How to help my Anxious child... before it's too late!
As a therapist working with children and families, I cannot count the number of times I have had this question posited to me at the start of a working relationship with a family (phrased in lots of different ways of course). Seeing a loved one struggle is emotionally challenging, seeing your child struggle can be overwhelming. So how do we help with child Anxiety?
What is Anxiety?
In attempting to respond to question, I think it useful firstly, to break down what Anxiety is. It’s pretty difficult to give an all-encompassing definition of Anxiety, however, one thing is for sure it’s an emotion, just like Anger, or Sadness, or Joy. So perhaps I need to circle back then and define what an Emotion is?
Sure, okay, (talking to myself again) – let’s do that.
What is an Emotion?
Well, from my reading of some scientific literature I would summarise emotions as follows:
Emotion refers to a complex biopsychological state that involves a range of feelings, behaviours, and physiological responses. Emotions typically arise in response to (internal and external) stimuli and play a crucial role in how individuals perceive and interact with the world. They can be brief and contextual (like feeling happy or sad in response to a specific event) or more enduring and general (like chronic feelings of anxiety or contentment) (APA, 2018; Gross & Thompson, 2007; Green, 1992).
Emotions involve several components including:
- Subjective Experience: The individual’s personal feeling or experience associated with the emotion.
- Physiological Response: Changes in the body, such as increased heart rate or sweating, that accompany the emotion.
- Behavioural Response: Actions or expressions (verbal and non-verbal) that result from the emotion.
I’m sure there are a million more unique, scientific, complicated articles, journals, and books defining what emotion is, but for the purposes of this article, on the website of a local therapist in Sydney, Australia, let’s go with this.
E-Motion = Energy in Motion. Emotion is communication, to ourselves and others. From an evolutionary perspective, emotions have specific functions in that they tell us (or others around us) something and encourage action based on that.
Take love for example, when we love is stimulated within us – toward our child for example, it encourages us to move toward, to comfort, to protect; and it encourages the other to reciprocate. To show love in return.
Unfortunately, (or fortunately), not all emotions are as comfortable or pleasant as love. This blog doesn’t seem like the best place to go into the neurochemical and biological reasons for this, but let us use another example:
You are walking along mindlessly thinking about how interesting that blog you read earlier was (it was about Anxiety in your child…) and suddenly, you look up, and there’s a bus coming towards you. In this scenario, I’m not sure a warm fuzzy feeling in your stomach would be the best thing for you. In that situation, a pang of Anxiety, causing you to jump out of the way is just what you need to, well, survive I suppose.
Our emotional responses are biologically hardwired to keep us alive. That’s why when you feel anxious, there are physiological changes in your body – your hands sweat, your heart race increases, you ‘tense’ up in your muscles and jaw. All of this is preparing you to get away from the threat you’ve perceived, or to fight with it.
If 30,000 years ago, you popped your head of your cave to see a sabre-tooth tiger walking around the corner, your body needs to ready itself in response to that. You perceive the threat and your body responds in kind.
So, there we are, the answer you were (not) waiting for: Anxiety is a survival mechanism. All emotions when they’re boiled down are about survival. The aim of any organism is to exist for as long as possible and human beings are no different. Anxiety is part of the human experience. It’s not good, nor bad, it just is. Like all emotions, it serves a function for us, quite a useful one actually and the work of a therapist (in this therapists’ view) is to help people begin the life-long journey of befriending and getting to know ones’ own Anxiety so that the you may begin to regulate it, not get rid of it!
Dr Kathleen Smith uses the fantastic analogy of Anxiety as a smoke alarm in her book, ‘Everything isn’t Terrible’. She states that as annoying as it is when the smoke alarm goes off, it’s designed to protect us from danger and one day, it might save our life. It’s up to us when the smoke alarm (Anxiety) goes off, to step back, assess whether there really is a fire here, and if not, learn to reset the smoke alarm and move on with our day.
