When I saw this book on my read list I didn't know what to expect. Nevertheless, is a book I felt was worth reading to let parents know more about it. This book is a guide for parents to help them support their child's mental health. That is the goal of this book anyway and I wanted to see how it did in this department. This book strives to help and is geared toward children from 3 to 10 (those older children can benefit). The main mental health challenges of that age group are discussed as well as anxiety and depression. Youth go through more than we know from a stressful home life to dealing with friendship situations along with what is happening in society and dealing with changes in their routines.

This book is not only something for parents but is interesting and perhaps helpful for those who work with youth as well. Teachers, for example, educate youth but work with the entire person. Understanding they are stressed at home or are anxious about making friends can help a child feel more comfortable overall in the classroom too. When issues are not handled or understood early on then it can continue on into teenage years and adulthood. When youth don't learn how to handle their emotions, for example, they won't understand how to respond to things in a healthy way throughout their life. This is true in their everyday life as well as at school.

The author is a bestseller and has experience in the subject. She works to help youth in challenging situations including dealing with feeling overwhelmed and uncomfortable as well as finding ways to "replace toxic thoughts". Her book is designed to help with these and other things. She designed her book through research and case studies. There are not many photos or illustrations, but that is not the point of this book. Her goal is to teach and educate in a practical guide. This is a guide that is well explained, but it does become overwhelming and technical at times with all the information. Nevertheless, many will find it helpful as it is full of interesting and helpful information.

In How to Help Your Child Clean Up Their Mental Mess, Dr. Caroline Leaf has written a brand new book to help parents in guiding their children in their thoughts. She begins the book by explaining how our children are facing a mental health crisis. We are witnessing an increase in depression, suicide, anxiety, and much more. Bullying is a new thing our children are having to encounter and now it occurs even online. In the book, she teaches readers how to help our children in mind management and tools that will help them. She explained for example how anxiety is from an actual thought pattern and the more they ponder on it and think about it the worst side affects it can have. They could experience physical symptoms. She explained how they could be fearful about going to school cause of a bad experience and it all occurs from a root in the brain. She compares the mind to a tree and included helpful illustrations to assist readers in understanding the mind. She explored how the mind works and what the neurocyle is. It is divided up into 5 steps and it will guide readers into helping their child to reflect and actively change their thoughts. She encouraged readers to spend 7-15 minutes a day for 63 days to establish new habits and repair past traumas. She enclosed a helpful Brain-ee cartoon character and helps children to understand the material in every day terms.



I would recommend this life changing book to every parent and this book will teach parents how to help their children to change their thoughts and to clean up their mental health. This book is very impactful and I love the way in Dr. Caroline Leaf breaks down neuroplasticity and the brain into terms that every day people can understand. This book is even more gears to making it simpler for children to grasp their thought progress and emotions. I liked how she covered the different age groups and help to our children at every stage of their lives. I immensely liked how she walked readers through key examples and illustrations to help children through the neurocyle process. This will help us to pay attention to their emotions and behaviors. She carefully walked through questions to ask to reflect on to actively reach towards a child’s particular issue. I liked how she did a beneficial table to use a tool to go even deeper into the steps to help our children. I loved how she also included personal stories from parents to walk parents through the steps in every day examples. I liked how she discussed boundaries and how critical it is for parents to explain the why behind it. There are tons of helpful information for parents to use and this book is meant to be reread again and again.

Thanks Netgalley for allowing me to read this book! The title and this beautiful cover drew me in and i was excited to read this book! I will be recommending this book to others for readers advisory.

A practical and well explained guide to helping kids work through hard and messy stuff. I will probably get a hard copy, as the ebook is a bit challenging to use to flip back and forth and find things.
I was disappointed, because after having read Switch On Your Brain by the same author, I was expecting more comparable Christian /faith connections and simple ways to explain the way this science confirms the Bible. I did not find that.

I received a copy of the book from @netgalley and chose to review it here. All thoughts are my own.

This was very informative, well organized, and a little more medical than I was expecting. I did find the information interesting but it was a little above me.

This book had a lot of technical information in it about how the brain works, which definitely made it easier for me to explain how feelings are connected to physical experiences to my son. He has been experiencing a lot of anxiety since the pandemic began, and I think this book will be a great tool in helping him to work through some of his triggers and to understand why his body reacts the way it does to certain emotions and thoughts.

I received a complimentary copy and this review is entirely my own.
How to help your child clean up their mental mess was a must read for any parent.
It is filled with all kinds of information to help you as you navigate your child though messes.
I will be going back to it as a valuable resource as my child grows and matures.

"How to Help Your Child Clean Up Their Mental Mess" is a complete guide for parents on what might be going through your child's mind and how best to respond.

Using Dr Leaf's prompts and systems to facilitate conversations about mental health and reroute their responses the reader can both get ahead of and respond to a child's mental health issues.

While interesting the book is wholly reliant on implementing the system given. I was hoping for more general information, rather than a workbook but parents with children of all ages would find this to be an informative read.

I received this as an ARC from net galley. So thank you to them and publisher for giving me an opportunity to review in exchange.

I thought this book was good. It contained a lot of information and I think it will be a hit with other parents and other caregivers. With the new age of parenting coming up and tapping into gentle parenting and asking our children how they feel, I think this book is a valuable tool in how to navigate it.

I thought it would be clearer laid out wise as I found it a bit too wordy but maybe the actual book is different compared to the Kindle version.

All in all a good book and can't wait to put some of it into practice

Modern day society has a lot to say for the mental health of our children and it can be really hard to know how to help them sort through all their thoughts and feelings. But Dr Caroline Leaf tries, and using analogies like building a tree in your mind she helps provide strategies for parents to help their children work their way through things. There are lots of useful hints in this book, which I know many will find helpful depending on their children.

Found this to be really helpful. I have an 8 year old who is suffering with anxiety so there loads of handy tips that we are going to try and use from this book.
I like how it has bits for the adults and actions for the kids.

I received ARC from NetGalley for my honest opinion. Below comment is my own opinion which was not influenced by publisher.

This is very interesting read about neuroplasticity and neurocycle. Dr. Leaf is explaining that it take 63 days to change a habit (not 21 days) and sometimes it take few cycles of 63 days to get it. There is good information on how to talk to children and how to help them deal with different situations using easy language with good examples for kids (thought trees).
One criticism was a story about a boy which read like an infomercial for Neurocycle App. After that story it was pretty difficult to focus on science for a while.

In general a good book.