Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1244 - Mental Health and Externalising Disorders With Dr Jaimie Northam

Transcript

#1244 - Mental Health and Externalising Disorders With Dr Jaimie Northam · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:05
Speaker 1: In Australia right now, ADHD is the most diagnosed mental
0:09
Speaker 1: health or neurodevelopmental challenge in our young people under fourteen.
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Speaker 1: Recent Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows that anxiety is
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Speaker 1: the number one for over fourteens and since COVID. That
0:21
Speaker 1: data indicates that as many as forty one percent of
0:24
Speaker 1: our girls and twenty one percent of our boys are
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Speaker 1: experiencing clinical levels of anxiety. In short, mental health challenges
0:32
Speaker 1: are rising, resilience is on the way down. Today on
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Speaker 1: the podcast, my guest is going to help us to
0:39
Speaker 1: work out how we can improve both access to support
0:44
Speaker 1: and processes at home to help our kids do better.
0:48
Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to the Happy Families podcast, Real parenting
0:51
Speaker 1: solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. My
0:55
Speaker 1: name is doctor Justin Coulson and I'm absolutely delighted thrilled
0:58
Speaker 1: to be joined the University of Sydney by doctor Jamie Northam.
1:03
Speaker 1: Doctor Jamie Northam is a clinical psychologist at sid DODR.
1:07
Speaker 1: Northam's clinical and research work focuses on children and adolescents
1:11
Speaker 1: and parenting. She has a particular interest in what are
1:15
Speaker 1: known as externalizing disorders. We'll talk about those in a
1:18
Speaker 1: sec that things like oppositional defiance disorder, conduct disorder, and
1:23
Speaker 1: youth substance use. Currently, Jamie's working on ways to help
1:27
Speaker 1: parents and young people notice the early signs of mental
1:31
Speaker 1: health problems and get access to research based resources. She's
1:35
Speaker 1: passionate about upskilling the community, better support well being and
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Speaker 1: helping parents to build new skills and Jamies and mum
1:40
Speaker 1: to Hazel, a typically rambunctious and busy and delightful two
1:46
Speaker 1: year old Dr Northam, thank you so much for being
1:48
Speaker 1: with me on the Happy Families podcast. Really glad to
1:51
Speaker 1: have you along.
1:52
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me to say, justin so.
1:54
Speaker 1: I want to start with a hypothesis. I'm going to
1:56
Speaker 1: get you to tell me, from your data and your
1:59
Speaker 1: clinically experience, how close I am At the moment. Kids
2:02
Speaker 1: aren't active, kids are on screens. Tech CEOs have developed
2:05
Speaker 1: algorithms to addict our kids to those screens. Parents are
2:10
Speaker 1: busy and stressed and distracted, sometimes in healthy ways, other
2:13
Speaker 1: times just in their own algorithmic miasma and school pressure
2:17
Speaker 1: is increasing at a society level. My hypothesis is that
2:20
Speaker 1: we're just doing it wrong right now. And these are
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Speaker 1: the things that I see as being central contributors to
2:25
Speaker 1: our mental health challenges. Where am I right? Where am
2:28
Speaker 1: I wrong?
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Speaker 2: It is harder than ever to be a parent of
2:33
Speaker 2: kids at the moment, and I think the screens, and
2:36
Speaker 2: I think the environment in which young people are in
2:38
Speaker 2: at the moment makes that doubly hard. We don't really
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Speaker 2: know how to manage screens, and we don't know the
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Speaker 2: long term effects of big time use of screens as well.
2:48
Speaker 2: And we can kind of make some guesses about ADHD
2:51
Speaker 2: and the effect that attention and screens is having on
2:56
Speaker 2: that diagnosis. But it is really difficult. So what did
3:00
Speaker 2: you get right? It's definitely more difficult than ever to
3:04
Speaker 2: be a parent and to be a young person. What
3:06
Speaker 2: did you get wrong? Screens aren't all bad, and screen
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Speaker 2: time and use doesn't necessarily relate to anxiety and attentional problems.
3:17
Speaker 2: Later on, what we do know is correlated with those
3:21
Speaker 2: things sears relationship with parents and relationship with the children
3:25
Speaker 2: and young people, and what we do to support conversations
3:28
Speaker 2: around how they're using screens and what they see, and
3:32
Speaker 2: what we can do to help increase that resilience within
3:34
Speaker 2: the home.
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Speaker 1: So Jamie to the point that I made about parents
3:38
Speaker 1: being busy and stressed and distracted sometimes with their own
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Speaker 1: screens as well as well as the kids being on theirs.
3:44
Speaker 1: Let's talk about this issue of building that relationship with parents.
3:47
Speaker 1: You've been working in this area at the University of
3:49
Speaker 1: Sydney for some time. What do you see as the
3:52
Speaker 1: biggest challenges outside of the world of screens to positive
3:57
Speaker 1: parent child relationships stress?
