A normal lifestyle: parental stress and coping in childhood diabetes

This article forms part of an extensive literature review informing a study exploring the parental experience of home management of children with newly diagnosed diabetes. As a diagnosis of childhood diabetes may represent a major stressor event for parents, selected theories and models of stress and coping are discussed. These suggest that, influenced by a variety of interpersonal and environmental factors, parents may approach the process of coping in different ways. Coping strategies employed by parents of children with diabetes elicited from the literature are categorized according to a psychological theory of stress and coping. Normalization, a coping strategy used by parents of chronically ill children, is discussed in relation to childhood diabetes. To conclude, implications for nursing practice are outlined and suggestions made about how parents may be assisted to cope with the demands of having a child with diabetes.