Relocating Tips: Help Your Kids Cope With A Move

Helpful relocating tips for families and how to transition your child to their new home

Little humans feel big emotions when it comes to change. Moving to a new home can cause excitement and anxiety. Relocating is chaotic and stressful so we have compiled some helpful relocating tips for families coping with the moving process.

Moving Tips for Families

Announcing the move 

Be prepared for your children to react with sadness or anger. Listen, acknowledge, and don’t try to talk your child out of her feelings, even as you reassure him. 

Get plenty of sleep

Getting enough sleep is the #1 rule for dealing with stress. You can’t be patient with your child if you’re exhausted. Since moving is very stressful for everyone, know that your child will require more patience from you. The calmer you are, the less anxious your child may be.

Know what to expect

Visit your new place before the move if you can. Go to the house, show them their new room, where they will play, to see their new school, etc. Show them that their new place is safe and how fun it will be.

Read a moving book

Kids can sometimes relate to the stories they read. They’ll identify with the characters, their struggle, and how they overcame it. You can explain that the character is feeling the same way your child does and how everything turned out just fine.

Honor their grief

It’s okay for kids to express their sadness about saying goodbye to everything they’ve known. In fact, it’s healthy and will make their adjustment easier in their new place. Allow them to say goodbye to friends, neighbors, and their favorite spots in town. Once the house is empty, walk through it together saying goodbye to each room.

Give your child some control

Let your child participate in any decisions that you can, such as what color to paint her room or where to put the furniture or toys. With older kids, give them a budget and let them do a little decorating in their room.

This may seem like the perfect time to get rid of some of that clutter, but forcing your child to give things away may just compound his sense of loss. Instead, offer the opportunity by giving them a box for stuff to give away that you don’t need anymore but don’t force it. To keep the peace, you may need to pack the stuff you want to get rid of, move it, and declutter after your child settles in.

Keep your child’s schedule the same, as much as possible

The more predictability, the more quickly your child will adjust. Don’t add more changes. Keep them comfortable with the familiar. You can incorporate changes after they adjust.

Moving Forward

Asking children to leave behind the only life they’ve known is asking a lot of them. But children do recover and set down new roots in their new community eventually. As long as you stay calm and make the moving process as fun as possible, your child will adapt more easily.

By Leslie Radford