4:01
Speaker 2: Absolutely, family stress, we've seen it in the news, the
4:04
Speaker 2: cost of living crisis, families and parents in particular doing
4:08
Speaker 2: everything they can to try and support their family in
4:10
Speaker 2: the best way that they can. So there's absolutely no
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Speaker 2: shame for parents from us for using screens and relying
4:18
Speaker 2: on these things at times. But where we would come
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Speaker 2: from with this is that there's a right way to
4:23
Speaker 2: use them and there's a way that we can use
4:25
Speaker 2: them that's more effective. Because at the end of the
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Speaker 2: day as well, if you need to sit down and
4:29
Speaker 2: you need to get dinner cooked, or you need to
4:31
Speaker 2: do your own thing, you've got work to do. That's
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Speaker 2: a reality for the life that we're facing at the
4:36
Speaker 2: moment and the times that we're living in. But there's
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Speaker 2: ways that we can do that I think that help
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Speaker 2: to increase connection and help to really help with children's
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Speaker 2: mental health and protect them a little bit.
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Speaker 1: Okay, let's take screens out of it for just a
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Speaker 1: sick If you were to give parents maybe one or
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Speaker 1: two of the best pieces of advice that you've come
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Speaker 1: across to help them to build a relationship better with
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Speaker 1: their children, whether the child's two or twelve or twelve
5:00
Speaker 1: or anywhere in between, what would be the best things
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Speaker 1: for parents to really connect with their kids.
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Speaker 2: The best thing for connection is absolutely scheduled time with
5:10
Speaker 2: your child doing an activity that's really fun. So when
5:14
Speaker 2: and the work that I do with kids who are
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Speaker 2: particularly naughty, one of the first things we do before
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Speaker 2: we even get to consequences is finding some really sort
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Speaker 2: of nice ways that we can work in some time
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Speaker 2: with Now I'm talking like ten minutes here, ten minutes
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Speaker 2: of sitting down and having a little play, going with
5:31
Speaker 2: what your child wants to do, whether that's playing lego,
5:33
Speaker 2: whether that's doing a quick picture. Just quick ten minutes
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Speaker 2: top up is often enough to save us from having
5:38
Speaker 2: a family battle when it comes to dinner time or
5:41
Speaker 2: around other family events.
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Speaker 1: I love what you've said there. I have a confession.
5:45
Speaker 1: Sometimes I'm distracted. Sometimes I have really important things to do,
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Speaker 1: and I forget that the most important things are my kids
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Speaker 1: and the things that they're interested in. Last night, my wife,
5:55
Speaker 1: Kylie was away. She wasn't able to be at home
5:57
Speaker 1: last night, and so I had the kids and look
6:00
Speaker 1: after dinner. I actually paid one of the kids to
6:01
Speaker 1: cook dinner because I had too much going on that
6:03
Speaker 1: while we were waiting for dinner, I finally had a
6:05
Speaker 1: break about fifteen minutes before it was to be served up.
6:07
Speaker 1: And what I really, what I really wanted to do,
6:11
Speaker 1: was lay down on the bed and zone out. I
6:13
Speaker 1: was happy to read a book, or listen to a podcast,
6:15
Speaker 1: or maybe watch a fraction of an episode of a
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Speaker 1: serious that I'm currently binging, sorry, trying to binge in
6:21
Speaker 1: fifteen minute increments. And my eleven year old daughter walked
6:25
Speaker 1: into the room and wanted to show me her dragon lair.
6:28
Speaker 1: She's collecting all of these three D printed dragons. I
6:32
Speaker 1: got to be honest, Jamie, I thought to myself, of
6:34
Speaker 1: all the things that I could engage in right now,
6:37
Speaker 1: checking out eleven year old's cardboard box dragon lair beside
6:42
Speaker 1: her bed in her bedroom is near the bottom of
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Speaker 1: the list, and because I'm a parenting expert, I pushed
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Speaker 1: all that down, got out of bed, or got off
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Speaker 1: the bed, and walked into the room with her, and
6:53
Speaker 1: I sat down on the carpet, and do you know what,
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Speaker 1: for that next ten minutes, as she described to me
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Speaker 1: how she's she's got the clothes hanging for the dragons.
7:01
Speaker 1: I didn't know the dragons walk clothes, incidentally, And she's
7:04
Speaker 1: got all of these different things that she's set up,
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Speaker 1: the creativity, the time, the effort, the hours she's put in.
