gift from the One we LOVE. When we change the way we look at them then we find changes in the way we parent them, with less pressure, as caretakers not owners.

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. >> KHALIL GIBRAN

• Know who their friends are. It is absolutely imperative that you know who their friends are and Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

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who their friend’s parents are. It is not enough that they live down the street or work in that great company or attend the same club as you do. At this age, children’s peers start replacing parents. Kids start resisting contact with parents. When this happens then their friends start dictating how they should act instead of them taking their cues from you. You stop being their moral compass. Friendships are important, but should not be as important as the primary relationship, which is with the parents. • Spend time one-on-one. It is hard to find time to spend individually with each of our children, but this is so important, especially when you see changes in your youngster’s behavior. Focus on the relationship, not the conduct. Dr. Gordon Neufield, one of Canada’s leading developmental psychologists, points out that if our spouse was being rude to us or not talking to us or rolling their eyes at us, we would not think that they have a conduct problem, we would think we have a relationship problem. We need to do the same thing with our children. Take them out for a treat, run errands with them or just sit on their bed and chat. Spending time with family members is a spiritual act so even if it is a few minutes a day, a calm conversation, not a lecture, can benefit both the parent and the child. • Communication, communication, communication. If all you are getting from your son or daughter is blank stares, monosyllabic answers or aggressive language, reflect on your part in the relationship. When they are younger, we hug them, shower kisses on them but as they grow older, many parents tend to start getting reserved with their teens. Fathers, especially, tend to back off after girls become a certain age. They start feeling ‘uncomfortable’ around their girls. Girls need fathers who constantly make them feel like they are a part of each other’s lives. If young girls, who are taking their first steps towards womanhood get positive male attention at home then they will not go seeking this attention elsewhere. Tweens and teens should feel like they can confide in their parents and talk to them about various topics, from finding someone attractive to following their dream careers without being blasted for being ‘out of control’. • Be involved in your children’s life, every day. Don’t wait till the situation is beyond repair to 16

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control it. Be involved in their lives every day, not to control your children but to really take an interest in their lives. If you notice that they are not acting like themselves, ask them “What’s up, I noticed that you were not your normal self?” Kids this age often make statements like “I don’t need your rules; I am going to run away.” If you face this, take them to the city, or a shelter or go feed the poor where they will see with their own eyes how people who run away from home live. • Get other adults involved in your kids’ lives. This really helps you parent, when kids know that there is someone aside from the parents who is keeping tabs on them, like teachers, aunts, uncles, family friends, an older cousin and neighbors. They need other upright adults involved in their lives that they can also trust. Ask these adults to check in on them and talk to them, reinforcing the principles that you are raising them with. • Be tech savvy and set limits. In today’s social media driven, super-connected world, parents really do themselves a disservice when they do not educate themselves about gadgets and technology. Don’t give your child a smartphone if you do not know how to use it yourself. To discipline them cut off their spending money or take away their gadgets (phone, laptop, games), set down strict laws and then monitor them to make sure they are adhering to your rules. • Maintain a balance. Even if you have ‘good kids’ do not just assume that your kid is ‘good’. My mother-in-law used to surprise my husband while he was in college—she would just show up at his dorm, without letting him know, to check up on him. Don’t think that your child can never do wrong; such parents lose their kids. Many parents whose children are changing in front of their eyes refuse to take sincere advice and gently curb the children while they are in their early teens. These parents will get upset with the person who is giving the advice and ignore the situation. But do not go to the other extreme: constantly spying on them and thinking that they are going to do something forbidden. At that point, because your expectations of them are so low, they start thinking, “I must be bad, that is why they (my parents) think I am bad, so let me act out on it.”

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They will make mistakes. When they reach a certain age they will make mistakes, it is inevitable. That is the time we need to let go. We can just give them the message in a loving but firm way. One thing that really helps me is reminding myself that their souls are just as old as ours. When we look at it from this perspective, it is easier to control our anger and focus on the issue at hand. They will stray but they can just as easily come back. Many people never give their children who make grave mistakes a chance to make amends, to repent, and come back to God. When God hasn’t closed that path, who are we to say that you will never be forgiven? Very few teens go out of control if they are given set boundaries, which don’t keep

changing every few weeks or months; and whose parents are constantly praying for them and talking to them about everything, without huge gaps in communication. • Make culture and religion a daily, relevant part of your life. Kids can spot a hypocrite from a mile away. When religion is relegated to something we do when a family member dies or a book wrapped up in silk, perched high up on our bookshelf, and then we use it to shame them into behaving, kids are confused. Even worse, if all they know about their faith is a quick prayer in a language that they don’t understand, taught to them by a teacher who they cannot relate to, how can we raise spiritual children who we have deep bonds with?

—— A snapshot of ——

SOUTH ASIAN PARENTING

Issues important to South Asian parents in the U.S. These answers are based on surveys of 250 South Asian parents in 2011 and 2012.

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Understanding Your Teen’s Social And Emotional Development Needs By Ulash Thakore-Dunlap, LMFT

As you may have discovered, living with a teenage son or daughter is like being on an emotional roller coaster with moods ranging from happiness, anger, sadness and more. The teenage years are a time of transitioning from childhood into adulthood and involve changes in personality, emotional, physical and social development. This article will explore the social and emotional developmental tasks that your child is experiencing during their teen years. Tips will be offered on how to support your teen during this stage. There are five major social and emotional transitions that teens experience during their adolescent years: Establishing Identity — Developing a unique social identity is part of your teens social development. Your teen will express his or her identity through clothes, makeup, hairstyle, music and friends. The question of “who am I” is not one that teens think about at a conscious level. Instead, over the course of time, teens begin to integrate the opinions of influential others (such as parents and friends) into their own likes and dislikes. As a parent, it is important to help your child find ways to express their individual spirit in an appropriate and healthy manner. Consider these desires and evaluate them against any negative thoughts that you have about them. For example, your fifteen year old son wants to go out with his friends to watch a film at the movie theatre. As a parent, your reactions might be, “I do not want my son to be out late”, “I worry about him going out”, or “is he seeing his girlfriend that I don’t know about?” As a parent, your concerns (positive or negative) are legitimate, but also may conflict with your teens need for independence and identity at this stage. Try having a conversation about your concerns with your teen and see if there is some comprise. In this example, you may want your son to call you to see if he is ok, or get a ride home after the movies. 18

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Establishing Intimacy — Intimacy refers to close relationships in which people are honest, caring and trusting. Friendships provide the first setting in which teens can practice their social skills with their contemporaries. It is with friends that teens learn how to begin, maintain, and terminate relationships, practice social skills, and become intimate. Generally, South Asian families are close knit and the extended families play a big role. Your children may go to older cousins or aunties and uncles for advice and support. If you are comfortable with your child getting support from extended family this helps foster these skills. Establishing Autonomy —Autonomy doesn’t mean becoming completely independent from others or rebelling. During this process your teen is trying to establish autonomy by becoming an independent and self-governing person. This may mean your teen is more likely to seek out advice and help from a friend than from you. Establishing autonomy going against South Asian cultural norms. Helping your teen to establish independence will help them in the future, for example when they graduate from high school and go to college or seek a job. Becoming Comfortable With Ones Sexuality — The teen years are the most important time for the development of sexuality. How teens are educated about and exposed to sexuality will largely determine whether or not they develop a healthy sexual identity and later a healthy physical relationship with their spouse or partner. It is important to discuss intimacy and sex with your teen. If you feel uncomfortable talking about this topic with your child, let them know and connect them with a trusting adult in their life to discuss this topic. Achievements — During this time teens need to figure out what they want to achieve academically and future vocational choices as well as exploring what they are currently good and need support on to reach their goals.

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What Can I Do? Tips To Help Your Teen Here are some tips to help you support your teen’s social and emotional needs as they navigate successful from childhood into adulthood: Communicating With Your Teen — Some teenagers will give you the silent treatment when they become angry or if they don’t get their way. Give them time to calm down. They’ll talk to you again (usually when they need something from you). Approach your teen when they have calmed down or let them know you are there for them when they are ready to talk. Modeling — Teens decide how they feel about themselves in large part by how their parents react to them. For this reason, it’s important for parents to help their teen feel good about themselves and modeling how to communicate their needs. Intimacy — Know your child’s friend(s) and/or curiously ask them about their friendships. Meet the parents of your teen’s friends. Provide fun things to do at home to encourage teens to “hang out” at your house so you’ll know where they are and what they are doing. Autonomy — If your teen spends more time away from home to hang out with friends in the evening and weekends make sure you know where your teenager is, who your teenager is with, and what your teenager plans to do. Encourage your teenager to update you if plans change. Sexuality — Talking honestly to your teen about sex is one of the only ways that a parent can help a teen to discover his or her sexual identity. It is very normal and healthy for a teen (or at any age) to explore sexual identity. The term sexual identity includes what it means to be intimate with another person and who am I attracted to. There is a general assumption of heterosexuality in our community but the statistics highlight 1 in 20 people identify as Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT). It is helpful to talk to your teen about what your cultural and religious expectations are about having sex. Many parents feel uncomfortable talking about this topic with their teens. If this is the case, have an older family member who is comfortable talking about sex and sexuality with them. Increasing your teens knowledge about this topic will help them make better decisions. chaicounselors.org

Monitor Your Teen’s As a parent, Emotional States — Help it is important your teen learn how to recognize to help your and deal with stress, anger, child find ways and sadness and other emotions to express their they are feeling. individual spirit Moods are also affected by what in an appropriate we eat, exercise and sleep; help and healthy you child to exercise regularly, manner. eat healthy foods and get a good nights sleep. Intervene if emotions are overwhelming your teen by talking to your child and seeking support from a professional counselor. Setting Values And Expectations — It is also important to communicate your values and to set expectations and limits, such as insisting on honesty, self-control and respect for others, while still allowing teenagers to have their own space. Resources: South Asian Parent http://www.southasianparent.com/ My Sahana http://www.mysahana.org/2011/08/south-asianparents-tips-for-successful-conversations-with-yourteens/ PAMF http://www.pamf.org/teen/parents/ Parenting Teens Online http://www.parentingteensonline.com/ USA Gov http://www.usa.gov/Topics/Parents-Teens.shtml PBS http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows teenbrain/etc/aliens.html

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Transition to College: A Family Affair By Kusha Murarka, PsyD

The transition to college marks an important milestone in late adolescence that involves physical, mental, and emotional challenges and opportunities as students begin the journey on this new life experience. As a parent, it may be difficult to see your child leave home and embark on uncharted territory. This article will help identify normal stressors for both South Asian college-age children and their parents from a cultural lens. Common stressors that arise for South Asian college-age students: Choosing a major/career path: Often times we see students that are negotiating their major or career choice in college. This is common as many students come in “undecided” or change their minds during their time in college. Parents can help by being supportive in this intimidating process as they try to narrow down their interests and career goals. Academic Performance: South Asian families are known to value education very highly. This lends itself to high pressure on academic performance for South Asian students. It is key for parents to provide encouragement and support since students often can feel paralyzed by the pressure and this leads to significant emotional, physical, and mental distress. Time management/balance: College campuses offer a breadth of student activities, social events, and academic opportunities that can be exciting for students. Managing time is the challenge here. Since academics are highly emphasized in South Asian families, social life may not be encouraged as a priority. A common conflict faced by South Asian students is academics vs. social life. Parents recognizing that both kinds of opportunities are valuable in the overall college experience helps prepare the students’ future work-life balance. Forming new identity and relationships: College is a time when students are likely meeting a diverse array of individuals forming new relationships. 20

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South Asian students also can identify with cultural, religious, and social communities that they may not have been exposed to in the past. This is often a validating experience for students as they are exploring personal identity in the context of these relationships, which is a very important part of selfesteem and confidence in this stage of life. Common stressors for South Asian parents: Conflict: It is not uncommon to experience conflict about separation from a child attending college. Parents may feel conflict with their child’s choices in regards to academic, social, and cultural realms. They may not agree with their child, but allowing them to explore and begin to make choices on their own is a crucial part of maturation into adulthood. It is important to listen to their struggles and refrain from judgment as best as possible. Separation/Loss: Separation from a collegeage child is difficult! However, there are different experiences of loss by the child and the parent. The child may feel a little homesick, but they are more excited by the new environment than the parents that are left behind. Parents should acknowledge this loss and try to build a support system outside of the relationship with the child. Parents also need to remember that younger children at home are experiencing loss of their sibling. It’s also be a time for parents to revisit personal hobbies and activities that may have been put on hold when raising children. Ambivalence and concern: Parents may notice that the college-age child vacillates between wanting to communicate as often as a few times per day or occasionally once every few weeks. They may also notice changes in the child’s moods and social activities. These are expected behaviors when taking this first big step away from the nest. As a South Asian parent, it is natural to be worried while they are attending college. There is less control a parent has

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over their day-to-day lives, which can be frightening. Expressing concern when they seem distressed is encouraged. Notable Signs of Distress to watch for in college students: • Physical complaints such as appetite changes, weight loss or gain • Less socializing • Sleeping too much or too little • Academic problems • Mood changes and/or a ‘giving up’ attitude • Valuable tips for South Asian parents with collegeage children: • Keep in mind that adjusting to this new relationship with your child takes time and patience. • Be creative and tactful with communication modes and frequencies. • Encourage your child to get involved and create a support network on campus.