This ancient system threat system of ours borne out of one of the older bits of our brain isn’t focused on whether the speech you have to do at work is really threatening or not, or whether your child going into school yard really feels like the stepping into the abyss for them, it just wants to reduce our discomfort in that moment by reducing the threat as soon as possible
So when is Anxiety Problematic for children? (and adults)
I’m sure many people out there reading this will feel like this blog is completely missing the mark because for lots of people, there are times when Anxiety feels like it’s suffocating us, it’s everywhere we go, ‘what ifs’ are hiding in the shadows of every corner of our life, waiting to jump out on us when we least expect it. It’s interfering with our everyday life and preventing us from thriving. For those people, you don’t want to hear that this is a normal part of life, so let me explain.
There are certainly times when our Anxiety gets out of control and starts to impact us in unhelpful ways. There aren’t many sabre-toothed tigers walking around inner-city areas nowadays (as far as I’m aware). Our brain has developed the capacity to imagine and perceive threats and often, where anxiety has become unhelpful, it’s these imagined threats that are contributing to it. We may be aware of this, we may not, we may be aware of part of it, again, we may not.
For instance, Linda has been asked by her boss to present on a topic at work in-front of the board later this week. Linda might be aware she is anxious about the presentation, but feels powerless to do anything about this. That might be because Linda has not broken down what her Anxiety consists of. In this scenario, perhaps it’s the thought, ‘I might stumble over my words and the board members will think I’m an idiot’, or the thought, ‘I’m going to be so embarrassed, they’ll all see me turning red’. This may lead to actions such as trying to avoid doing the presentation altogether, or delaying the preparation as it all feels too overwhelming.
One final analogy here that I use, due to being an expat Brit living close to the beach in Sydney. No matter how hard I try, no matter how many videos I watch, I cannot seem to spot rips in the water when I go to the beach. I understand the theory, I know how they work, but I still cannot differentiate between safe parts of the sea to swim and others. Thankfully, I can just swim between the flags and stay safe that way, but there have been times when I’m on a beach that isn’t life-guarded and there are no flags to be seen and, on those occasions, I have learnt more about rips, by being in them, experiencing them and then looking back at them with fresh eyes from a safe position. I noticed the nuances in how the waves broke, or how the water looked on top. I gained information through experience.
Anxiety is like the rips, if we don’t understand what we are looking out for, what our Anxiety tells us, what it feels like in our body, or what it urges us to do, it’s very easy to walk into it and be swept away, out of our depth, drowning in it.
If, however, we take the time to experience and observe Anxiety, we may come to better understand it. We may recognise the signs that Anxiety is leading us, we may learn what we do reactively when feeling Anxious and importantly; whether that’s helpful or not (because sometimes, it will be).
So, back to the kids.
Often, parents will come to me concerned about one thing or another:
‘John doesn’t talk enough when he’s around his friends, I’m worried that they’ll stop making an effort with him, and what about when he has a job – if he can’t interact with people, then what?’
‘Mia is having problems with her friends, they are nice to her in person, but really unkind to her online, yet she won’t stay off social media!’
‘Sophie has been struggling with Maths, she feels she can’t do it and her teachers are concerned too, I’ve tried to get her to sit and study a bit extra every evening but she doesn’t do it unless I sit and force her’
‘Jaden won’t go into school unless I walk him through the gates, he cries and cries. Sometimes when I get home, the school call me to tell me he’s inconsolable, often I have to go and collect him, and sometimes, he won’t go in at all’.
I often ask parents if they’ve ever struggled with Anxiety themselves and if so, how they got over it? Usually, these adults aren’t clear. Anxiety has been present at different points of their life, sometimes it’s died down on its own over time, sometimes they have worked on it. The crucial element that I’m trying to get at here though, is that no one has done it for them; because the reality is, no one can.
Children manage Anxiety better when they are treated as if they are capable, but from a parental perspective, this requires (deep breath) – a lot of failure, distress, frustration and supportive adults who can tolerate all of this.