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Speaker 1: It was actually, it was just delightful to see the
7:12
Speaker 1: joy that she was finding. When you say to invest
7:16
Speaker 1: that time, even if it's ten minutes, it makes it
7:20
Speaker 1: just makes a world of difference for them because they
7:22
Speaker 1: want us to be in their world.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely it does. I love that example so much because
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Speaker 2: you were able to find a place within yourself even
7:31
Speaker 2: though you're busy and stressed and you've had a huge day,
7:34
Speaker 2: to then reconnect with your daughter. But I also just
7:37
Speaker 2: want to highlight the fact that not everybody is able
7:39
Speaker 2: to do that, and that's okay, that's really okay. If
7:43
Speaker 2: you're not able to do that. There are times when
7:45
Speaker 2: I'm exhausted as well, and I know that even if
7:48
Speaker 2: I try to do it, I'm going to be snappy
7:50
Speaker 2: and I'm not going to be engaged, and that's not
7:52
Speaker 2: going to be a good use of anyone's time. So
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Speaker 2: I guess if you're looking for practical, implementable things, if
7:58
Speaker 2: my daughter comes up to do that and I'm in
8:00
Speaker 2: a space but I'm not able to do that, I
8:03
Speaker 2: will say, Wow, thank you so much for coming to
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Speaker 2: show me this. I'm so excited to see this, but
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Speaker 2: mummy needs ten minutes and then I'm going to come
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Speaker 2: and I want you to show me everything about this
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Speaker 2: dragon's lair, because then you're also modeling that it's okay
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Speaker 2: to have time to yourself and that there are times
8:20
Speaker 2: when you need a moment, And so you're modeling to
8:23
Speaker 2: kids how to manage emotions, how to set expectations, but
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Speaker 2: that that connection and that relationship is still very important
8:30
Speaker 2: to you. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: I just wanted to share that story so I could
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Speaker 1: virtue signal a little bit and show how awesome I.
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Speaker 2: Amazon's dad's well nailing it. That's right.
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Speaker 1: Let's get back to the serious conversation about mental health.
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Speaker 1: This concept of connecting belonging, feeling like you're mad at
8:43
Speaker 1: your parents, getting time and attention in spite of the business,
8:47
Speaker 1: the stress, the distraction, the screens, the school pressures, and
8:49
Speaker 1: so on. What are the long term mental health implications
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Speaker 1: when kids can't get that connection.
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Speaker 2: It's really tricky to monitor exactly what causes mental health
8:58
Speaker 2: problems and what makes them line. But we do know
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Speaker 2: that at least half of all child mental health problems
9:05
Speaker 2: emerge before twelve, and that they become life course persistent,
9:08
Speaker 2: which means that they.
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Speaker 1: When I hear that, yeah, that's right, like they keep
9:13
Speaker 1: for a long time, I'm cutting you off because because
9:15
Speaker 1: that mental health challenges sort of present or show up
9:20
Speaker 1: before the age of twelve and they become life long
9:22
Speaker 1: That's one of those statements that we hear a lot.
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Speaker 1: Can you really unpack that and describe precisely what we're
9:27
Speaker 1: supposed to take from that? What does it mean specifically?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I raised this also in just in terms of connection,
9:34
Speaker 2: because we need to be able to notice when things
9:36
Speaker 2: have gone off with our kids. So what does it
9:39
Speaker 2: mean specifically? It means that when we think about mental
9:44
Speaker 2: health problems, we think about difficulties in a specific area
9:48
Speaker 2: for kids, the things that I'm most interested in and
9:50
Speaker 2: worried about with kids' mental health. Are they making friends,
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Speaker 2: Are they feeling confident and happy to engage in school?
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Speaker 2: Are they following most the direction so that there's not
10:01
Speaker 2: lots of stress at home with parents as well. And
10:04
Speaker 2: if they're able to do that, that means that we
10:06
Speaker 2: know they can engage in school well, and they can learn,
10:09
Speaker 2: they can make new friends, and they can learn all
10:11
Speaker 2: the social things they need to do at different levels.
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Speaker 2: But if there are fears and worries that are getting
10:16
Speaker 2: in the way of making friends, of being at school,
10:19
Speaker 2: or learning with their peers, or listening to their parents
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Speaker 2: and following those instructions, then we know that they're not
10:26
Speaker 2: going to meet a lot of the needs that they
10:28
Speaker 2: need to meet and the milestones. If they don't meet
10:31
Speaker 2: those milestones, then it's a constant catching up process that
10:35
Speaker 2: starts and that happens. So what we and so that
10:38
Speaker 2: what that looks like is ow you have a child
10:40
Speaker 2: who might be in kindergarten and really struggles following directions
10:44
Speaker 2: with their teacher. They don't know how to share with
10:47
Speaker 2: their peers very well, so they don't have very many
10:50
Speaker 2: friends and their self confidence goes down and that has
10:55
Speaker 2: these big knock on effects, and so then as clinicians
11:00
Speaker 2: and as a psychologist, it's about getting in as early
11:04
Speaker 2: as we can so that those long term knock on
11:07
Speaker 2: effects don't keep building up and that kids then don't
11:10
Speaker 2: become disadvantaged in different ways.
