🦁 Lenny’s Letter - Why recovery isn’t linear - and what to do when it doubles back

Hello kind grown-up,

One of the most confusing things about supporting a child through a difficult experience is what happens in the days and weeks after the initial event.

The first day or two, the feelings are usually clear and present and relatively easy to respond to. The child is visibly upset, or embarrassed, or sad - and we know what to do. We sit with them. We listen. We offer comfort.

But then they seem better. They go back to school. They seem fine for a few days. And we quietly exhale.

And then, almost without warning, it comes back.

Not as intensely, perhaps. Not in the same form. Still it’s there - a flatness, a heaviness, a quiet withdrawal that seems disproportionate to what’s happening on the surface.

This is not a setback.

This is how emotional recovery actually works.

Feelings, particularly feelings of embarrassment, shame, disappointment, or failure, don’t process in a single pass. They tend to come in waves - receding when other things occupy the foreground of attention, returning when those distractions fall away, in quiet moments, at the start of the week, in the small hours of the morning.

This wave pattern can be confusing for children, who often conclude that the return of a feeling means they haven’t recovered, or aren’t recovering quickly enough, or that something is wrong with them.

It can also be confusing for parents and carers, who thought the hard part was over.

What helps when recovery doubles back:

Name the wave without alarm.
“Sometimes feelings come back for a little while after we think we’re past them. That doesn’t mean you’re back at the beginning - it means the feeling is still settling.”

Resist the urge to rush past the return.
The instinct, when a child seems worse again after seeming better, is often to redouble efforts at cheering up, fixing, or distracting. This can inadvertently communicate that the return of the feeling is a problem. Sitting with it calmly is almost always more helpful.

Challenge the internal timeline.
Many children - and adults - have absorbed an implicit belief that there is a correct amount of time to feel bad about something, and that exceeding it reflects badly on them. Gently naming this: “whoever decided you should be over this by now?” can be quietly liberating.

Watch for patterns, not individual days.
The question worth asking is not “are they okay today?” it’s “are they generally moving, over time, in a direction of feeling better?” Individual hard days are not evidence of stagnation. A sustained absence of any movement over several weeks may be worth paying closer attention to.

Model your own non-linear recovery.
When you have a hard day following a period of feeling better, say so. “I thought I was past feeling worried about that, and then it came back today. That’s okay - it usually settles again.” Children learn enormously from watching adults navigate the wave.

Recovery takes as long as it takes.

And the time it takes is not a reflection of character, resilience, or effort.

It’s simply the time it takes.

With warmth,
Lenny 🦁

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