• Know that you and your values are in their minds even though they may not say it explicitly. • Encourage students to seek help with college campus resources. Students grow in many different ways throughout their college experience, but it is by no means an overnight or linear progression. The personal and social growth can be tremendous and overwhelming but also very rewarding. It is important for parents to stay as consistent and supportive of children during this major life transition as possible. For more information on the college transition experience, visit http://www.transitionyear.org/parent/intro.php References: Almeida, R. (1996). Hindu, Christian, and Muslim families. In M. McGoldrick, J. Giordano, & J.K. Pearce (Eds.), Ethnicity & Family Therapy (395–423). New York: The Guilford Press. The Illinois Higher Education Center for Alcohol, Other Drug and Violence Prevention (2011). Freshman Year: A New Direction, A New Beginning. Charleston, IL: Illinois Higher Education Center.

—— Major Religions of ——

SOUTH ASIA

Buddhism

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Christianity

Hinduism

Islam

Sikhism

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SCHOOL YEARS

Navigating the School System and Advocating for your Child Khyati Y. Joshi, EdD We all want our children to succeed in school—not just in terms of academic achievement, but also we want our children to be happy, healthy, and have a circle of friends and teachers who build their sense of self. But success in school doesn’t just happen. As a South Asian American parent, you have to be your child’s advocate—and that can be daunting. For immigrant parents, who did not go through U.S. schools, the very system and culture may be unfamiliar. But even second-generation parents, who may be more familiar with American schools because they are products of the system, navigating the educational system, may need reminders and tips on what to do. Whether you were born here or are newlyarrived, your children are not just like you, and their experiences in twenty-first century American schools will be different from yours of the twentieth century. You are your child’s first and best advocate. It’s not always easy, but not much about parenting really is, right? You might be uncomfortable in school for many reasons: You could be unfamiliar with school culture. Even if you’re not, you may not have role models because your own parents did not advocate for you or participate in your school growing up. Whatever the reasons are, you need to find out why you’re uncomfortable, and what you’re scared of. Start by conquering the unfamiliarity of it all: Get involved in the classroom, as a way to get to know the teacher and your child’s peers. If your schedule permits, be the mom or dad who brings snacks, chaperones a field trip, or reads to the class during library week. If you’re only free in the evenings, show up at a parent-teacher-student association (PTSA) or Board of Education (BOE) meeting. Find a friend, the parent of another child in the school, and get involved together. It’s not easy to 22

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show up at a PTSA meeting or BOE meeting--but that’s where many of the important decisions get made that will affect your children’s education. South Asian American parents may not know how to advocate for their children in school, and they also may not think it is their “place” to do so. Last summer, my friend Gita told me about a situation her daughter, a bright girl about to start the fourth grade. When Gita’s daughter was in first grade, her teacher provided extra homework and enrichment activities in and out of the classroom. Gita’s daughter loved it, and thrived; she excelled academically and loved school. But in subsequent grades, teachers did not provided the same type of enrichment. For two years, Gita didn’t want to ask for the teachers to provide enrichment work, because she feared the teachers would retaliate against her daughter because she asked. Gita and her husband never went into the school to talk to any teacher or the principal; instead, they pay extra money to a private company to provide after-school enrichment, while their daughter remains bored in school. Here are the suggestions I gave to Gita: Establish a relationship with the principal and teacher. Go in and say, “Hello.” You don’t need to discuss anything on that first visit. Just establish a relationship, so teachers and administrators will know you when the time comes to discuss your child’s needs. Be comfortable with being uncomfortable, in order to put yourself in a place—physically and socially— where you can advocate for her child. Other parents are advocating for their children, establishing a presence in school, being heard, and their children’s needs are addressed. We can do this too. If you believe a particular teacher will be a good fit for your child, make the request. School officials may still say they don’t take requests, but they will hear your request. They will see you as an advocate for your child.

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Don’t stay away because “there’s nothing wrong yet,” or “my child seems happy.” It’s by building relationships in the good times that you can have the access you need to help your child through the bad times. For South Asian American parents, advocacy goes beyond ensuring your child’s academic needs are being met. It has to encompass their social and emotional needs too—in particular, by ensuring our children’s positive ethnic and racial identity development. For South Asian American kids, whether Muslim, Sikh, Hindu, or of some other religious background, acknowledging cultural celebrations and religious festivals in school can be very positive and is very important. Research shows us that the smaller the gap between home culture and school culture, the greater chances of increased academic achievement. In other words, the less time your kid has to stress about navigating two divergent social words—the White Christian milieu of most schools, and your South Asian home and religious community—the better they will focus on their studies and develop self-esteem in the context of his relationships with peers. To achieve that goal, parents need to advocate that schools recognize their holidays and celebrations. This doesn’t always mean a day off from school; if anything, it’s more important that the curriculum or classroom activities involve an event around various holidays. Here, parents can serve as resources. Maybe Ethan’s mom can bake a cake and tell a nursery rhyme, but you can teach the class to dance at Navratri or relay the significance of Eid. Having positive experiences in regard to cultural and religious backgrounds in a school setting helps foster positive and healthy ethnic and racial identity development. Kids spend 50% of their waking life in school, so feeling “this part of me is welcome here,” “this part of me belongs here,” is essential. That is the message you’ll help send to your children when you make sure the school recognizes your religious festivals. Advocating for your child also means taking the time to listen to and hear what your child is telling you about school. If your child says he’s being teased or harassed, ask why he thinks that, and why he thinks it’s happening. Asking “why” frequently will help you get at the root of the matter. Don’t automatically assume your child isn’t experiencing discrimination, chaicounselors.org

but also don’t automatically assume that he is either. Some bullying has nothing to do with kids’ skin color or religion. But sometimes it does. And sometimes racial and religious bias appears not in overt acts of discrimination, but in your child feeling invisible or marginalized because he is different from his classmates. Sometimes working with your children’s teachers means educating them on these issues. Use resources like the links in this article to help yourself, and your child’s teachers and school administrators, understand what’s needed. As parents, we aren’t always our kids’ best friend. But there’s no one who can be a better advocate for our kids. They need us to stand up for them, and for kids like them in their classes. Step out of your comfort zone, step up to the plate, and the rewards for your children will last a lifetime.

What do I say to teachers and administrators? “Hello.” Meet teachers, principals, and other school leaders the first chance you get. (But remember, it’s also never too late!) “How are you?” Get to know your kids’ teachers. They’re human too; you don’t need to be their friend, but knowing what makes them tick can help you help them help your kids. “Here we are!” Find a friend and join the parent/ teacher organization or attend a school board meeting—just to say, “I am here and part of this community.” “Let’s talk.” Use formal conferences and informal meetings to talk about your concerns, and to hear from teachers about how your child is doing. “Here’s what we need.” Whether your child is in the gifted program, an English Language Learner or English for Speakers of Other Languages (ELL or ESOL), or a student who needs an Individualized Education Plan (IEP), know and express your child’s needs. Be firm, polite, and tenacious, and if you’re not getting a response at one level (teacher, department chair), take your request up the line to the next level (principal, superintendent, Board of Education).

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SCHOOL YEARS

Barriers in the Early Identification of Learning Problems By Preetika Mukherjee, PhD Despite constituting less than 1 percent of the U.S. population, Indian-Americans are 3 percent of the nation’s engineers, 7 percent of its IT workers and 8 percent of its physicians and surgeons. About 69 percent of Indian Americans age 25 and over have four-year college degrees (as compared to 30 percent achieved by whites). The success of Indian Americans is often ascribed to the culture which places strong emphasis on academic achievement. Thus Indian American and children form other South Asian countries are viewed as being well behaved, well adjusted, and high achieving…a “Model Minority”. So what happens when an Indian American child has learning difficulties? The research in this is area is very limited and our understanding comes from our experience with the culture and working with Indian American parents who have children with special needs. Although we know that identifying learning disabilities early can pave the way for children to get the support they need to experience successful futures both in and out of school, there is a delay in detection of these disabilities and intervention for South Asian children. We can only speculate some reasons for these delays: • Understanding of learning disability in India (or for that matter in Asia) is still in nascent stages. When a child is unable to perform well in school he/she is branded as a failure and perceived as not trying “hard enough.” Therefore, parents who grew up in India (about 87 percent of adult Indian Americans) or other South Asian countries lack awareness regarding developmental and learning disabilities. • Parenting and “being a good parent” is very important in the South Asian American community. 78 percent of Indian Americans say being a good parent is one of the most important things to them personally. Additionally, a child’s behavior and learning is reflective of how well 24

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a child is raised by his or her parents. Delays or failures in the child’s achievement are seen as failure of parenting. Although parents may suspect that their child is not developing at a typical rate, they may wait to see if the symptoms will resolve on their own. • The South Asian culture’s emphasis on adherence to social norms may also prevent parents from seeking out help for their children, for fear of social rejection or loss of face. In a study¹ on process of symptom recognition, help-seeking, and initial diagnosis of developmental disorders in India, parents waited as long as 2 years and 8 months before seeking help from a professional. • The stigma of disability is another factor that plays a role in late detection in the South Asian American community. What are the implications of later detection of learning difficulties? Once the child starts pre-school, he/she will have difficulty learning at the same pace as other children. Time and again, children with learning difficulties and their parents hear, “He’s such a bright child; if only he would try harder” or “If he only paid attention more, he would have less trouble.” Ironically, no one knows exactly how hard the children with these difficulties are trying. This can frustrate the child and parent which might lead to stress in family relations and further difficulties in the feelings of self worth of the child. Another important consideration is that a learning disability is not an isolated disorder. There are large number of children with learning disability who also suffer from Depression and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Whether learning disorders predispose a person to other disorders, whether other disorders lead to underachievement and, thus, to learning disorders, or whether a common risk factor leads to concurrent development of learning disorders and other disorders is a matter of debate.

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So, how would you know to suspect that your child has a learning disability in preschool? • Pay attention to language and communication development. Is my child saying single words (12 month–15 months)? Is he/she putting 2-3 words together by 2 years of age? Does he/she understand what people are saying or things needs to be repeated multiple times? Does he/she understand social cues (e.g., gestures, nonverbal communication)? • Pay attention to the motor development, such as delays in learning to sit, walk, color, and using scissors. Look for his/her pencil hold and formation of characters. • Delays in socialization including playing and relating interactively with other children.

If you see these clues and believe your pre-school aged son or daughter might have learning disability, you should get the child evaluated as soon as possible. If the concerns are primarily educational, you can get a “psychoeducational” evaluation for your child. However, if your concerns include educational issues as well as other cognitive tasks, such as attention, information processing, developmental delays, the assessment is called a “neuropsychological” evaluation. For more information on these issues go to: www.ldonline.org Reference: 1 Daley T. (2004) From symptom recognition to diagnosis: Children with autism in urban India. Social Science & Medicine, 58(7), 1323–1335

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Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

SCHOOL YEARS

Bullied Brown By Neha Navsaria, PhD

This article is reprinted with permission from the online magazine South Asian Parent. www.SouthAsianParent.com is an online parenting resource for families caught between cultures and identities. It was rare to see South Asians mirrored in media and entertainment when I was growing up in the U.S. Anything that represented being South Asian, such as food, clothing or skin color, easily set us apart from the majority culture. This experience of being notably different from others has constantly placed South Asian children at risk for bullying. Let’s fast forward to present day. With the popularity of South Asian culture and Bollywood music, movies and popular culture, it appears all things South Asian have become trendy. One would think greater acceptance into mainstream culture means the next generation of South Asian youth are not targets of harassment. Sadly, the data paints an upsetting picture and extinguishes this hopeful thought. During a Bullying Prevention Summit hosted by the White House in 2011, the Department of Education released an alarming report based on a survey of 6,500 students:¹ • 62% of Asian-American students say they have been harassed over the Internet • More than half of these Asian-American teenagers say they have been bullied • Asian-American students are 20% more likely than other ethnic groups to be bullied at school, and three times as likely to be bullied over the Internet. This tells us South Asian children are specific targets. We’d like to say this has nothing to do with ethnicity, but evidence tells us otherwise. An article published in the British Journal of School Psychology found a significant difference of racist name calling between South Asian and White children who were bullied.² A similar study from Britain found 26

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that bullying against South Asians was more likely related to religious or cultural difference, such as the animal forms of some Hindu Gods, the clothing worn by South Asian Muslims or the languages spoken.³ It seems differences in appearance and lifestyles will always create a perception that South Asians are “foreign” and a target of harassment. Who have South Asian youth turned to for support? Asian bullying victims often feel they can’t turn to their parents because their parents don’t understand what bullying is.4 Bullying doesn’t necessarily include violent actions; there are subtle forms as well. Bullying can refer to verbal taunts, physical assaults, exclusion from a peer group, spreading rumors and gossip, and more recently, cyberbullying through social media such as Facebook.

