So what should you do when your child begins to suffer from their appearance? Psychologist Pascal Anger explains how to support this discomfort without minimizing it… or giving it more space.
“I built myself a little in this complex“
Laura Felpin no longer hides what once made her look away. Invited on France Inter, the comedian returned with emotion to the
significant strabismus from which she suffered as a child, to the point of undergoing several operations and numerous rehabilitation sessions.
A memory that has long occupied an important place in the way she perceived herself.
“At the beginning, I very proudly displayed this photo of myself as a child on my show poster, saying to myself, there I had straight eyes, I had no strabismus (…), and I said that I had built myself a little in this complex.”she says.
With hindsight, however, Laura Felpin qualifies this story. Because if his strabismus mattered in his childhood, he did not have the last word.
She attributes a large part of this development to her parents, who supported her without ever leaving her alone in the face of this difference.
“In fact, I think my parents were so encouraging, they were really there, (…) that it actually allowed me the opposite, I think.”she confides on France Inter.
This testimony highlights a question that many parents may ask themselves: how can you help your child when their appearance becomes a source of suffering?
Don’t act like the resort doesn’t exist
Faced with a child who finds himself “different”, the first instinct may be to want to immediately reassure him: “But no, you’re just fine like that”, “It’s not obvious”, “It’s not serious”…
A well-intentioned reaction, but not always enough.
The psychologist Pascal Anger advises, on the contrary, to
put into words what the child feels.
“Parents can talk about it very simply: they must recognize that the child has this particularity, put it into words and help them to better express their emotions.”.
In other words, it is neither a matter of dramatizing nor of denying. If the child suffers from the gaze focused on him, this suffering deserves to be heard.
“Above all, parents must not act as if this physical peculiarity did not exist, so that the child can learn to live with it without being uncomfortable with it.continues the psychologist.
This recognition can help him understand what is happening to him rather than feeling that his discomfort is incomprehensible or forbidden.
Faced with mockery, the child above all needs to know that he is not alone
The problem does not always come from the child’s view of himself. It can arise from that of others.
A remark in the playground, a nickname, a laugh or a repeated thought can gradually transform a physical peculiarity into a real complex.
In these moments, the child should not have the feeling that he must fend for himself.
“Faced with mockery, it is also important to support him in what he is going through.”insists Pascal Anger.
Parents can help him put into words what happened, ask him how he felt, and think with him about how to react. If the situation becomes repeated or resembles harassment, it must obviously be taken seriously and reported to the school.
And when parents no longer know how to intervene, asking for help is not a failure. “And if parents can’t find the words, they can get help from a therapist.”recalls the psychologist.
The trap to avoid: passing on your own complexes
Finally, there is a more discreet difficulty. A parent may themselves have suffered from the scrutiny of their appearance.
However, even without meaning to, their concerns can sometimes influence the way a child looks at their own body.
Also be careful if the mother or father has the same complex. Pascal Anger invites parents to remain vigilant: “It is therefore important to be careful not to pass it on to the child“.
This obviously does not mean that a parent should hide their own weaknesses. But rather it avoids systematically presenting a physical characteristic as something to be ashamed of or get rid of.
Laura Felpin finally offers a personal illustration. His strabismus was part of his story. He even participated in the construction of her self-image. But he didn’t stop his parents from passing on something more powerful to him:
the confidence to dare.
“I just believe that my parents supported and loved me so much, so that I did not feel the weight of operations and rehabilitation, that they gave me the confidence to dare. I owe them a lot.”she confides.
For a child who feels different, the objective is not necessarily to teach him to no longer see his particularity. It is to help him understand thatshe is only a part of him, and certainly not his whole identity.