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Speaker 1: Early intervention would also help to avoid the need for
11:16
Speaker 1: a diagnosis. Would that be a fair statement.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely so. When we're thinking about early intervention, I like
11:23
Speaker 2: to think about what is it that's currently getting in
11:26
Speaker 2: the way for kids. So is it that there's a
11:29
Speaker 2: big emotional meltdown that it's happening all the time that's
11:32
Speaker 2: stopping them from learning in school, In which case we
11:35
Speaker 2: might do some early intervention in emotion regulation skills, which
11:38
Speaker 2: can be done with parents and with teachers. If there's
11:41
Speaker 2: something to do with being friendly and social with others,
11:45
Speaker 2: we might help them to learn sharing skills and really
11:47
Speaker 2: model that, and we can do these things first before
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Speaker 2: things continue to escalate and become mental health disorders.
12:01
Speaker 1: Jamie, there's so much advice out there at the moment.
12:04
Speaker 1: Instagram and TikTok are just full of information that frankly,
12:09
Speaker 1: I think is freaking everyone out. Parents are more on edge,
12:12
Speaker 1: more nervous, more worried, more anxious about their children and
12:15
Speaker 1: their mental health than perhaps at any other time. To
12:18
Speaker 1: what extent is that impacting the current state of mental
12:23
Speaker 1: health or mental illness in children? And I guess, by extension,
12:28
Speaker 1: how much do you see parental anxiety about children having
12:32
Speaker 1: emotions and being anxious contributing to the fact that the
12:35
Speaker 1: children are having emotions and being anxious.
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Speaker 2: Oh, such an interesting question and interesting phenomenon. And as
12:42
Speaker 2: a parent of a two year old, I find myself,
12:45
Speaker 2: even though I'm an expert, questioning myself every day about
12:48
Speaker 2: the impact of things or if I'm doing things right.
12:51
Speaker 2: So it's a bit of a big question to answer.
12:53
Speaker 2: So I'll just start with the first thing that popped
12:54
Speaker 2: into my mind, which was around the advice and around
12:58
Speaker 2: the amount of content that currently exists from a parenting perspective.
13:03
Speaker 2: I know, even when my daughter was a baby, I
13:06
Speaker 2: felt like I was learning parenting from Instagram, and a
13:09
Speaker 2: lot of the stuff that I would get fed up
13:11
Speaker 2: would be conflicting information. I would hear something from one
13:15
Speaker 2: specialist something from a different specialist, And I feel like
13:18
Speaker 2: that's a really common experience before social media really took
13:22
Speaker 2: off just from different nurses and things when you're learning
13:25
Speaker 2: for breastfeed and all that kind of thing. Beau's not
13:27
Speaker 2: one way works perfectly for everybody. But in the current
13:30
Speaker 2: day and age, we get this messaging constantly about how
13:34
Speaker 2: to best parent your child, how to best protect them
13:36
Speaker 2: from anxiety, how to best protect from social media influences,
13:40
Speaker 2: and different different things that are coming up on those platforms,
13:44
Speaker 2: and it's really really difficult to actually know what to
13:46
Speaker 2: do and to question that. So if I could offer
13:51
Speaker 2: any practical advice about that, it's really about asking yourself
13:56
Speaker 2: what is happening for my child at the moment, and
13:59
Speaker 2: of the signs that things might not be going well,
14:02
Speaker 2: and taking it back to really basic principles. So in
14:05
Speaker 2: psychology we always speak about the three d's when we're
14:10
Speaker 2: thinking about needing to intervene with kids, and those are distress, dysfunction,
14:16
Speaker 2: and devians. So distress some behavior is worrying you or
14:22
Speaker 2: worrying your child, that's a perfect time to get help
14:26
Speaker 2: because that's one thing that's really important. Dysfunction, that's the
14:29
Speaker 2: things that I like to think about, is impacting learning
14:32
Speaker 2: or impacting a really happy life. So if you can't
14:35
Speaker 2: make friends. If you can't form those relationships, that's having
14:38
Speaker 2: a bit of dysfunction, So that's probably worth looking at.
14:41
Speaker 2: And then debans is the last one, which sounds a
14:44
Speaker 2: little bit scary when you say, like like that, But
14:48
Speaker 2: what devians refers to is really, is my child within
14:51
Speaker 2: the realms of what's considered normal at this age and
14:53
Speaker 2: are they sort of meeting those milestones that would be
14:55
Speaker 2: expected of them, And if they're not, again, that's probably
14:58
Speaker 2: another tick that you know that it's time to seek
15:01
Speaker 2: out a little bit of extra support.