Bullying is linked directly to depression and anxiety, and in some cases, suicide.

Some immigrant parents may have difficulty recognizing the implications of bullying because they too, have experienced racism or harassment upon arrival to the country. Perhaps they feel if they survived it, why can’t their children do the same? While the experience of bullying is harsh for any age group, to be ridiculed and embarrassed during a developmental stage when identity is formed and self-confidence is built is quite dangerous. These experiences can negatively shape a child’s sense of self-worth, and enduring bullying without outside support can take a toll. Bullying is linked directly to depression and anxiety, and in some cases, suicide.

SCHOOL YEARS

The American Psychological Association (APA) describes signs parents should look for when they suspect their child is bullied: ripped clothing, hesitation about going to school, decreased appetite, nightmares, crying, or general depression and anxiety. The APA provides the following suggestions for parents who have found out their child is getting bullied:

to manage encounters with children from diverse backgrounds are important. And remember, it’s not just the conversations. Being a role model is important; so watch what you say and to whom you say it—respect for others can be contagious! For more information on what can be done to prevent and address bullying, visit www.StopBullying.gov.

• Don’t tell children to “Let it go” or “Suck it up”

References:

• Have open-ended conversations to learn what is really going on at school so you can take appropriate steps

¹Dutt, E. (2011, November 11). South Asian parents, students urged to report bullying incidents. News India Times from epaper.newsindia-times.com

• Practice scenarios at home where your child learns how to ignore a bully and/or develop assertive strategies for coping with it

²Eslea, M., & Mukhtar, K. (2000). Bullying and racism among Asian schoolchildren in Britain. Educational Research, 42, 2, 207-217.

• Help your child identify teachers and friends who can help

³Moran, S., Smith, P. K., Thompson, D. and Whitney, I. (1993), Ethnic differences in experiences of bullying: Asian and white children. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 63: 431–440.

There are also things you can do at a school or community level. For example, KiVa, an innovative anti-bullying program for schools developed at the University of Turku in Finland, has shown great success in preventing and tackling emerging cases of bullying.5 It is focused on influencing children’s perceptions of their peers, and teaching children how to manage peer relations in a constructive and healthy manner. The success of the KiVa model means that discussions with your children on how

4Hwang, H. (2012). In the face of bullying. Hyphen.

Issue 24 from http://hyphenmagazine.com/ magazine/issue-24-survival/face-bullying 5Williford,

A., Boulton, A., Noland, B., Little, T.D. and Kärnä, A. (2012). Effects of the KiVa Anti-bullying Program on Adolescents’ Depression, Anxiety, and Perception of Peers. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 40 (2): 289-300.

It seems differences in appearance and lifestyles will always create a perception that South Asians are “foreign” and a target of harassment. chaicounselors.org

Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

Mental Health and Mental Illness and the South Asian Community By Razia Kosi, LCSW-C

What is Mental Health? Mental health is the state of well-being in which an individual realizes their potential, can cope with normal life stresses and be productive at work or school and contributes positively to the community. The potential of the person is based on the talents they nurture, the persistence in becoming better at a skill or task, and the relationships they develop around them. It’s not merely about achievement or accomplishments. Taking care of our mental health is as critical as taking care of our physical health. The mind is a part of our body and they are not mutually exclusive of one another. Learning to cope with life stresses is critical for one’s mental health. We all have situations that occur in our lives, from our car breaking down, to physical illness to loss of a job. Our beliefs about why it happened and our beliefs about how much we can or can’t control situations affects how well we handle the different stressors that occur in our lives. Learning healthy coping mechanisms supports a person’s well-being. Unhealthy coping mechanisms, such as over-eating, substance abuse or “bottling” everything inside can lead to more serious physical health issues and behavioral disorders. Everyone of us has to attend to our physical health in order to prevent illness and heal when we are hurt. Our mind is an integral part to our functioning and should not be separated from our body. Gaining understanding, proactively attending to our mental health and teaching our children skills to cope with life stressors is essential to their social and emotional well-being.

What is Mental Illness? Mental illness is a condition that affects the way a person thinks, feels or behaves. A way a person 28

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thinks, feels and acts are not mutually exclusive, and each affect the other. The descriptions below give definition and examples of how symptoms of mental illness can present, more specific information about mental illness can be found numerous websites, some of which are listed at the end of this article. The following are some examples of how a person’s cognitive state can be affected: Confusion, inability to form complete thoughts, severe forgetfulness or loss of memories. In addition to unclear thoughts, delusions can be another cognitive symptom. Delusions are false fixed beliefs which can be grandiose in nature. For example a person might believe they are God or a person with magical powers. Paranoid thoughts, hallucinations (or seeing and hearing things) others do not see or hear are other examples of a person experiencing some symptoms of mental illness. A person’s emotional state and mood (how they feel) can also be an indication of mental illness. Having emotions are normal and healthy; however when we are experiencing severe or radical shifts in emotional states for an extended period of time, this can be an indication of mental illness. For example, one would expect a person to grieve and feel sad after the loss of a loved one or a divorce. The feeling of not being able to get up in the morning, inability to go to work or school and a sense of hopelessness, for an extended piece of time might be indicators of clinical depression. Other conditions that affect a person’s emotional state or the way they interpret emotions are autism, borderline personality disorder or anxiety. Behavioral issues can range in severity. Some of the symptoms may affect a child’s ability to focus in school, manage anger, use alcohol or drugs as a means of self-medicating, or at the most severe level affect a person’s ability to maintain a job or attend school. The behaviors might exhibit as an

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inability to focus, explosive outbursts, or inability to form and keep relationships. Mental illness does have symptoms and diagnosis. Early diagnosis, intervention and treatment can result in recovery from mental illness. It is important to know that many mental illnesses do not have a “cure” but many people can lead full, productive and highly fulfilling lives with treatment and support.

Why is there Stigma? Mental illness is greatly misunderstood and stigmatized in the South Asian community. Images of a person in a fully psychotic state, hair loose, incoherently talking to themselves, might be the image strongly connected with mental illness. The term “pagal” is a negative term used to describe a person with a mental illness or someone acting erratically. Even among the South Asian languages we do not have the words to describe mental illness beyond terms which connote a “possession” of evil spirit or someone who is not in touch with reality. Suicide is also criminalized in India, so the fear of consequences or the family seeking support for the person voicing suicidal ideation can face barriers within the system. Given that death is one of the most frightening realities with severe mental illness, it becomes more crucial for South Asians to learn and

understand about mental health and mental illness. Another way to view stigma is that it is in actuality a severe form of discrimination. The view that mental illness is such a “disgrace” is in essence creating social and perhaps legal discrimination against a person obtaining treatment or healing towards recovery. Understanding about both mental health and mental illness can create a more compassionate approach to care and allow a person to be treated with dignity when they are experiencing a relapse in their condition. Resources: A govermment website with resources for mental health http://www.mentalhealth.gov A mental health resource specifically for the South Asian community http://www.chaicounselors.org A resource and advocacy for those living with mental illness, National Alliance for Mental Illness http://www.nami.org A government resource with information on Substance Abuse Prevention and Mental Health http://www.samhsa.gov

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Parenting Through Religious Lenses

Religion plays an important role in the life of South Asians. Many of the religious texts offer guidance and expectations for the parents on how to parents. The selections below are just a few examples of parenting from a religious perspective. The selections are listed in alphabetical order.

Buddhism

Nisha Gautam Buddha laid some guidelines for parents to raise their children with mindfulness and compassion. In Singlaovada sutta he says,

Proverbs 22:6 Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it. In Christianity the person’s relationship with God is the crux of their faith. Parenting is like a mirror of their relationship with God. The passage below expresses the love God has for his children and will give them what they ask for or even great rewards. Thus a parents should love and take care of a child with as much love and benevolence as God would show to his children. Luke 11:11-13

1. The parents should dissuade their children from doing evil. Parents are the first school for their children where they learn their elementary lessons in good and evil. Therefore parents should be very careful to steer their children from all kinds of evil, such as lying, cheating, dishonesty, revenge and so on.

Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!

2. The second duty of parents is that they should persuade their children to do good. By their words and by their example parents should persuade them to manifest good qualities, such as kindness, obedience, courage, honesty, perseverance, simplicity, good manners.

It is also important for parents to be the child’s role model. Often parents are seen as shepherding a child’s development through infancy, childhood, and teen years. The Bible instructs parents to look at the heart of the child when parenting and training children. Luke 6:45 states “…out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.” Therefore, parents are seen as children’s first teachers and should make sure that children are not only taught God’s word but live God’s word.

3. Parents must give their children good education. The best legacy that parents can bequeath to their children is proper decent education. There is no treasure more valuable for a human being than a good education.

Hinduism Christianity

Gloria Anjali Durepo & Brenda CampbellJones Learning about God is an important part of the relationship between the child and the parent. This proverb encourages parents to train and teach our faith to children from an early age so that when they grow old, they will not depart from it. 30

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Anirudh Khajuria Parenting is a highly developed art. To develop this art, one must follow the observations of various saints and seers who always guided us on right parenting. Citing the role a gardener plays while planting a seed, Swami Vivekananda says, “You cannot make a plant grow in soil unsuited to

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it. A child teaches itself. But you can help it to go forward in its own way. What you can do is not of the positive nature, but of the negative. You can take away the obstacles, but knowledge comes out of its own nature. Loosen the soil a little, so that it may come out easily. Put a hedge round it; see that it is not killed by anything, and there your work stops. You cannot do anything else. The rest is a manifestation from within its own nature. Nurture them, keep them safe, give them the right “soil” and try and not smother them from not growing… give them the sunshine of your love, prune when necessary, put up a moss stick or a support stick if required, give adequate amount of manure & right quantity of water, talk to it….and above all help it become the best plant it is meant to be and do not burden it with your expectations and dreams. It shall flower and fruit in its own time….”

Buddha laid some guidelines for parents to raise their children with mindfulness and compassion.

Islam

Razia Kosi Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) said: • The child is the master for seven years (1st stage birth to age 7 yrs.)—This is the care-free stage and the parents attend to all the needs of a young child, thus he or she is the “master” in the family. Discipline is not emphasized in this staged. The parents are to modeling good behavior and manners to the child. It is believed the child learns by watching the parents. • The next seven years is Tarbiyaah or “Good Upbringing” (2nd stage ages 7–14 yrs.)—This stage requires teaching,teaching right from wrong, good manners and using firm discipline. The emphasis in on firm discipline, not punishment. • In the next seven years (3rd stage ages 14–21 yrs.) —The parent serves as a guide to the young adult, approaching him or her with respect and speaking with them with kindness and logic in order to build good character. The character building is to help the young adult become an adult who is able to be financially successful and then at the later years take care of his or her parents. So if the person builds a good character within 21 years, well and good, otherwise leave him alone, or continue to guide if needed. The fourth Khalifah (leader after the Prophet) Ali, chaicounselors.org

interpreted that passage as: PLAY with our children till the age of 7, to DISCIPLINE and TEACH them from the age of 7 to 14 and to BEFRIEND them at the age of 14 on.

Sikhism

Jasleen Modi Guru Arjun Dev, Goojaree, Fifth Mehl: O son, this is your mother’s hope and prayer, that you never forget God even for an instant. May you always adore him. May the True Guru be kind to you and may you love the Society of Saints. A parent’s first and most important duty is to inculcate in their child a devotion to God and place them on a spiritual path, from which their development in all other fields will follow. For instance, spirituality is expected to instill physical, intellectual, and ethical values (e.g. treating the body as sacred (thus Sikhs are expected to be physically active and refrain from intoxicants), value knowledge, wisdom, and reason, and share earnings (as opposed to giving charity). Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

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Helping Your Child Handle Stress By Mala Datta, PhD

Some stress is a normal part of our daily life including children’s lives. Stress can come from a variety of sources, for example, doing well in school, making new friends and expectations from parents, teachers, ourselves and even the culture we live in. Stress is helpful when it helps children do well on the test, give a great presentation in class, score well on the Spelling Bee etc. However, when stress is excessive and it goes on for a long time, it can have both immediate and long term effects on children. Adults are sometimes unaware that children can be feeling stressed and therefore not pay attention to the youngsters. South Asian parents may dismiss “stress’’ as something which happens to ‘others’. However, stress is experienced by every culture and every section of society. Experts recognize two categories of stress—Acute stress may be sudden and intense, it may subside. An example of Acute stress may be sudden illness in the family which goes away after a while. Chronic stress on the other hand is ongoing and lasts a long time with significant effect. An example of chronic stress may be domestic fights and violence, loss of a parent, very high academic expectations, parents experiencing stress themselves, etc. Each child is different. How children experience stress depends on a lot of different factors. This includes the child’s temperament, personality and the environment. Stress can be expressed in many different ways by children. The American Psychological Association provides the following tips to recognize possible signs of stress in children: • Frequent episodes of ‘stomach aches’ or ‘headaches’. Stomach aches and headaches are part of growing up, and children may be down with flu, stomach upset etc. But when it is very frequent and before an important event (e.g., test), it may indicate a significant stress.

