Self-Care Tips: Practicing Reinforcement

There is no doubt that having children with special needs is a full-time job in itself. The hours are long, and sometimes it can feel as though your work isn’t appreciated. That’s why it’s so important to develop some self-care strategies to help recharge after all the work we do as parents!

One of the ways that you can do that is to reinforce yourself in the same way that you reinforce your children for positive behavior. Most of us already do something like this: “After I finish cleaning the living room, I’m going to have a cookie.” That’s reinforcement, even if we don’t think of it that way. Reinforcing yourself with intention is a great way to practice self-care, and if you have a specific goal tied to a specific reward, you’re less likely to skip it and wind up feeling burned out.

The first step is to conduct a preference assessment. Now, with our children, this takes the form of a long questionnaire, repeatedly offering different items, and then ranking how interested the child is in each item. As a parent, you can just make a list. Take a break and jot down a couple of things you enjoy, hobbies you wish you had time for, books you want to read, or maybe even a date night. Then rank them by how easy they would be for you to do. For example, some things might only take a few minutes, while others might involve an entire day.

Look back through your list. Are some of the things more important or meaningful than others? Do you feel like some things would make a bigger difference in your overall wellbeing? Go ahead and mark those with a star… those will be our priority reinforcers.

Now, for every skill or target your child masters, make sure to reinforce yourself as well as reinforcing them! After all, you and your child have both worked hard to achieve that goal, master that target, reduce that problem behavior, etc. For example, say you’re working with your child to say their ABCs. If it’s a fairly short-term goal, you can decide what your reinforcement will be after they have fully mastered saying them from beginning to end. If you know it’s going to take longer, you might decide that reinforcement for both of you will occur after they master saying them up through the letter M.

Reinforcement works best, both for ourselves and for our children, when we know in advance what the reward will be for all of our hard work. So before you start tackling a goal, look through your list and figure out what will be a motivating reinforcer for this particular task. Then, if things get difficult, you know exactly what you’re working toward and why you should keep going!

Self-care is incredibly important if we want to avoid burnout and feelings of frustration. The more we take care of ourselves as parents, the more energy and motivation we will have to care for our children.

Elizabeth Gudiel, M.A., BCBA
Clinical Director, Salt Lake City