15:02
Speaker 1: Devins does sound a little alarming. I tend to use
15:05
Speaker 1: the word deviation instead. Deviation just softens it that little
15:08
Speaker 1: bit for a parent who's already so anxious. But I
15:12
Speaker 1: think that's going to be so valuable and so useful
15:14
Speaker 1: for parents who are listening. Let's extend that then and
15:18
Speaker 1: highlight how do you know that you're accessing support that's
15:24
Speaker 1: evidence based, Because I mean, the reality is that there
15:29
Speaker 1: are really well credentialed, really well intentioned, really smart experts.
15:34
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about and I don't say this in
15:37
Speaker 1: a disparaging way. It's just the easiest descriptor instamums or
15:41
Speaker 1: TikTok influencers, well intentioned and often sharing really great information.
15:45
Speaker 1: As somebody with a doctorate in psychology myself, sometimes I
15:48
Speaker 1: look at these social media people and go, Dan, that's good.
15:51
Speaker 1: I'm stealing that, Like the evidence is right there for it.
15:53
Speaker 1: That's brilliant. I think it's amazing. And other times they
15:56
Speaker 1: say such rubbish. But I want to I want to
15:59
Speaker 1: ignore that for a minute. I want to talk about
16:01
Speaker 1: There's me, and I'm saying, well, let me pick one
16:04
Speaker 1: that you know, Professor Mark Dads. You work with Mark,
16:09
Speaker 1: and you obviously know me and the work that I do.
16:11
Speaker 1: And he and I disagree profoundly on one particular thing,
16:15
Speaker 1: which is the use of time out. I mean, he's
16:18
Speaker 1: all for it because he's from the Triple P Matthew
16:21
Speaker 1: Sanders University of Queensland School, and I'm from a self
16:25
Speaker 1: determination theory perspective, which says, we want to minimize controlling techniques,
16:28
Speaker 1: and there are much better ways that we can do
16:30
Speaker 1: this without crippling relationships or without making kids experience these
16:34
Speaker 1: punitive outcomes. We can actually do it better. So Mark
16:38
Speaker 1: is highly credible. He's a really smart guy. He's done,
16:42
Speaker 1: he's made an enormous contribution with the world in his
16:44
Speaker 1: parenting research, as has someone like Matt Sanders. And yet
16:48
Speaker 1: somebody like me who's relying on incredible experts who have
16:51
Speaker 1: written books like voluminousts the most published scientific research is
16:58
Speaker 1: on the planet. Their research is deep and meaningful and
17:02
Speaker 1: useful as well. So when a parent comes across someone
17:05
Speaker 1: like me saying don't use time out and then the
17:08
Speaker 1: next thing in their algorithm serves up Mark or Matt
17:11
Speaker 1: or somebody like that saying no, no, no, timeout is really
17:13
Speaker 1: really valuable and you need it, what are they supposed
17:16
Speaker 1: to do? Because both of us are coming from an
17:18
Speaker 1: evidence based situation. How do you guide parents in that situation?
17:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, so this is one that comes up all the time,
17:29
Speaker 2: As I imagine you would know when you've got a
17:33
Speaker 2: child who's behaving poorly and you want to help them
17:36
Speaker 2: to learn the new skill to behave, Well, how do
17:39
Speaker 2: we do that best? And how do we figure out
17:43
Speaker 2: the evidence behind what's going to work? So you did
17:46
Speaker 2: a beautiful job that I'm explaining that there is a
17:48
Speaker 2: huge amount of evidence behind time out and behind time
17:51
Speaker 2: out not being harmful and being really helpful at times.
17:54
Speaker 2: But what I like to think of it too, as
17:57
Speaker 2: I love metaphors when I'm working with families in particular,
18:01
Speaker 2: is that you can have a child who have you
18:03
Speaker 2: had the dandelion orchard metaphor before I have?
18:06
Speaker 1: But please share it.
18:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the or good metaphor is that you've got
18:10
Speaker 2: different types of kids, and you can think of kids
18:12
Speaker 2: as different types of flowers. The dandelion flower or a
18:17
Speaker 2: child is the sort of child who'll grow anywhere. They're
18:20
Speaker 2: really resilient, they're robust, they need really minimal conditions to
18:25
Speaker 2: grow into a healthy, functioning human being who's pretty happy.
18:28
Speaker 2: Then we get these children sometimes who refer to as orchids,
18:32
Speaker 2: and they're very sensitive to environment, and they need very
18:36
Speaker 2: particular parenting input and very particular environments to grow. And
18:40
Speaker 2: when they grow, my goodness, they are spectacular. And I
18:44
Speaker 2: like to think about the parenting choices we make about
18:47
Speaker 2: discipline and learning skills and all those things as really
18:53
Speaker 2: individual to families and really individual to kids. What will
18:57
Speaker 2: work well for one kid might not necessarily work well
19:00
Speaker 2: for the other kid, even if both things are evidence based.