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• Acting irritable or ‘moody’, angry outbursts. Children may find it difficult to say what’s on their mind, and even recognize when they are stressed. Young children especially can ‘act out’ and their behavior may change. Paying attention to these changes can help the adults recognize that something is going on in the children’s lives. • Frequent fights or disagreements with friends, Withdrawing from activities that gave them pleasure. Children may start by avoiding their friends or spending more time alone. They may abandon long time friends. • Saying negative things about themselves. Children may say things like “I am stupid’, or ‘No one likes me’, and this may indicate that they are experiencing overwhelming feelings of stress.

What can Parents do to help their Child? Early in children’s lives, parents are very important. Talking to children and letting them know that you are interested and that you care goes a long way in communicating with your child. Some specific ways that parents can help include • Provide a supportive environment so they can express their concerns. Listen to them even if they are not looking for solutions. They may just want to complain about the difficult subject or the tough teacher. For example, the social studies teacher may give difficult tests. It helps to talk to a caring adult. • Help them identify potential stressful situations. This may be an upcoming test, a competition, a sport event or a school play. • Together with the child, identify the problem and brainstorm possible solutions. It is helpful for children to see and learn how to handle stress but with your support. For example, if it’s a friendship situation, then figuring out ways to resolve the

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situation. If the child is enrolled in too many extracurricular activities cutting down may be the answer. • Help children recognize, identify and name and accept their feelings appropriately. For example, it’s OK to feel butterflies in the stomach before going on stage. • Help children identify a variety of coping strategies or skills. For example, asking a teacher for extra help at school before a test, walking away if someone is teasing, talking positively to self. • Teach them skills to calm down like deep breaths, thinking of a quiet place, meditation etc. • Examine your own life. Children may learn to be stressed because the parents are stressed. If you

are feeling overwhelmed then it may be time to change your life style. In South Asian Families, having relatives staying at home for extended periods of time can be stressful. Learn to address your own stress. If children continue to experience overwhelming feelings and if parents are concerned please contact a mental health professional like a Psychologist. Psychologists are trained to help children and adults with identifying problem issues and developing effective strategies in coping with stress.

Resource: www.apahelpcenter.org

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Fostering a Healthy Self-Esteem By, Anshu R. Basnyat, LCPC Self-esteem can be defined as the beliefs we have about ourselves, which is also known as positive or negative self-worth. Self-esteem should not be confused with self-confidence, although they are closely related. Think of self-confidence as the image we project to others. This includes our verbal and nonverbal behaviors. Understanding self-esteem is not an easy task and current research findings do not make it any easier. Current, academic discussion around self-esteem is messy and it may actually downplay the importance of having a healthy self-esteem for the following reasons. First, recent research on self-esteem is stating that high self-esteem may not always be a good thing because it can be linked to aggressive behavior. Second, it was widely thought that high self-esteem meant that people are happier, but recent research suggests this may not be true. For all intent and purposes, this information is not necessary to raise psychologically healthy children, but only to be empowered consumer of research. To begin, we need to understand what healthy self-esteem looks like and what we can do to cultivate it.

Behaviors associated with healthy self-esteem: • Realistic and positive self-worth • Good self-control • Act independently • Assume responsibility for mistakes and achievements

• Handle peer pressure and other stressors appropriately • Attempt new tasks and challenges • Empathy towards others

• Take pride in their accomplishments

• Offer assistance to others

• Tolerate frustration well

• Good interpersonal skills

There are three key ways parents can cultivate healthy self-esteem: a positive parent-child relationship, effective communication, and effective discipline. 34

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A positive parent-child relationship is essential. If there is no emotional connection between the parent and the child, then moving forward will prove to be challenging. There are several key factors that help develop and maintain positive parent-child relationships: • Affection. This can be accomplished in many different ways such as physical expressions like kisses, hugs, saying “I love you,” using kind words in private and public, etc. In many South Asian cultures, overt expression of affection is not common, as in other cultures that may demonstrate their love with words of affection. This may create an internal conflict for the South Asian child who is being raised in the Western world. In order to bridge the gap between the two cultures, South Asian parents can also express affection in this way. It may feel strange at the beginning, but with practice it will seem natural! • Quality Time. Making physical time by prioritizing and reducing “on the go” will be key in this busy world. Further, the quality of time we spend with our children is even more important. One sentiment that South Asian adolescents often express is that they do not like being “dragged” to parties, but they would rather do “fun” things with their families. Here, the child is expressing that they crave quality family time more than being physically close with their parents. Family dinners with a focus on conversations, weekly game night or movie night are some ways to spend quality family time. • Attention. This speaks to quality time spent together but also listening without judging, answering their questions, anticipating the child’s physical and emotional needs, and providing more positive attention than negative attention will be crucial here. Positive attention given to specific characteristics the family values such as kindness, honesty, caring or respect as well as behaviors such as perseverance, achievement, following family traditions, doing chores, etc. will cultivate high self-esteem rather than being critical of the child’s negative behaviors in an effort to improve them.

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This tends to be a trend with families who are more achievement-focused because they want to fix the problem behavior and attain higher goals. However, keep in mind that children and adolescents often feel that receiving negative attention from their parents is better than receiving no attention at all. Therefore, if you want your child to display more positive behaviors than negative ones, then the parent has to give more attention to the positive behaviors than to the negative ones. Effective communication. Having good communication is essential in building trust and high self-esteem in a parent-child relationship. Children learn best by watching their parents’ words and actions. Some ways to effectively communicate include: • Clear messages. Eliminates confusion, and the child will learn not only learn what is right or wrong, but also what is expected of them. Often, parents may tell their child what not to do versus what they should do. For example, when a parent slaps their toddler’s hand for hitting another child is not sending a clear message that hitting is wrong. The toddler will remember the parent slapping their hand rather than the words the parent used to teach that you should not hit others. • Empathy. Also known as “putting yourself in another’s shoes” is a life skill that helps to increase understanding of others. This is best taught when parents are empathic with their child first. For example, if your child comes home reporting that he was teased by a peer then respond by first being empathic and then getting the facts. One way you can handle this is by saying something like “I think you are dealing with bullying and this happens to many children. It is very upsetting. Things can be done to make it stop. Tell me exactly what happened and when.” Telling the child to just ignore it and that teasing is just part of growing up, dismisses what the child is feeling and the potential seriousness of the issue. • Consistency. When parents’ words and actions match then consistency exists. Parents often make empty threats and do not follow-through with the consequences. When there is a consistency problem in parenting, it not only compromises good communication and trust in the parentchild relationship, but it inevitably becomes a discipline problem. chaicounselors.org

Effective discipline is essential for parents to maintain parental authority and for children to learn that their behaviors lead to consequences. Discipline also teaches children to be respectful and responsible. Key components include the following: • Values. Identify and share your family values to guide an effective discipline plan. This will also help in decision-making and enforcing rules in the home easier. For example, parents often state that education is an important value, but their child spends lot of time in extracurricular activities which takes time away from education time. Thus, identifying the core values will help in deciding how much time to spend in activities that do not support the family values. • Structure. Set up daily routines, house rules, chores chart, and limits on behaviors. This will promote predictability and competency rather than fostering fear, anxiety, and feelings of inadequacies. Moreover, the child learns responsibilities and essential life or executive functioning skills like organization, self-monitoring, paying attention, selfcontrol, etc. when there is proper structure in place. • STOP and START behaviors. Creating a list of behaviors you want to encourage and discourage will be helpful to identify strategies that can help. For example, if you want your child to use good manners then praising them for using good manners will usually suffice. However, if you want to discourage negative behaviors like lying then you would use strategies like taking privileges away to send the message that this is inappropriate behavior in your family. Putting behaviors in these two categories will help the parent in determining what discipline strategies to use. Helping a child foster a positive, realistic and solid sense of self will strengthen their self-esteem. This does not mean as parents we should foster a heightened sense of self-esteem that may actually mask a fragile sense of self or anger or insecurity with any imperfections. Research has shown that this may actually have a negative impact on a child. Resources: http://www.webmd.com/balance/news/20080428/ high-self-esteem-isnt-always-healthy http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2004/07/ happy.aspx Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

Building a Strong Relationship: The Importance of Empathy By Sapna Chopra, PhD

Children of all ages worry about issues ranging from being accepted by their peers, to school work, to scary events they hear on the news. It’s important for parents to listen to their kids, so kids can express what they’re feeling and their feelings can be addressed. Young people want to be seen, heard, and feel understood by us. Responding with empathy means listening to your children’s feelings and acknowledging those feelings rather than trying to take them away. Too often, kids’ feelings are dismissed. They are told, “stop crying,” “don’t be mad,” and “big boys don’t cry.” Imagine how you would feel if you were genuinely angry and someone told you “don’t be silly, there’s no need to be angry.” When kids don’t feel heard, that’s when small things become big things, and big issues become bigger issues. Many of our kids’ meltdowns are prompted by their feeling of being misunderstood. • Acknowledge your children’s feelings by reflecting back to them what you sense they are feeling. For example, “I know you’re disappointed the play date got cancelled” or “I can see how frustrating this homework is for you, and I like how you aren’t giving up.” Kids need to know that we are there for them, no matter what they are feeling. When kids get upset about something, it feels like a really big deal to them. When we don’t see that, they feel like they have to let us know in other ways. • Reflecting your child’s feelings does not lessen your authority as a parent. To the four year old who wants ice cream for dinner, instead of “no!” you can say “I know you’re frustrated that you can’t have ice cream before dinner.” You can be firm about setting limits while also acknowledging that it’s hard not to get your way. • Kids don’t always express what they’re feeling in words. They may not have the vocabulary for it or may not be aware of what’s bothering them. We can pick up on their feelings through their play, drawings, stories, or behavior. It’s our job to pay attention and be sensitive to their cues. 36

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• Don’t push your kid to talk, but do be available and tune in to your kids’ experience. Not all kids will want to sit and talk. Some kids may communicate more through their play or say a little during a car ride when they don’t have to make direct eye contact. For older children, and children in their teens, they might need the time and space to come to you. Be available and listen before responding. For adolescents, their experiences are their reality and they want adults to validate what they are experiencing and understand how the situation might be difficult for them. They also want to have the autonomy to try figuring it out on their own. Here’s a story from my life that illustrates these points: My son was very close to his Nana (my father). Nana was his buddy, his playmate, and his confidante. When my beloved father passed away, my son was almost 8-years-old. I had expected that my son would be sad in the way that I was sad. I assumed that he would express his grief through tears, talking about his sadness, and wanting to reminisce over fond memories. Instead, he was grumpy, irritable, and angry. As I myself was mourning the loss of my dad, it took me a while to recognize that he wasn’t trying to be disagreeable; he was just grieving in his own way. Not seeing this in the moment, I sometimes responded by letting him know that his behavior was unacceptable. He would then feel more frustrated and angry, so I would again let him know that his behavior was inappropriate, and this became a cycle. One day, he stuck his tongue out at me with a look of contempt. I was caught off guard by the intensity of his anger. This time, instead of setting limits and dismissing his feelings, I reflected to him, “Wow, you’re really angry.” His expression softened, he looked down, and started to cry. In that moment, I realized he was expressing his pain through anger, and all that time, I had been dismissing and invalidating his experience. What a difference it made when he felt understood by me.

HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

—— Words of wisdom ——

HOPE IS…

WORD COLLAGE FROM THE AUSTIN FOCUS GROUP, TEXAS.

Some South Asian parents may have learned not to value emotional expression or may see it as weakness. Parents may worry that talking with kids about their feelings of sadness, anxiety, or anger will just make them more sad, anxious, or angry. On the contrary, it’s when people suppress their feelings that more problems start to appear. We do our kids a disservice by teaching them to push their feelings away. We aren’t perfect, and that’s okay. Traditionally, many South Asian parents have believed that admitting mistakes to their kids would jeopardize their kids’ respect for them. Parents can be genuine with their chaicounselors.org

kids, even when they make a mistake, and kids can respect their parents at the same time. It’s okay to make mistakes, apologize, and learn from them. Our kids can also learn to do this from the example we set. (In the example with my son, I did apologize to him for not understanding and seeing how he was hurting.) Kids learn from watching us. They learn more from the example we set than from what we tell them to do. If we want them to grow up to be kind, caring, compassionate, and loving people, we need to model that in our own lives and in the way we respond to our children.

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South Asian Immigration Timeline into the U.S. EARLY IMMIGRATION

1900’s PUNJABI FARMERS After WWII, the Punjabi men who were unable to bring their families from India were able to send for families.

