Click here for updates on this story
Nashville, TN (WSMV) — With Thanksgiving three weeks away, doctors say parents should prepare their children to see some differences this holiday season.
Turkey and dressing around the table will likely be among smaller groups of family and friends.
“Our typical thing we love to do… Eating… Drinking… Hugging… Kissing…Getting together with our grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousin are going to be much harder this year,” Dr. Edwin Williamson, who is a child and adolescent psychiatrist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said.
Williamson said it’s important you start to have a conversation with your children about the differences this holiday season, sooner rather than later.
“To anticipate the changes often takes a little bit of the steam out of the anxiety of what’s going to happen,” Williamson said. “Let them know that of course you’re going to have holiday traditions but they’re going to be different.”
Williamson said there is a plan in place for loved ones this holiday season and you inform your kids.
“Are you going to have a zoom presents opening at the holidays? Are you going to have a zoom thanksgiving? How you going to have an outdoor picnic,” Williamson said.
Williamson said remind the children, they are not alone in this year of uncertainty and challenges.
“I think there is relief when a lot of kids hear this is a nationwide and actually a global thing,” Williamson said. “That everyone is going through this.”
Other health experts advise parents not to punish their child about having a negative outlook to the new changes. Instead, health experts say tell them it’s OK to feel sad or disappointed.
Parents are advised to ask kids about their ideas about how to make the holidays special.
Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.
Regulators authorized AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine for use in adults throughout the European Union on Friday, amid criticism the bloc is not moving fast enough to vaccinate its population.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A former FBI lawyer was sentenced to probation for altering an email that the Justice Department relied on during its surveillance of an aide to President Donald Trump during the Russia investigation.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Democratic Gov. Tony Evers lashed out Friday at rival Republicans who tried to repeal his statewide mask mandate, saying killing the order would be a ridiculous move comparable to abolishing speed limits.
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — As some conservatives in South Carolina celebrated getting a bill that would ban almost all abortions in the state past a legislative barrier and likely becoming law, they said they are not finished trying to end all abortions.
A Moscow court on Friday put the brother and several allies of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny under house arrest for two months as authorities sought to stymie more protests over the jailing of the top Kremlin foe.