19:03
Speaker 2: So what we need to do when considering which treatment
19:06
Speaker 2: to go with or which fills to implement if you're
19:10
Speaker 2: thinking about advice that you receive on Instagram or TikTok,
19:13
Speaker 2: it's one, are there studies behind this that show that
19:16
Speaker 2: it works and that it doesn't do harm. Two, what
19:19
Speaker 2: I think is really important are there clear guidelines and
19:22
Speaker 2: how to actually do it? Because a lot of the
19:24
Speaker 2: time instrums will tell a nice thing and you go,
19:28
Speaker 2: that sounds cool, but I don't actually know how to
19:29
Speaker 2: do that. Then, so you want to see the actual
19:31
Speaker 2: steps involved so you don't screw it up to put
19:34
Speaker 2: it really bluntly. And then lastly you're going to go
19:37
Speaker 2: is this right for me? And is this the right
19:39
Speaker 2: fit for my child? So, as you've mentioned, I work
19:42
Speaker 2: with Mark Dads who is very big on time out,
19:45
Speaker 2: and it does work very well for a lot of kids,
19:48
Speaker 2: but it doesn't work very well for all kids. And
19:51
Speaker 2: so even when I'm working in the clinic, it's very
19:53
Speaker 2: much a conversation about what are your needs, what can
19:57
Speaker 2: we do to meet those needs, and what's going to
20:00
Speaker 2: work for your family? And if you're assessing evidence based care,
20:03
Speaker 2: our evidence based skills, it's that lens of has there
20:07
Speaker 2: been worked onne to show this is true? How do
20:09
Speaker 2: I do it? And does this fit my philosophy and
20:12
Speaker 2: does it fit how my child is Jamie?
20:15
Speaker 1: Parenting is complex, and it also highlights, I think the
20:18
Speaker 1: challenge that we have with psychology. Generally, we know what
20:21
Speaker 1: works well on average, but very few people are actually average.
20:24
Speaker 1: If anybody right, we're all, we're all that a little
20:26
Speaker 1: bit different. Let's bring it back to a mental health
20:30
Speaker 1: discussion again, because that's really the central area that we
20:33
Speaker 1: need to focus on for our conversation. So far, you've
20:37
Speaker 1: highlighted that if we see a child who is distressed, dysfunctional,
20:41
Speaker 1: or deviating from what we see happening on average for
20:44
Speaker 1: their age group, for their developmental stage, we should start
20:48
Speaker 1: to say, Okay, there is cause for some concern here.
20:52
Speaker 1: I have a couple of tricky questions to follow that up.
20:56
Speaker 1: First off, how do they get help? And secondly, what
21:01
Speaker 1: do they do when help is really hard to find
21:05
Speaker 1: because of the current challenges in our medical and psychological system.
21:10
Speaker 1: If they're dealing with really big challenges that need help
21:15
Speaker 1: sooner than the appointments will allow.
21:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's one of those impossible problems that we're trying
21:21
Speaker 2: really hard to fix. At the moment. You raise several issues.
21:24
Speaker 2: So the first one through the around barriers to getting
21:27
Speaker 2: access to care. So in order to get children the
21:30
Speaker 2: care that they need, you need parents to recognize that
21:32
Speaker 2: there are issues that are going on that need more support,
21:36
Speaker 2: and then you need for them to be able to
21:37
Speaker 2: know where to go to actually access that support. And
21:40
Speaker 2: then you need to have the money usually to see
21:43
Speaker 2: a specialist or to see a psychologist, and you need
21:45
Speaker 2: to have that reduced waging time to get in. So
21:48
Speaker 2: it's a really tricky context at the moment, especially with
21:51
Speaker 2: parental anxiety really high at the moment about looking after
21:53
Speaker 2: their kids the best they can. There's a lot of
21:56
Speaker 2: people trying to access services and there are really long
21:58
Speaker 2: wait lists at the moment. So what we're really trying
22:01
Speaker 2: to do at the moment is find ways that we
22:03
Speaker 2: can help families to recognize when there are signs that
22:07
Speaker 2: things aren't going quite right, and then to give them
22:10
Speaker 2: some guidance on typical milestones like when the kids are
22:13
Speaker 2: meeting them are not and also how their children are
22:15
Speaker 2: going on a range of different areas in terms of wellbeing.
22:20
Speaker 2: And then we're providing links to services that are available
22:25
Speaker 2: online and that are free, so these things might be
22:28
Speaker 2: self directed programs that they can do themselves, which can
22:32
Speaker 2: be a bit of a holdover until getting in to
22:34
Speaker 2: see somebody face to face. And our hope is that
22:37
Speaker 2: a lot of the time that doing these free, instantly
22:40
Speaker 2: accessible programs is actually going to decrease the amount of
22:44
Speaker 2: need that is put on the mental health service and system,
22:48
Speaker 2: so that those kids who do need to get that
22:50
Speaker 2: support really fast can get it. Yeah.