19471965 IMMIGRATION & NATIONALITY ACT

Many settled in California.

1965 REFUGEES FROM UGANDA Tens of thousands of Asian Indians were expelled from Uganda after Idi Amin took power. Some went to India, some to the U.K. and others sought political asylum in the U.S.

CENSUS 2010 Immigration from South Asian countries increased dramatically from Census 2000 to 2010. Bangladeshi population + 212% Indian population + 69% Pakistani population + 137% Sri Lankan population + 92%

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A wave of Sikh Punjabi men left India and come to Washington State and California to farm. By 1917 immigration restrictions ending the immigation.

Passage of Immigration and Nationality Act, eliminating quotas limiting immigration from Asian and non European countries. The “Brain Drain” of doctors, engineers and scientists from India to the U.S.

1970’s

TECHNOLOGY BOOM

1990’s

2010

Silicon Valley became a beacon for Indian immigrants highly trained in IT skills.

IF WE ARE TO REACH REAL PEACE IN THE WORLD, WE SHALL HAVE TO BEGIN WITH THE CHILDREN. >> Mahatma Gandhi

HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

Healthy Communication: Money Matters By Dhara Thakar Meghani, PhD

This article is reprinted with permission from the online magazine South Asian Parent. www.SouthAsianParent.com is an online parenting resource for families caught between cultures and identities.

Who taught you about money, and how did you eventually learn to value it? If you have trouble recalling the precise moment (or are in the group of parents who believe you’re still figuring it out), rest easy; it is hard to pinpoint because it’s a process, and will be one for your children, too. Financial literacy, or understanding about managing money, is an important ability parents can start honing in their children quite early. Children’s understanding of the way money works progresses in multiple stages over several years.¹ As early as age three, children are aware that goods cost money. Because they don’t yet have an understanding of basic math, they won’t be able to recognize that some things cost more money that others, or that you can’t buy something if you don’t have enough money, ideas that are clearer around age six or seven. By middle childhood, a child certainly knows that money is important, symbolic of status, and emotionally laden. All children, regardless of age, are constantly picking up what they know about money from watching their parents’ spending behavior and hearing them talk about their finances. What does all this developmental information mean for parents? Make it a point to talk to your children about money in age-appropriate language soon, if you haven’t already started. Being proactive about this topic is essential in this generation in which money exchanges hands much less literally than ever before. Children rarely witness those ancient parental activities—trips to the bank, 40

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paying for groceries with cash, writing and mailing checks for bills—that communicated valuable ideas that money is earned and can be saved, and that there can be negative consequences for spending too much money or not paying bills on time. When packages magically appear at the doorstep or books and music are instantly downloaded on your child’s iPad because they were purchased with plastic as opposed to a face-to-face transaction, the fact that money is valuable and limited becomes abstract for children (and honestly, for you too). Confronting the money discussion may feel new to you if you came from a family where money matters were not discussed openly with children, where children were never allowed to have and spend their own money, or where managing money was by default the man’s responsibility—which is often the story in many traditional South Asian households. You may also see things differently than your parents’ generation or an earlier generation of South Asian immigrants who encountered the struggles of starting anew in a different country. For example, while frugality and saving money were the main priorities for that generation, additional financial flexibility in your and your children’s generation may bring spending for pleasure, investment opportunities and philanthropy into the financial literacy discussion. So if you’re ready to dive in, remember this: Lectures about valuing money and exercising financial restraint are just not enough. Hands-on experiences in which your child has some control over managing his own money are much more powerful teachers. Here are a few strategies parents have tried: 1. Provide a flat monthly allowance that gradually increases over time (based on what you think is appropriate) and sit down with your child to help him create a monthly budget. Suggesting

HEALTH AND WELL-BEING

broad categories such as “giving, investing, and spending” can encourage children to think about the different ways their money can be spent from the start. 2. Stay firm if your child goes over budget (or work out a loan system where she can borrow from you) and help her identify how she can plan a bit more wisely in future months. 3. Decide whether you will allow children to “make money” by doing household chores or to reward exceptional behavior – this concept is generally practiced much more among cultures with Western origins² and does not always make sense to parents who expect children to participate in these tasks and be well behaved without a monetary incentive. 4. Check out websites that promote children’s financial literacy and give them opportunities to practice what they learn. Pktmny allows

children between the ages of 8–16 to use an online spending account that is created and closely monitored by their parents. It also makes communication between parents and children a little less daunting and hopefully, more fun! There’s not a generation that goes by that doesn’t lament the “careless” spending culture of its youth. Don’t let this truth prevent you from being the one your child thinks of fondly when he’s asked the question, “how did you learn the value of money?” References: ¹Berti, A.E., & Bombi, A.S. (1981). The development of the concept of money and its value: A longitudinal study. Child Development, 52, 1179-1182. ²Bowes, J.M., Flanagan, C., & Taylor, A.J. (2001) Adolescents’ ideas about individual and social responsibility in relation to children’s household work: Some international comparisons. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 25(1), 60-68.

MULTI-GENERATIONAL DISCUSSIONS, MARYLAND.

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CHALLENGES

Your Child: Immigrating and Adjusting to Life In The United States By Ulash Thakore-Dunlap

There are approximately 3.4 million South Asians living in the United States. The majority of South Asians who live in the United States are foreignborn, with over 75 percent of the population born outside of the United States. Moving to the United States from another country can be one of the most challenging life events for a child. This article will explore the effects of immigrating to the United States on your child and tips on ways to support your child through this process. For people who move to the United States from another country, the adjustment process can be easy or difficult. Meet Nina, a 12-year-old who recently moved to the United States, “The first few months, I was so excited and nervous. Starting a new school was scary and I hated it. I had to make new friends and couldn’t understand what other student’s were saying. A few months of being here I started to get home sick, missing my life and friends back home, but it is getting a little easier”. Such stories highlight the experiences for many children that move to the United States—joy, disconnected, culture shock, isolated, language barriers and more. Moving to a new country typically has four adjustment phases: honeymoon, hostility, humor and home. • Honeymoon — At this stage, you are in love with the country, happy, a little confused but excited to learn and be part of your new home. • Hostility — You might be feeling angry and frustrated, or even depressed. You are getting frustrated that people cannot understand what you are trying to say, or wondering why you moved and left your friends and family. You grief the loss of your life back home and at the same time trying to creating a new life for yourself in a new environment.

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• Humor — Now you are feeling more settled, relaxed and able to relax in your new home/culture. • Home — At this stage you finally feel at home but still maintain loyal to your home culture. You now have two cultural homes. During the initial adjustment, your child may be experiencing the following: • Missing home — Your child may experience missing the family and friends they left behind. • Social Isolation — Making new friends, starting a new school, and moving to a new place can create feelings of loneness. • Feeling sad and anxious — With so many new changes, you child may feel sad due to missing their old life, anxious in making friends, and starting a new school. • Language — Your child may be fluent in English but each country and State has it’s own nuances and sayings that children have to learn. For children who have limited English skills, there may be some anxiety around communicating with teachers and peers. Here are some tips to help your child adjust to life in the United States: • Talk about “the old home” — Talking about the “old’ and “new” home with your child helps them to understand the importance of both homes. Talking about the home they left allows the child to explore with you any sadness and other feelings they may be afraid to talk about. • Find ways for your child to connect to others — If your child has few friends, help your child to connect to others by joining afterschool activities, or check with the school regarding what kind of programs are offered.

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• Watch out for signs of loneness and sadness — Talking to your child about their day will help to gauge whether they are feeling lonely and sad. If your child does not want to talk to you, then let them know you are available if they want to talk, or you can connect them to a counselor for emotional support. • Show interest in school life — Ask your child about their day and school. Also, if your child is starting a new school, take a tour and meet the teachers and staff. If your child is a teenager, they may not want you to go to their school often, respect their space but also stay informed and connected about school life. • If needed, seek support for your child and family — Your child may need extra support, speak to the school counselor for suggestions. If you are feeling overwhelmed, seek support adjusting to life in the United States and ways you can support your child. Adjusting to life in the United States is a process and not always a smooth path. Both parent and teen is learning to adjust at the same time. The most important tips for any parent is make sure you understand the U.S. education system so you can be empowered and help you teen. We hope the information and tips provided will help you through the process. Below, we have listed some resources that you may find useful.

The majority of South Asians who live in the United States are foreignborn, with over 75 percent of the population born outside of the United States.

Seek support from your local school. School counselors can be helpful in linking you to local resources. Resources: Bridging Refugee Youth & Family Services, http://www.brycs.org/family_strengthening.cfm The Learning Community, http://www.thelearningcommunity.us/resources-byformat/tips-for-parents/diverse-families/immigrantfamilies.aspx PTO Today, http://www.ptotoday.com/pto-today-articles/ article/298-connect-with-immigrant-parents

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CHALLENGES

Languages and Communications Across the Shores By Sabiha Bandali, LMSW

I grew up speaking six languages—Kutchi, Gujarati, English, Swahili, Hindi, and Urdu. My husband added two more to his lingual assets—French and Spanish. Headed for the U.N., you may ask? Well, he did give that some thought at one point. Needless to say, being multi-lingual came naturally to us, part of our growing experience, born and raised in East Africa. The experience has enriched our lives many folds. So, it was but natural that we wanted our children to enjoy some of these skills as well. Well, that’s been easier hoped then realized. Our grandparents, in the early 1900s, migrated from India across the majestic Indian ocean to the pearly shores of East Africa. As a consequence, our parents were born in Africa, and so were we. We had an incredible opportunity to grow up in a diverse, multi-cultural, lingual and spiritual environment that was simple, and peaceful, rich and fulfilling. We had no TV while growing up; computers were nonexistent. Cell phones were rare, yet we never lacked for communication. We knew our neighbors, we had meals with our families. Stores closed at 5:30 pm – people went home to be with family and friends. We learned all these languages simply by growing up in this environment. Following the footsteps of our grandparents, we too migrated. I was 16 when I left Africa for the U.S. Our children—ages 14, 12 and 4—were born in the U.S. As all parents do, we too wanted to give the best in us to our children. Language was a priority. When our first child was born, we limited our English usage and primarily interacted in our native tongue, Kutchi. Until the age of three, my daughter spoke little English, fluently conversing in Kutchi. When she started Montessori, she picked up English rapidly, erasing our anxiety that she would struggle and be compromised with our decision to limit English as a primary language in our home.

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When our son was born, we did the same. However, his exposure to English was greater as our daughter now spoke English fluently and she had also discovered cartoons, a delight she loving shared with her sibling. Things started to change as the kids began elementary school. The kids who had once happily switched between languages started to speak less of the other languages, using primarily English. We understood that this was normal, and probably predictable, however, our concern grew when they began to resent speaking in any language other than English. As much as we understood their need to identify with the greater culture and environment we lived in, we were fearful that our children would lose their ability to speak our native language, and as a result, lose part of their heritage. I tried to explain, and cajole, and coax, and sometimes threaten too. Every effort seemed to make the kids more determined to embrace English and reject anything otherwise. Finally, one summer, I laid down the rule: we would speak only in Kutchi for the entire summer. I expected objections—I got it. I held my ground. What I did not expect is what I saw in days and weeks to come: a breakdown in communication. The kids started to share less and less, communication become stilted. ‘Never mind’ became a common end to a start of conversation. Pretty soon we realized that this was not working, in fact was probably detrimental. I was compromising something greater in my quest to give my kids something great. Even though I knew that one day the children would demand why I had not found a way to give them this gift of languages, I knew I had to back off. We came up with a compromise, my husband and I. We would not insist that the children speak to each other in a language different than English, nor did we demand that they respond such. However, we made a pact to try our best to talk to each other, and to the children, in our native tongue

CHALLENGES

so that they would continue to ‘hear’ the language. We also asked our parents, who are greatly involved in the kids’ lives, even long-distance for one set of grandparents, to try and converse with the kids in our native language so as to increase exposure from that end too. And so, things relaxed, and soon, conversations began to flow more naturally. A few years later, our third child was born, and we were delighted when the older siblings readily agreed to speak primarily in our mother tongue to the baby so he could learn. It was lovely hearing them converse with him and quite gratifying to see how much language they had retained. The baby of the family is now four and the oldest a teenager. Our home is multi-lingual. The children do not have the fluency or ease of being multi-lingual as we would have hoped, but there is a familiarity of languages that I am learning to appreciate. We easily use words from different languages in sentences, and it’s our

very own mixture, so to speak. My daughter and I enjoy switching to a different language when we are out and about, creating privacy and intimacy between us. My son switches to our mother tongue when he’s trying to cajole me into saying yes, and the baby still says ‘I am scared’ in our native language, reverting to a comforting language that met his needs in the earliest years of life. The challenge continues, however, there is a shift. The task is now upon us as parents to keep the languages alive by using them regularly, and not slipping into English as we sometimes find ourselves doing. In the end, it’s all worth it as we are already reaping the benefits of some of the earlier struggles. Hopefully one day they too will feel the necessity of passing these linguistic skills along, and I’m sure they’ll come up with their own creative, and maybe better, ways to keep this rich heritage alive.

