Page 49 - Petelin, Ana, et al. Eds. 2019. Zdravje otrok in mladostnikov / Health of Children and Adolescents. Zbornik povzetkov z recenzijo / Book of Abstracts. Koper: Založba Univerze na Primorskem/University of Primorska Press
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ents' role in emotional confrontation with a child's chronic psihosocialno zdravje v otroštvu in v mladosti | psychosocial health in childhood and youth
illness
Tanja Pate
University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Theology, Poljanska cesta 4, 1000 Ljubljana,
Slovenia
Introduction: Parents play an important role in the life of a child with a chronic
illness. They represent a source of support, reconciliation, and confirmation to
the child, and play a particularly important role in illness management, as well
as providing a better quality of life.
Methods: The experience of parents of children with type 1 diabetes (T1D)
will be presented. The study involved 7 parents of children with T1D aged 4 to
9 years. The duration of T1D was from 1 to 3 years. The data were collected
durning the Parent Support Group sessions and analyzed with a thematic anal-
ysis.
Results: The main theme was "adaptation", subtthemes were emotional expe-
rience, experience of T1D, experience of child, ambivalence in parenting and
environmental responses. Living with T1D represents a constantly changing ad-
justment process. T1D affects all areas of life and requires adaptation in paren-
tal functioning, particularly adaptation to a new way of living both inside and
outside the family.
Discussion and conclusions: The way in which the child and consequently the
entire family face this experience does not depend solely on the parental way
of dealing with the disease, but mostly on parental ability of emotion regula-
tion. The results of the research show the importance of parental role, which
is often trapped by the requirements of the disease as well as the developmen-
tal requirements of the child, the family and the environment.
Keywords: parents, type 1 diabetes, emotions, change, coping
47
illness
Tanja Pate
University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Theology, Poljanska cesta 4, 1000 Ljubljana,
Slovenia
Introduction: Parents play an important role in the life of a child with a chronic
illness. They represent a source of support, reconciliation, and confirmation to
the child, and play a particularly important role in illness management, as well
as providing a better quality of life.
Methods: The experience of parents of children with type 1 diabetes (T1D)
will be presented. The study involved 7 parents of children with T1D aged 4 to
9 years. The duration of T1D was from 1 to 3 years. The data were collected
durning the Parent Support Group sessions and analyzed with a thematic anal-
ysis.
Results: The main theme was "adaptation", subtthemes were emotional expe-
rience, experience of T1D, experience of child, ambivalence in parenting and
environmental responses. Living with T1D represents a constantly changing ad-
justment process. T1D affects all areas of life and requires adaptation in paren-
tal functioning, particularly adaptation to a new way of living both inside and
outside the family.
Discussion and conclusions: The way in which the child and consequently the
entire family face this experience does not depend solely on the parental way
of dealing with the disease, but mostly on parental ability of emotion regula-
tion. The results of the research show the importance of parental role, which
is often trapped by the requirements of the disease as well as the developmen-
tal requirements of the child, the family and the environment.
Keywords: parents, type 1 diabetes, emotions, change, coping
47