22:53
Speaker 1: So now I'm on the edge of my seat because
22:54
Speaker 1: I'm thinking myself, I don't want to wait two years
22:56
Speaker 1: to get a diagnosis sort of find out what's really
22:58
Speaker 1: going on, but some people or literally waiting one to
23:01
Speaker 1: even two and a half years was one that I
23:03
Speaker 1: heard the other day from somebody who just had to
23:05
Speaker 1: get some help. You're suggesting that you're working on some
23:07
Speaker 1: things to potentially provide the early intervention which may, if
23:12
Speaker 1: not alleviate the problem entirely, at least reduce the challenges
23:16
Speaker 1: that parents are facing. Can you tell me a bit
23:18
Speaker 1: about that. What are you doing specifically to alleviate the concern,
23:22
Speaker 1: the anxiety, the stress that parents are facing when it
23:24
Speaker 1: comes to the they're worries about their kids and their
23:26
Speaker 1: mental health challenges.
23:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, at the moment, we've developed a talk called
23:31
Speaker 2: the Growing Minds check In, and the Growing Minds check
23:33
Speaker 2: In is a website that you can log onto. It's
23:37
Speaker 2: for parents of children zero to seventeen years of age,
23:40
Speaker 2: so a very broad range of age groups for parents,
23:44
Speaker 2: and it takes on average six minutes to do. And
23:46
Speaker 2: this check in what it does is we combine subjective concerns,
23:51
Speaker 2: so just general issues that parents have, and we have
23:54
Speaker 2: what we call an objective measure. And an objective measure
23:57
Speaker 2: is a population based score that can tell you how
24:02
Speaker 2: your child is functioning overall in terms of mental health
24:05
Speaker 2: and wellbeing and also in terms of anxiety, conduct issues,
24:10
Speaker 2: and attention. And that compares your child's score to other
24:13
Speaker 2: kids their age, so you can get a bit of
24:16
Speaker 2: an idea whether what areas they might be struggling in
24:20
Speaker 2: and then we give recommended resources based on those outcomes
24:25
Speaker 2: for what's available online at the moment. So the goal
24:27
Speaker 2: is to really upskill parents that you know what's happening
24:30
Speaker 2: with their child a little bit more, but they also
24:32
Speaker 2: know where they can go to online to get that
24:35
Speaker 2: really early intervention.
24:37
Speaker 1: I love it. I'm going to summarize that because there
24:39
Speaker 1: were several things that you said that I think are
24:41
Speaker 1: really important in case somebody was listening while they're dealing
24:44
Speaker 1: with a child or I don't know, doing other stuff.
24:48
Speaker 1: Six minutes, you do this questionnaire based on what your
24:52
Speaker 1: experience is, and then your results are compared with population
24:56
Speaker 1: level data so that you can see whether your child
24:58
Speaker 1: is or is not deviating, or the levels of distress
25:01
Speaker 1: or whatever. A different it's for anyone with kids between
25:04
Speaker 1: zero and seventeen. So we're talking about if you're a
25:08
Speaker 1: parent and you're worried about your child, there's information here
25:12
Speaker 1: that's going to be useful. And once the information has
25:16
Speaker 1: been collected through the questionnaire, your system provides directions for
25:22
Speaker 1: where to go for the appropriate level of help and
25:25
Speaker 1: how to get that.
25:26
Speaker 2: That's exactly right. And the other thing that we do,
25:29
Speaker 2: which I think is really fantastic, is we give the
25:31
Speaker 2: feedback summary reform. And this feedback summary reform can be
25:35
Speaker 2: used to take to your GP, it can be used
25:37
Speaker 2: to take to other psychologists or pediatricians, and it gives
25:40
Speaker 2: a snapshot of how things were at that moment. And
25:43
Speaker 2: in the study that we're currently running, where it's a
25:45
Speaker 2: study because what we're trying to do is get as
25:48
Speaker 2: input as we possibly can before we just put the
25:53
Speaker 2: tool out into the world and we're partnered with Raising
25:55
Speaker 2: Children's Network to put this tool out nationally into the
25:59
Speaker 2: world once it's done. So we're really really seeking parents
26:03
Speaker 2: to help us to test this at the moment and
26:05
Speaker 2: to give us feedback on what works and how we
26:07
Speaker 2: can make it better, because this tool is really for parents,
26:10
Speaker 2: and it's to encourage people to think about wellbeing and
26:13
Speaker 2: what we can do every day to look after our kids.