The children do not have the fluency or ease of being multi-lingual as we would have hoped, but there is a familiarity of languages that I am learning to appreciate.

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CHALLENGES

Managing Two Cultures in Parenting: Understanding Parenting Challenges and Some Suggestions By Dr. Arifa K. Javed, PhD

Sociocultural Environment and Its Role in Child Development

flexible, and are functional in more than one cultural environment.

The growth and development of a child is dependent on the macro and micro spheres surrounding him, the macro being the society and micro being the family. The two simultaneously impact on a childâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s personality and identity. In fact the macro sphere, the society, also affects the micro sphere or the family dynamics in terms of determining the gender roles and expectations.

Conflicting Role Models: Because the adults do not share the same cultural tradition, they are of little assistance as role models to the children. Neither presents a complete picture, which the children can imitate, and neither teachers nor parents can ever have a firsthand experience of this duality. As a result immigrant children grow up with conflicting role models both at home and at school. Parents and teachers both have limitations in socializing the children, and neither is capable of understanding the nature of cultural duality, and the challenge it presents for the children. The best they can do is to attempt to understand the possible dilemmas, and try to alleviate the conflicts the children are likely to experience. This can be accomplished if each tries to understand the other cultural world and envision the possible problems that may develop.

Parents in immigrant families when they are raising their children in a society they themselves were not raised they face some parenting challenges in addition to generation gap. Parallel socialization and biculturalism can be the two most important of them.

Parallel Socialization Parallel socialization refers to the simultaneous socialization the children in immigrant families are going through at home and at school. This is a consistent and prolonged learning process of dos and donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t approved and disapproved both at the micro level in their families and in the school representing the society or the macro sphere. Possible impacts of parallel socialization: Duality of Expectations: Duality of expectations refers to the lack of cultural consistency between the host society and family, with the host society represented by teachers, and the parents representing the culture supposedly left behind, but still influencing a great deal of the familyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s social and cultural patterns. Patterns at home have a different point of reference than those at school, and both have their own expectations. This causes duality of expectations, and children learn dual compliance. As a result bicultural children often are more 46

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Dual Anchorage: As a response to the dilemma they face, most immigrant children work out a mechanism that they consider compatible with both sets of expectations, and acquire flexibility in adjusting to the cultural differences. They move on to being bicultural and bilingual, speaking both English and the home language fluently without any accent. This enhances their own cultural competence and helps them develop a dual anchorage and sense of belonging to both cultures. As we have suggested, immigrant children are often more effective in developing a dual anchorage in the two cultures than their parents.

Biculturalism Parallel socialization leads to biculturalism, which becomes a fact of life in all immigrant families and the same is true of Asian immigrant families. Being bicultural as a family means living by two different

CHALLENGES

cultural expectations in our two worlds of home and work/school. Such families can choose to continue to abide by their old cultural guidelines but that gets restricted to their micro sphere of home and family. As they integrate in the mainstream culture and learn an additional set of norms and values in order to be functional in the macro sphere of this new society. Their challenge is to balance the micro and macro sphere of their lives and successfully meet the demands of both the worlds. The extents they want to maintain their old culture and pick up the new one can vary from family to family. This mixing and matching of two cultures can be called acculturation. Acculturation keeps the old culture alive while the new is being embraced. In fact the paces and patterns of acculturation are dependent on social class, education, employment skills, race and religious differences and similarities between the old and the host culture. For South-Asian immigrant acculturation is a preferred route to integration because of certain physical, cultural, and religious differences, unlike past influxes of European immigrants who shared physical, cultural and religious similarities.

Examples An example of the differential rates of acculturation can be seen in some of the Arabic families who participated in my workshops. They were willing to learn the language and culture, but were concerned with maintaining their own social patterns and cultural traditions as well. Parents, in particular, exhibited a willingness to acculturate but not to assimilate. Their children, on the other hand, were bilingual and bicultural, as well as highly functional in the mainstream society. They were fluent in Arabic and spoke English without an accent, which was frequently an asset for their parents’ business. They were active at local mosques and practiced their religion and maintained their identity. They went through the public school system and were culturally competent to deal with the peer pressure and popular culture comfortably. They enjoyed a sense of dual anchorage to both cultures and took pride in their hyphenated identity.¹ Immigrant children often have serious issues of identity. The acuteness of this crisis varies with the degree of dissimilarity they have from the mainstream, in terms of race, religion and ethnicity. Among the students in the workshops, those children who were lighter-skinned had an advantage chaicounselors.org

compared to darker-skinned children or Asians. Children who were from Christian backgrounds also had an advantage over Muslims, because of the similarity of their religion to the mainstream. Those groups with the least in common with the mainstream had the most difficult time of all.¹ The children in immigrant families were seen struggling with their differences to deal with peer pressure and the challenge of fitting in. Some students, especially Indian and Pakistani immigrants whose parents were in high-level professions, but also including others whose parents were not highly educated, look to academic excellence as a way to deal with these issues. This approach helped them gain the respect of both their parents and teachers. At times, however, they were bullied and ridiculed by their fellow students for their focus on academics.¹

Suggestions • Be sensitive to the variation of time and space and not expect them to be like ourselves when we we in that age. • Pay attention to the macro (society) micro (family) of the children we are raising here and expect them to have personalities and identities different from us. • Parallel socialization and biculturalism are the additional challenges we face as immigrant families. We as parents need to help our children deal with them positively. • Acknowledge the fact that immigrant children are balancing dual expectations of parents and teachers simultaneously. • Recognize the fact that immigrant children are growing up here have conflicting role models at home and at schools. • Culture should be seen as a precious capital while we struggle to retain our heritage and acquire the new culture and maintain a balance. • Immigrant children have the advantage of having the best of both worlds if they consciously pick and choose from both cultures. Reference: ¹ Sengstock, M. C., Javed, A. K., Marshall, B. I., & Berkley, S. (2009). Voices of diversity: Multiculturalism in America. New York, NY: Springer. Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

CHALLENGES

Intergenerational Conflict By Salmaan Toor, PhD

I was 14, and the tryout for the freshman basketball team was in 30 minutes. As I was lacing my basketball shoes, my mom called from downstairs, “Get ready for dinner, we are eating in 15 minutes.” I assumed my mom was talking to my brothers, she knew I had the tryout in 30 minutes. Fifteen minutes later I came downstairs and said, “I’m ready to go, the tryout is in 15 minutes.” My mom responded, “You can’t play basketball on an empty stomach, eat first, and then go.” My attempt to explain that I could not be late fell on deaf ears. It was important to eat as a family and my mom wasn’t familiar with sports tryouts or the necessity to be on time. Respectfully, I sat down and ate with my family. Afterwards, my mom happily drove me to the tryout and with an enthusiastic smile said, “Good luck,” not realizing that I was already 15 minutes late. I walked into the gym and immediately the freshman basketball coach confronted me on being late. I felt embarrassed for a number of reasons, but in the end I couldn’t bring myself to say what was in my head: Sorry, my mom didn’t realize I had to be on time for tryouts, she didn’t know I had to be here at exactly 6:00PM. You see, my family is from Pakistan and this is the first competitive tryout that my parents have experienced, so they aren’t aware of how important it is to be on time. They are probably more casual about being on time than some of the other parents whose kids have participated in organized sports for years. So that’s why I’m late today. Instead of explaining the cultural background of my family, I went with, “Sorry sir, my mom had to work late so she got me here as fast as she could.” The coach growled and the interrupted tryout continued. My mom recently retired as a school counselor with over 20 years of experience working with kids of all ages. Even today, she tells me how regretful she is for not understanding that I needed to be on time for the basketball tryout. She would say, “I now know how important it is to be on time to practice because my school kids were always running down the hall saying they couldn’t be late.”

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The intent of the above example was to demonstrate how even with good intentions, sometimes cultural differences can cause problems. In addition to the challenge of cultural differences, the lack of cultural awareness can be equally challenging for South Asian families. The above example is symbolic of the larger issue facing South Asian families: how to balance the generational, cultural forces that impact your family. The South Asian community is a relatively new immigrant community in America. South Asians have mostly been in America for one or two generations1. Since it is a relatively new immigrant community, many South Asians still have a strong connection with the culture of their home country. This can sometimes lead to problems, especially if their “new” home is in a country with very different cultural norms than the country of origin. This is the case for many South Asians who immigrate west to America. How do you find common ground in your multicultural family? If you can’t find common ground, then what can you do? Each family is unique; your family has to discover what balance works best for your family. Here are a few tips that may be helpful:

Acceptance. Your family immigrated to America. Family life will not be exactly the same as your family life in your native country. Your family will be impacted, in some way, by the surrounding culture. You were raised in a time when the internet did not exist, now it’s hard to find a family without internet access in their home. It will be much easier to find a lifestyle that fits your family if you accept that you will have to blend your South Asian culture with the surrounding American culture.

Communication. For almost any issue, communication is key. Talk about the generational/cultural differences within your family. In a family setting, ask questions like, • What cultural aspects and values are important to our family?

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• What is a fair expectation for my children who are growing up in a different culture than mine? • What traditions are you willing to let go or start new with your children? • What do our children expect from us, as parents? By having conversations about cultural forces, you will gain much needed insight into how the South Asian cultural is both similar and different to the “western” culture.

Understanding. When conflict arises, it is important to be understanding and open to other views. Try to understand your child’s perspective. Is it really that surprising that they are more “western” than you, when they have grown up in America for most or all of their life? Try to put yourself in your child’s shoes. If you were your child’s age, what would be important to you? Just because something is different or unfamiliar, doesn’t mean it’s bad.

Compromise. In the end, both you and your children will have to compromise. What is important is that your children feel heard by you. Talk with your spouse about what is a fair compromise and make sure you both are on the same page. Compromise shows your kids that you care about them; you care about their feelings and beliefs. Compromise is not a weakness, it shows that you are fair and flexible.

Respect. Related to all of the points above is respect. Be respectful in how you communicate anything to your children. Even if you are upset with them or disagree with what they are saying, be respectful in how you interact.

What does it mean to be respectful? • Listen to your child fully, let them say what they have to say without interruption. Make good eye contact to show that you are paying attention. • Paraphrase what your child has said, that will let them know that you are listening and that you value what they are saying. Effective paraphrasing captures the essence of what the person says and reflects it back to the person, thus validating what they are feeling or saying. For example,

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° Child: “My teacher doesn’t like me, he moved my seat away from my friends and I have to sit with the kids I don’t know. ° Parent: You’re upset because your teacher moved your seat away from your friends. ° Child: Yes, it’s not fair, and I don’t know the other kids. ° Parent: (moving from paraphrase to empathy) It’s not fair and it might feel scary to sit with new kids, I might even feel worried about whether they’d like me.” • If you disagree with your child, in a calm, respectful tone tell your child why you disagree with them. • Empathize with your child. If they express an emotion, acknowledge the emotion (even if you don’t agree with them). • If you make a mistake or say something that you wish you didn’t say (maybe because you were angry or disappointed), then apologize. Apologizing can be difficult, but it will show your child that it is okay to make mistakes. It will also show your child that no one is perfect and that you value them as an individual. Raising children in a new country is difficult. For a South Asian, it may seem impossible to raise your children in a country that appears completely different than your home country. The good news is that it is possible. It is important that you familiarize yourself with the culture around you. Don’t isolate yourself from neighbors, co-workers, or acquaintances. The more you know about your child’s generation, the more credibility you will have with them when conflict arises. Disagreements are normal, it’s the way that we communicate that can be harmful. Reference: 1 Kellar, M. (2012). South Asian immigration in the United States: A gendered perspective. Harvard Journal of Asian American Policy Review, 22, 20112012. Retrieved from: http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/ icb.topics1074693.files/AAPR_south%20asian.pdf

Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

CHALLENGES

Gender Roles in South Asian Families By Simran Kaur, MHS

“ ‘…just as there are two Indias for the rich and the poor, there are two Indias for men and women. A woman’s domain is of the home—she takes care of the family, manages the servants. A man’s domain is of the world—working, eating at restaurants. That is why, when you walk on the streets as a woman here, you can feel like a minority. It’s the men who are out and about. And sometimes they like to taunt those of us who dare to venture out.’ ” —Shilpi Somaya Gowda, Secret Daughter Like some other parts of the world, South Asia exhibits a preference for sons and a social system, known as patriarchy, in which males hold the primary authority in societal and familial settings. This preference is revealed in three key dimensions. These include economic, social, and religious reasons that demonstrate the low value placed on females in Indian society and that support the utility of having a son. Economic factors that influence son preference include higher wage earning capacity for males, traditions that ensure sons provide security for parents in old age and illness, property inheritance, and in some regions, assistance with family agricultural endeavors. Religious factors are most prominent among devotees of the Hindu faith, as tradition dictates that only sons may light the funeral pyre of their deceased parents and sons provide an offering of food and clothing to higher caste members and the poor in order for their deceased parents’ souls to have a chance at attaining salvation. Social norms that perpetuate son preference include dowry payments in place for a son’s family to benefit from marriage alliances, continuation of the family name and blood line through sons, traditions that require sons and their wives to reside in joint/extended family arrangements with the husband’s family, social status and strength afforded to women and families by having sons, and the burden felt by families in needing to defend and protect their 50

CHAI Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

daughters, especially once they have reached adolescence.1,2,3

Religious and Cultural Norms Despite some religious and cultural norms today that belittle or exclude women, early literature and religious discourse demonstrate that there was a period of ancient South Asian history during which women were respected and valued. Excerpts from the Manusmrithi,3 and the Sri Guru Granth Sahib include the following as translated into English: Women are worthy of worship. They are the fate of the household, the lamp of enlightenment for all in the household. They bring solace to the family and are an integral part of dharmic life. Even heaven is under the control of women. The gods reside in those households where women are worshipped and in households where women are slighted, all efforts at improvement go in vain. —Manusmriti, Laws of Manu, 3-56 “From woman, man is born; within woman, man is conceived; to woman he is engaged and married. Woman becomes his friend; through woman, the future generations come. When his woman dies, he seeks another woman; to woman he is bound. So why call her bad? From her, kings are born. From woman, woman is born; without woman, there would be no one at all.”

