These tips will help you and your child acclimate to the new surroundings quicker and help your child cope with moving abroad so you can both get back to feeling normal again.
Moving can be a stressful time for the whole family, but it can impact a child the most because it is such a dramatic shift in their life. Moving is hard on them because they can feel lonely or separated from friends and the familiarity of their old place. One of the most difficult moves for a child can be being left to live abroad, as this is a huge change in their life.
Helping your child cope with moving abroad is definitely not an easy task, but it is important to make them happy.
These tips will help you and your child acclimate to the new surroundings quicker so you can both get back to feeling normal again.
How to Help Your Child Cope With Moving Abroad
Get Settled Quickly
The difficult thing with helping your child cope with a move abroad is making them feel settled and at home quickly.
Many people choose locales that are very different from their own, and this change in culture and setting is a big step for children.
For many families in the UK and other fair climate regions, moving to hotter places is a big shift in lifestyle, especially on kids, so it is important to have your home ready to go fast to give some semblance of familiarity.
It would mean a huge change for a child, but feeling comfortable with home helps.
It is important to give them a smooth transition and with boxes and shipping out of the way they can feel at home fast.
Moving to Warmer Climates
Many families move to go somewhere warmer.
This change is incredibly different from their current situation, and it can be a big shock to a child.
The difference in things like climate is a major change, and moving from a colder climate country like the UK to a warmer area like Cyprus is going to be hard to cope with for a child.
Cyprus is a warmer island in the Mediterranean, and that means a big undertaking in moving.
Getting an assist with moving to Cyprus would mean some culture shock, which relates to the previous point as these locations are difficult to have things shipped to.
Moving somewhere warm should mean you are prepared for a new lifestyle for your child, and that means covering all bases with your moving needs.
Help Them Find Friends
The biggest problem for children is feeling far away from their friends.
It is very helpful to find them friends or help them find friends quickly.
Joining clubs, groups, or sports and enrolling them in school quickly will help them meet new friends faster.
The longer it takes, the harder it might feel for a child to connect with new people in their new home.
Another good idea is to meet people close to your home, like neighbors, to foster a sense of community.
This is a good way to help introduce your family to other families and potentially help your child find friends quickly to help them cope with the distance between them and their friends back home.
Listen and Talk With Your Child
Listening to your child’s concerns and talking to them to understand what they are feeling scared or sad about is just as important as helping them feel settled or finding friends.
Children are often talked to and not talked with, meaning we do not listen to their issues because we can sometimes think that because they are so much younger, they are not experiencing complex emotions.
A move abroad can bring about a lot of complex emotions, like anxiety, which is easier to deal with for them when they know that their most loved people, their family, want to talk to them and understand how they feel.
Letting them express how they feel about the move is valuable and will give them some relief knowing they are being heard (TIME).
Develop a Routine
Moving is a lot of work and can leave everyone feeling exhausted and burnt out.
The key to getting you and your family feeling back in the groove after all of the hard work is done is to develop a routine.
Make sure everyone is still getting up on time, doing chores, focused on things like work and school, and setting regular dinner times, and anything that contributed to your daily routine at your old home.
Routine making helps children feel more organized and less likely to get discouraged or feel like they are bored.
Moving abroad is a big change in the life of a child, no matter what age.
This big shift in their life can result in them finding coping mechanisms to feel better but they might not all be good and might make their transition to their new home harder.
Using this advice, you can help make that transition smoother for you and your family.