26:16
Speaker 1: I'm hearing you say it, and part of me is thinking,
26:18
Speaker 1: why is it only just happening in twenty twenty five,
26:21
Speaker 1: Like this seems like it's so obvious that somebody should
26:23
Speaker 1: have done this already. All right, So if parents want
26:25
Speaker 1: to check up on their kids and I want to
26:27
Speaker 1: be able to access this six minute questionnaire and obviously
26:31
Speaker 1: it sounds like this is for science, so it will
26:32
Speaker 1: support the work that you're doing as well. Where do
26:35
Speaker 1: they go and how do they do this? How do
26:37
Speaker 1: they find out how their kids are going?
26:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you can sign up to be part of
26:41
Speaker 2: the study, which is the Growing Minds check In Study
26:43
Speaker 2: and the website all one word Growing Minds check In
26:50
Speaker 2: AU and I'll spell it out to it's g rwng
26:57
Speaker 2: MNDS ch e ck I N dot AU.
27:05
Speaker 1: So growing minds check in dot au. We'll link to
27:09
Speaker 1: that in the show notes six minute questionnaire, and then
27:13
Speaker 1: a comparison of your child against what's going on for
27:16
Speaker 1: the rest of the population and.
27:18
Speaker 2: Links to available resources that are online and freely available.
27:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, probably should have mentioned that as well.
27:24
Speaker 2: That was my fault.
27:25
Speaker 1: That's really important for anyone who wants help, Jamie. I
27:29
Speaker 1: think this has been a really important conversation. I reckon
27:31
Speaker 1: so many parents will have taken so much from it.
27:34
Speaker 1: Is there anything that you would like to share that
27:37
Speaker 1: we haven't discussed just in the last sort of twenty
27:41
Speaker 1: five thirty minutes or so.
27:42
Speaker 2: I just really want to reiterate how difficult it is
27:45
Speaker 2: to parent kids at the moment, and how many stresses
27:48
Speaker 2: there are out there and competing ideas and demands, and
27:51
Speaker 2: how hard it is to know what the right thing
27:53
Speaker 2: to do is. But that if you can really go
27:56
Speaker 2: back down to basics and think about those three d is,
28:00
Speaker 2: think about how your child is, what you're doing to
28:02
Speaker 2: support that relationship with that special time every now and
28:06
Speaker 2: then that nine times out of ten, you'll be doing
28:09
Speaker 2: a fantastic job and that your gut will tell you
28:12
Speaker 2: when it's time to do the next thing. But there's
28:15
Speaker 2: always extra things that we can be doing to support
28:17
Speaker 2: our kids, just like there's always extra things we can
28:19
Speaker 2: be doing to be better in all different areas of
28:21
Speaker 2: our life, and so sometimes do it can be good
28:23
Speaker 2: to use something like the check in just to check
28:26
Speaker 2: if there is anything extra that you can be doing,
28:28
Speaker 2: Or if you have no worries about your kids and
28:30
Speaker 2: you just want a bit of a baseline touchstone, then
28:33
Speaker 2: that's great too. That's the great use of the check.
28:35
Speaker 1: In directly making it too hard on ourselves. Do you
28:38
Speaker 1: think we're thinking about it too much?
28:40
Speaker 2: Oh? It's hard, isn't it? Because we're in an age
28:43
Speaker 2: where we know more than ever before what works.
28:47
Speaker 1: And I'm not convinced that's helping us, right, I know that's.
28:50
Speaker 2: The thing, isn't it? And so like, how do you
28:52
Speaker 2: actually use that? It's impossible to know sometimes, but I
28:56
Speaker 2: do think if we can try to simplify what we
28:58
Speaker 2: get into some sort of filter and go, how am
29:01
Speaker 2: I showing my child I love them? How am I
29:04
Speaker 2: enjoying being in this relationship? And that's your basis, because
29:08
Speaker 2: then when things slightly go off, you can go ooof,
29:11
Speaker 2: something's not quite sitting right there, and then that's when
29:14
Speaker 2: you can go into the next step of going what
29:16
Speaker 2: do we know about this issue? How can I approach
29:18
Speaker 2: this in a way that I know is going to work.
29:20
Speaker 2: Let's be shown to be effective and will be effective
29:23
Speaker 2: for my particular kid.
29:26
Speaker 1: Really enjoyed the conversation, so great for your time. Thanks Jamie,
29:29
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for having me. Doctor Jamie Northam is
29:32
Speaker 1: a clinical psychologist and lecturer at the University of Sydney.
29:35
Speaker 1: We will link to doctor Northam's profile in the show notes,
29:38
Speaker 1: as well as everything that you need to know about
29:41
Speaker 1: the check in so that you can find out how
29:43
Speaker 1: your kiddo is going. The Happy Families podcast is produced
29:47
Speaker 1: by Justin Rouland from Bridge Media. More information and resources
29:51
Speaker 1: to make your family happier can be found at happy
29:54
Speaker 1: families dot com dot a u