—Guru Nanak Dev Ji in Raag Aasaa on Pannaa 473, Sri Guru Granth Sahib

Over time, it is believed that factors such as fear of loss of culture and tradition, barriers to the education of women, changing political situations, and a decrease in the female age of marriage led to increasing patriarchy and oppression against women that endure in the social fabric of South Asia today in the form of female abuse and infanticide, sati, dowry-related violence, child brides, and rejecting women from participating in certain religious rituals, among others.3

CHALLENGES

Migration and Acculturation Migration from one’s home country to a new and different culture can be a stressful and life-changing experience for children and families, as described earlier in this booklet. Many South Asian families continue to hold certain beliefs and practices related to gender roles even after immigration to more liberal societies where cultural values in their new home emphasize relatively greater equality between genders. These traditional South Asian beliefs and practices about gender roles include, among others, the following: mothers are solely responsible for daily childcare, cooking, and homemaking while fathers are responsible for discipline; parents must control the independence and sexuality of their daughters more strictly than their sons because their daughter’s actions represent the family’s honor; and daughters must be socialized from a young age to sacrifice their desires and freedom. Additionally, traditional gender roles hold men and boys to high standards of masculinity, as demonstrated by exerting power, control, aggression, and being able to provide, while women and girls are expected to display femininity in their physical appearance and dress, passive demeanor, proficiency in household chores, and nurturing behaviors. These roles are often also reinforced through South Asian movies, music videos, and television serials. For South Asian families, this process of holding on to one’s ancestral beliefs and values while also adapting to a different culture can be difficult as it requires a balance of traditional gender roles with more open-minded and empowering gender roles held by western society. Research on South Asian adolescents tells us that gender segregation (keeping girls and boys separated with limited interaction) seems to be one socialization method used by parents and families to ensure the continuation of traditional gender roles, especially after migration. South Asian adolescent girls in western societies report parents having more control over their social activities, strict rules, and supporting arranged marriage.4,5 Arranged marriage can instill young girls with the idea that marriage should be a significant goal in their lives and that education and career ambitions can increase their chances of securing a worthy marriage proposal. These chaicounselors.org

For South Asian families, this process of holding on to one’s ancestral beliefs and values while also adapting to a different culture can be difficult as it requires a balance of traditional gender roles with more open-minded and empowering gender roles held by western society.

methods are also increasingly used in immigrant families as a way to ensure that girls will become wives and mothers who preserve traditions and beliefs, and retain traditional family relationships. Therefore, South Asian gender roles and expectations result in different parenting of sons and daughters which leaves girls facing more demands from their families which can result in serious mental health issues such as depression, stress, anxiety and behavioral problems.6 Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

CHALLENGES

Impact on our Community

operate separately from gender role attitudes.9

Domestic violence is a serious problem among the South Asian community in the United States. According to experts, attitudes and beliefs about traditional gender roles in South Asian families significantly influence the epidemic of violence against women.7,8,9 Thus, this has implications for how relationship ideals and expectations are shaped in the family and community, whether daughters learn to silently tolerate abuse within their immediate and extended families while sons learn that they must display hyper-masculinity through power and aggression, and could engender future long-term issues of domestic abuse in the South Asian community.

Regardless of how traditional gender roles are displayed in the home, they can place undue burdens and expectations on children from a very young age. Moreover, the language used and the interactions displayed by family members that children grow up observing has repercussions on the roles they exhibit, limitations they place on themselves, and the relationships they have with their peers, partners, children, and community members in the future.

What Can Parents Do? Since the roles considered appropriate for men and women in South Asia may vary from those believed to be suitable in western societies, South Asian parents may find themselves in the challenging position of helping their children make sense of conflicting beliefs. What is important to remember is that life choices should be dictated by personal goals and qualities, and not by society. Not all boys are naturally aggressive and not all girls are dainty. Some boys enjoy cooking and some girls enjoy sports. While South Asian women in western societies do obtain an education and ultimately work outside the home out of necessity and/or desire, the responsibility of child rearing and household chores still often falls on them. South Asian men, however, may want to be more involved in supporting their wives, contributing to household errands, and raising their children. Thus, it is important that traditional gender roles do not limit children or other members of the family in displaying who they are, who they become, and how they live their daily lives. All children have different needs and personalities and when there is a disconnect between who children truly are and want to be and who their parents or extended families expect them to be, children can experience mental health issues. While some families may feel that maintaining strict gender roles is needed in order to make sure children do not abandon other cultural traditions, research among South Asians in western society suggests that this is not the case and that the preservation of cultural traditions and beliefs can 52

CHAI Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

Resources: Websites: MySahana, a nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing awareness about mental health, emotional health and well-being in the South Asian community http://www.mysahana.org/ Counselors Helping (South) Asian Indians (CHAI), provides support and mental health resources for the South Asian community http://www.chaicounselors.org/resources/links Articles: To Indian Parents: From an Indian Daughter by Priya C, January 2014 http://browngirlmagazine.com/2014/01/indianparents-indian-daughter/ South Asian Couples: A Story about Gender Roles, May 2012 http://www.mysahana.org/2012/05/south-asiancouples-a-story-about-gender-roles/ Documentary Film: Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a Girl Shadowline Films, 2011-2013 http://www.itsagirlmovie.com/

References: 1 Arnold,

Fred; Choe, Minja Kim; and Roy, T. K. (1998). Son preference, the family-building process and child mortality in India. Population Studies, 52(3), 301â&#x20AC;&#x201C;315.

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Pande, Rohini and Malhotra, Anju (2006). Son preference and daughter neglect in India: What happens to living girls? Washington, D.C.: International Center for Research on Women. Available at: http://www.icrw.org/publications/sonpreference-and-daughter-neglect-india. 3 Shankar, Janki; Das, Gita; and Atwal, Sabrina

(2013). Challenging cultural discourses and beliefs that perpetuate domestic violence in South Asian communities: A discourse analysis. Journal of International Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Studies, 14(1), 248-262. Available at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/jiws/vol14/iss1/15. 4 Naidoo, Josephine C. (1984). South

Asian women in Canada: Self-perception, socialization, achievement, aspirations, in South Asians in Canadian mosaic. Kanungo, R.N. (Ed). Montreal: Kala Bharati, 123â&#x20AC;&#x201C;144. 5 Talbani, Aziz and Hasanali, Parveen (2000).

Shariff, Aneesa (2009). Ethnic identity and parenting stress in South Asian families: Implications for culturally sensitive counseling. Canadian Journal of Counselling, 43(1): 35-46. 7

Ayyub, Ruksana (2000). Domestic violence in the South Asian Muslim immigration population in the United States. Journal of Social Distress and The Homeless, 9(3), 237-248. 8

Mehrotra, Meeta (1999). The social construction of wife abuse: Experiences of Asian Indian women in the United States. Violence Against Women, 5(6): 619-640. 9

Bhanot, Surbhi and Senn, Charlene Y. (2007). Attitudes towards violence against women in men of South Asian ancestry: Are acculturation and gender role attitudes important factors? Journal of Family Violence, 22: 25-31.

Adolescent females between traditional and modernity: Gender role socialization in South Asian immigrant culture. Journal of Adolescence, 23, 615-627.

CHAI FOCUS GROUP, SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA.

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Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

Contributors The editors of the book express our sincere gratitude for the authors’ time, expertise, and personal stories in making the CHAI Parenting Book a unique and meaningful resource for the community. Sabiha Bandali, MSW was born and raised in Tanzania, East Africa, and moved to the US in 1992. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a bachelor’s degree in Psychology, and later from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a master’s degree in Medical Social Work. She is a mother to three children and also a hospice social worker, and is passionate about End of Life care. She lives with her husband and children in Austin, TX. Anshu R. Basnyat, LCPC is a parenting coach and therapist in private practice in Ellicott City, MD. She specializes in parenting infants to elementary school-aged children, is the author of her parenting blog (www.theempoweredparent.net) and other publications on mental health and parenting issues. Her therapy approach is based on Cognitive-Behavioral Psychology and she enjoys working with multicultural families. She speaks English, Nepali, and some Hindi, American Sign Language, and Spanish. In her leisure time, she enjoys spending time with her

family, friends, and traveling. Anshu can be contacted at anshu.basnyat@gmail.com. Sapna Batra Chopra, PhD is a licensed psychologist and faculty member of the Counseling Department at California State University, Fullerton. She received her Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from the University of Maryland. She teaches courses on Human Development and Cultural Diversity and provides trainings to the university counseling center staff on counseling South Asians. She co-wrote a book chapter on parenting in Asian American families for the textbook Asian American Psychology: Current Perspectives. She is also the proud mom of a 9-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter. She can be contacted at sapnachopra@fullerton.edu. Mala Datta, PhD is a New York State Licensed Psychologist. She is in private practice with offices in Manhattan and in Suffern, NY. Dr. Datta works with children and adults providing psychological and bilingual educational testing in

CHAI Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

NYC schools and psychotherapy in her practice. She helps individuals to cope with anxiety and depression. She works with children who may have difficulty with attention and concentration and behavior problems. She also works with couples to strengthen their relationship. She uses cognitive behavior therapy techniques to help people identify and change the patterns in thinking. She also uses mindfulness to help people stay connected with the present. She can be contacted by phone on 201-952-9905. Information and directions can be found at www.Maladattaphd.com. Preet Dhillon is currently pursuing a graduate program in counseling psychology at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology. She is originally from Malaysia but has also lived in India, Canada and New Zealand. From these crosscultural experiences, she has developed a keen interest in cross-cultural psychology and its applications within the counseling context. She has also had a high level of exposure to crisis intervention and has spent time in Northern Thailand serving HIV/AIDS adults and orphaned children. Her current area of clinical research focuses on the behavioral outcomes in children who have been exposed to domestic violence. Bindu Garapaty, PsyD is a clinical psychologist and the co-founder of The Happy Leader, LLC. She is

dedicated and passionate about empowering youth to successfully execute their leadership potential. Her research has focused on leadership development, selfawareness and cultural identity. The training curricula focuses on increasing happiness, improving performance, overcoming adversity and enhancing the human experience of resiliency for youth and adults. She offers a unique perspective on evaluating and assessing leadership skills as our youth prepare for their academic, personal, and professional futures. Dr. Garapaty’s presentations have included both national and international forums in areas of leadership, education and women’s health. Dr. Garapaty has held various clinical and leadership roles within health care, hospital, university, and for profit and nonprofit organizations. Additionally, she has a longstanding commitment to volunteering and serving on non-profit boards with a focus on the S. Asian community. Working out, spending time with friends and family, traveling and creating new experiences are a few things that contribute to Dr. Garapaty’s happiness quotient. Dr. Garapaty has two preschool aged children. Arifa K. Javed, PhD is a comparative and applied sociologist at the University of Michigan Dearborn. Her recent areas of research interest include immigration, acculturation, changing family dynamics, and challenges of parenting. She has worked extensively with post 1995 immigrants of varied chaicounselors.org

ethnic backgrounds in United States. Those experiences, which included interaction with six different groups of immigrants (Arabic, Bosnian, Bangladeshi, Chaldean, Indian and Pakistani), led to an article called Mainstreaming Immigrant Children through Parallel Socialization Workshops, which was published as a chapter in the 2009 book Voices of Diversity (edited by Dr. Mary Cay Sengstock). Dr. Javed has written and produced a documentary on Indian immigrants with a special focus on Michigan, it is called Essential Arrival: Michigan’s Indian Immigrants in the 21st Century. The film focuses on the important contributions of Indian immigrants in the 21st century to America and reflects upon the American value of pluralism, which allows immigrant minorities to survive, thrive, and give back to the richness of American society. This film is also a unique source of ethnic enrichment for the American audiences. Khyati Y. Joshi, EdD is an Associate Professor of Education at Fairleigh Dickinson University. Dr. Joshi is the author of the book New Roots in America’s Sacred Ground: Religion, Race, and Ethnicity in Indian America (Rutgers University Press, 2006), which received the NAME 2007 Philip C. Chinn Book Award. She is co-editor of Asian Americans in Dixie (University of Illinois Press, 2013) and Understanding Religious Oppression and Christian Privilege (Sense Publishers, 2008).