Strategies for managing Anxiety
The problem with strategies
The number one request for clients coming to therapy or counselling, is, “I need some strategies…”
Whilst strategies are certainly important, think about having a broken washing machine, if I gave you a spanner and screwdriver, whilst it’s leaking out water and intermittently cutting out, sure, you may eventually figure out how to fix it, but it’s going to take you longer than if you’ve taken the time to notice where the leak is, understood what the different components of the machine do, and how it all fits together; it makes the work more efficient. Sometimes, with strategies, we can put the horse before the cart, and for lots of clients in therapy, this is why the strategies only work short-term, or sometimes, not at all.
The other issue is that it’s very easy in a therapy room to learn strategies, when things are calm, when the challenging aspects of life feel so far away; but implementing them at the school gate when your child is overwhelmed, and crying, and you need to go to work, is a totally different thing. It’s kind of like being taught to drive on a nice quiet country road, then being dropped in the middle of New York City at rush hour!
‘Get to the point’ I hear you say…
Parents, it’s crucial to remember that building resilience in your child is not about shielding them from all potential sources of anxiety. Instead, it’s about guiding them through these experiences and helping them develop the skills to manage their anxiety on their own. Think of yourself as a coach: you can provide guidance, support, and encouragement, but ultimately, your child has to play the game themselves.
Just as a sports coach believes in their athletes’ abilities to overcome challenges, you must demonstrate to your child that you believe in their capacity to handle anxiety. When you step in too quickly to rescue them from distressing situations, you inadvertently send the message that they are incapable of managing on their own. This can create a dynamic where your child becomes reliant on you to solve their problems, which can hinder their ability to develop independence (including their own strategies and skills) and resilience.
Tolerating Distress as a Parent
This process requires a lot of anxiety and distress tolerance from parents. It can be incredibly difficult to watch your child struggle, fail, and experience distress. However, these experiences are essential for their growth and development. By allowing your child to face their fears and anxieties, and by supporting them through these challenges rather than rescuing them, you help them build the resilience they need to navigate life’s ups and downs.
- Encourage Gradual Exposure: Allow your child to face their fears in small, manageable steps. This might mean encouraging them to speak up in class, gradually spending more time away from home, or tackling difficult homework assignments on their own.
- Model Coping Strategies: Show your child how you manage your own anxiety. Discuss your feelings openly and demonstrate healthy coping mechanisms such as deep breathing, mindfulness, problem solving, or taking breaks when needed.
- Provide Support, Not Solutions: Be there to listen and offer comfort, but resist the urge to solve their problems for them. Ask questions that help them think through their challenges and come up with their own solutions. Often, what prevents us doing this as parents is our own anxieties (‘What if they never figure it out’, ‘What if it goes wrong’, ‘What if they are upset or hurt in the process’).
- Celebrate Effort, Not Just Success: Praise your child for their efforts to face their fears, regardless of the outcome. This reinforces the idea that trying and learning are more important than always succeeding.
- Set Realistic Expectations: Help your child understand that it’s okay to feel anxious and that it’s a normal part of life. Encourage them to view anxiety as a signal to pay attention and take action, rather than something to be avoided at all costs.
Creating a Supportive Environment
Creating a supportive environment where your child feels safe to express their feelings and take risks is crucial. This includes maintaining open lines of communication, being empathetic to their struggles, and providing consistent encouragement and support.
Remember, the goal is not to eliminate anxiety but to help your child learn to manage it effectively. By fostering resilience and self-efficacy, you empower your child to navigate their world with confidence and independence.
In conclusion, parenting through your child’s anxiety involves a delicate balance of support and independence. It’s about being there to guide them without taking over, showing faith in their abilities, and tolerating the distress that comes with watching them struggle. This journey is challenging, but it’s also incredibly rewarding as you watch your child grow into a capable and resilient individual.