She is the Religion, Schools And Society section editor for the Encyclopedia on Diversity in Education (Sage Publications) edited by James Banks, and has authored numerous book chapters and articles on race, immigration, and religion. In addition to numerous presentations at academic conferences, she presented her research on Hindu communities at the White House; to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to Vienna, Austria, where she addressed the racialization of religion, particularly Hinduism, Sikhism and Islam, as it relates to the development of policies to prevent and combat hate crimes in the OSCE region; and at several conferences in India. Anirudh Khajuria, PhD is a Ph.D. scholar from Jammu and Kashmir, India. He received his B.A. and Post graduation from the University of Jammu and taught psychology at undergraduate level in Government degree colleges of Jammu. He has qualified national eligibility test (NET) and state eligibility test (SET) for lectureship. He is working as an online course author in Psychology at Professional Education Organization International (PEOI) for the last three years. He was nominated as one of the ambassadors for “STAR” programme, an initiative by international publishers Taylor and Francis, which provides online access for individual researchers from emerging regions to support writing and

Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

publication. He is also working as an online volunteer for United Nations. Razia F. Kosi, LCSW-C is a Cultural Proficiency Specialist for a public school system in Maryland and is the founder of Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians, Inc. (CHAI) a non profit organization addressing mental health & wellness with the South Asian community. She created and co-facilitated the CHAI South Asian Women’s Wellness Group, which focuses on strengths and facilitating growth through wellness strategies. National conference presentations include: Cultural Proficiency, Islamophobia, Effective Outreach, and the Women’s Wellness Group. Writings include, Diversity chapter in Wiley-Blackwell’s Handbook of Group Psychotherapy, editing & contributing to the CHAI Mental Health Resource booklet and co-authored an article for Educational Leadership. Ms. Kosi is the Treasurer for the Division on South Asian Americans in the AAPA. In 2012 Howard County Women’s Commission recognized Ms. Kosi for her work in the community and school system. Her personal journey includes an interracial and interreligious marriage since 1992 and raising a family in a multi-cultural environment. She and her husband have the privilege of being both biological and adoptive parents to two daughters.

Dhara Thakar Meghani, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Integrated Behavioral Health and Primary Care Department at the University of San Francisco. Dhara teaches courses in the clinical psychology doctoral program at USF including Human Development and Psychopathology of Children and Adolescents. Her research focuses on how stress, coping, and cultural context relate to parenting and early childhood mental health, with an emphasis on family functioning following major life transitions. She is a regular contributor to the ‘Borrowed Knowledge’ column of South Asian Parent magazine where she discusses research findings and implications about child development in a friendly and accessible manner for parents. Dhara holds a B.A. in psychology from the University of California Berkeley and received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She completed her internship and postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California San Francisco. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for the South Asian Public Health Association and was named a 2013–14 Leadership Fellow for the Asian American Psychological Association. Nanmathi Manian, PhD is a developmental psychologist by training with 15 years of experience in research focusing on children, youth, and families.

CHAI Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

She is currently a Westat Senior Study Director as an evaluator of national and international programs. While a research fellow at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), she served as principal investigator for an 8-year study of maternal depression and early childhood outcomes. Dr. Manian’s work has focused on child socio-emotional outcomes in conjunction with factors such as parenting practices, motherinfant interaction, utilization of mental health services, and father involvement, especially in immigrant families. She has presented on these topics and national and international conferences, and published in various peer-reviewed journals. Preetika Mukherjee, PhD completed her Ph.D. in School/Clinical Psychology from New York University and two years of postdoctoral training in Pediatric Neuropsychology from St. Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital. She has worked with children, adolescents and young adults with various kinds of neurological, developmental and learning difficulties. Dr. Mukherjee is currently an Assistant Professor in Psychiatry at Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai and the Director of the Neuropsychological Services at Mount Sinai St. Luke’s Hospital. The service that she runs involves the evaluation of cognitive abilities and psychiatric functioning using a battery of standardized assessment measures. These

evaluations can be used to help diagnose or rule out different conditions (e.g., Autism, ADHD) as well as to describe the impact of a condition (e.g., hydrocephalus, cerebral palsy, epilepsy, Traumatic Brain Injury) on a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s functioning (social skills, learning, and academic functioning). She teaches and supervises pre-doctoral psychology interns, psychology post-doctoral students and psychiatry fellows who are a part of the Neuropsychological Service. In addition, she conducts comprehensive neuropsychological evaluations with children, adolescents and young adults with varied conditions (e.g., neurological, neurodevelopmental, learning). Kusha Murarka, PsyD is a licensed clinical psychologist in Chicago and has worked at a number of university counseling centers in the Midwest and on the East Coast. Dr. Murarka received her B.A. at Northwestern University and then her Psy.D. at the Illinois School of Professional Psychology. She has significant experience working with adults who are challenged with mental health concerns, multicultural issues, interpersonal relationships, and identity development. She is very invested in South Asian mental health and seeks to promote education, advocacy, and culturally sensitive services in this community. She is currently the Chair of the Division on South Asian Americans (DoSAA) that aspires to be a voice in chaicounselors.org

this community locally and nationally through various activities including social activism, online media presence, clinical consultation, and psychoeducation. Dr. Murarka is also a member of the American Psychological Association (APA), Asian American Psychological Association (AAPA), and serves on the executive board of the Asian American Suicide Prevention Initiative (AASPI). Neha Navsaria, PhD is a psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Her interests include: early childhood, parenting, ethnic identity development, immigrant mental health and cultural competency training. She has presented at national conferences and published articles related to cross-cultural psychology and parenting. Neha served as the Chair for the Division on South Asian Americans within the Asian American Psychological Association and a contributor to the online magazine South Asian Parent. She is the co-recipient of the Asian American Psychological Association/ American Psychological Foundation Okura Mental Health Foundation Grant allowing for the creation of the CHAI Parenting Initiative. Neha is grateful that her connection to extended family, travels and family migration history (US via East Africa and the UK) have given her a greater appreciation of the South Asian diasporic

experience. Having lived in various cities in the Northeast and currently living in the Midwest, her upbringing and family life have exposed her to the similarities and differences of South Asians living in various regions of the United States. Mudita Rastogi, PhD, LMFT is Professor and the Coordinator of the Child and Family Concentration at the Illinois School of Professional Psychology, Argosy University, Schaumburg, IL. She obtained her Ph.D. in Marriage and Family Therapy from Texas Tech University, her Masterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s from University of Bombay, and her BA (Honors) in Psychology from University of Delhi. Dr. Rastogi has published extensively in the areas of family and couple therapy, cross-cultural and gender issues and South Asian families, is editor of the book Multicultural Couple Therapy (2009, Sage Publications), and has authored several other publications. She is also Program Director for the SAMHSA funded Minority Fellowship Program at AAMFT. Dr. Rastogi has over 15 years of clinical experience in both India and the United States, and is in private practice in Arlington Heights, Illinois, as a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. Her research and clinical interests include couples, families, attachment, adolescents, cultural and gender issues, domestic violence and trauma. She frequently presents workshops nationally and internationally. Her website is http://Aspire-CT.com

Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

Simran Kaur Sabherwal, MHS research interests include women’s health and empowerment, maternal and child health, sexual and reproductive health of women and girls, positive youth development, school-based health, genderbased violence, Asian American health and well-being, community-based participatory research, and implementation science. She completed her undergraduate training at University of California, Berkeley, and holds a Masters of Health Science and Doctor of Philosophy from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Raised in the Northern California Bay Area, she grew up surrounded by a large, vibrant South Asian community and actively participated in community volunteer efforts, religious functions, and cultural events. She can be reached by email at simran3@gmail.com. Ulash ThakoreDunlap, LMFT is a Licensed Marriage Family Therapist. Currently, Ulash is Core Faculty at the Wright Institute MA Counseling Psychology Program and Adjunct Faculty at San Francisco State University MS Counseling Program. In addition, she has a private practice in San Francisco, CA, and provides therapy, consultation, clinical supervision and trainings. Ulash is the founder of Understand My Mind, a website providing free articles and podcasts on mental health 58

topics. Ulash is very active within the Asian American community. She has been with the Division of South Asian Americans (DoSAA), part of the Asian American Psychological Association, since it’s formation. She previously served as treasurer, Chair (2011–2012), and currently serves on the Senior Advisory Council. In addition, Ulash is past Communications Officer (2010–2014) for the Asian American Psychological Association. Ulash can be contacted at ulashmind@gmail. com and 415-570-3820. Salmaan Toor, PhD is a licensed clinical psychologist practicing in Knoxville, TN. He previously worked at a group practice in northern Virginia. He works with children, adolescents, parents, and adults, and provides individual, play, couples, and family therapy. He currently resides in Knoxville, with his wife and two children. True to his blended PakistaniAmerican upbringing, he loves haleem and college football. His blog, which can be found at www.tfcknoxville.com, focuses on child and adolescent issues, relationships, family, and parenting. Hena Zuberi is the Editorin-Chief of Muslimmatters.org, an award-winning web magazine. A community organizer for years, she resides in Washington, D.C., where she is a staff reporter for the Muslim

CHAI Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

Link newspaper and a columnist for Motherhood magazine. Hena transitioned from television into print after working as a TV news reporter and producer for CNBC Asia and WTN. Her work has been published in New America Media and quoted on sites such as the CNN Belief Blog. She uses her decade long experience as a youth counselor to run Growing God workshops across the country. This mom of four loves chai and blogging about contemporary issues facing parents. She tweets @henazuberi.

About CHAI CHAI takes a holistic approach to providing proactive, culturally competent information and referrals on mental health and wellness to the South Asian population. CHAI volunteers are concerned about the mental health and wellness in the South Asian community; we represent a diversity of experiences, ethnicity, age and professions.

CHAI Focus Groups Through funding with the APF, we conducted regional focus groups with parents of South Asian background to openly and honestly discuss parenting in the US. Focused, open-ended questions were used to gain insight into the experiences of South Asian parents in the US. The following themes emerged from the group discussion.

Who we (parents) want to be

Our Goals:

• Provide information on mental health and wellness • Increase access to services for the SA Community • End stigma about mental health and wellness • Collaborate with both the SA community and mainstream providers

• A guide to our children rather than push ourselves on them • Accept children’s choices • Understand children’s different developmental stages • Flexible in parenting • A good listener in order to form the parent-child relationship • Open, build trust and understanding

Our Resources:

What we want for our children

• Mental health resource materials available online. * Some translated materials available in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Tamil, contact us for more info. • Blogs on mental health and wellness topics • Women’s Wellness Group highlighted in The WileyBlackwell Handbook of Group Psychotherapy, Chapter 33Diversity in Groups- Culture, Race and Ethnicity • National provider directory

Our Outreach in the Community:

(In the Maryland area) • Participation in local health fair • Community workshops at local mosques, temples, and gurdwaras, universities and schools • Women’s Wellness Group • Focus groups- for South Asian Parenting and South Asian Adolescents

Our Workshops with Mental Health Professionals:

• Asian American Psychological Association • New York University Center for the Study on Asian American Health • National Association of Social Workers National Conference • National Association of Multicultural Education • National Conference on Race and Ethnicity • On New Shores Conference—University of Guelph, ON, Canada For more information please contact 443-615-1355 , board.chai@gmail.com or visit our website, www. chaicounselors.org, follow us on Twitter @chaicounselors, and Facebook, Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians

Learn more by visiting www.chaicounselors.org. chaicounselors.org

• Academically strong • Able to stand on one’s own legs in the community • Confidence, comfortable and able to accept themselves • Happy and well-adjusted • Self-sufficient

What we value as parents

• Well-behaved children • Respect for elders and others • Respect all religions • Being a good citizen • Connections across multiple generations • Education and achievement • Make religion a part of children’s lives • Have pride & joy in culture

What is important in our culture

• It (culture) is a central part of life • Important to expose children to various aspects of culture (language, food etc.) • Practicing faith • Navigating bicultural atmosphere successfully • Having bilingual children • Don’t forget own culture or identity • We model for our children • Rituals and prayers integrated into way of life • Know and respect traditions, customs and festivals

What we still struggle with

• Keeping children engaged in cultural traditions • Being a good role-model • Placing too much emphasis on academic success • Being patient with children and with ourselves • Confidence to discuss difficulties in parenting with others • Our own baggage and the pressures we bring Counselors Helping (South) Asians/Indians CHAI

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