How to Help Your Anxious Child
It can feel overwhelming and upsetting to see your child struggling with anxiety. As parents, we want our children to feel at ease and confident instead of suffering. In order to relieve our child from their anxiety, parents will often try to protect their child from their fears. While this is coming from a place of love, it can actually make our child’s anxiety worse.
Our goal as parents is to help our children manage their big feelings, including their anxiety or fears. This includes helping our child figure out the best way to manage their anxiety when it comes up. In order to do this, we have to allow the anxiety to come up and not just avoid things that do make our child feel anxious. By gradual exposure of the fear, your child will gain confidence and their anxiety will decrease little by little.
Help your child embrace their discomfort. When we take our child out of the situation, instead of helping them manage it, the child learns this as a coping skill and will continue to avoid the situation when big feelings arise. Teaching them how to tolerate the fear, by using self-affirmations, deep breathing, and other coping skills that allow for them to feel confident.
Validate and acknowledge their feelings. Validation does not always equal agreement. For example, if your child is afraid to go to the dentist, sending a message of their fear being heard and that they have got this, is important. Saying something along like the lines of “I can tell you are feeling worried about going to the dentist. That is okay, you are brave and you can do anything. I will be right there along the way.”
Problem-solve together. After you validate your child’s fears and concerns, take the time to find solutions to the issue together. Make sure to listen to what your child thinks could be helpful when they are worried. For example, bringing a stuffy or holding your hand throughout the appointment. Make sure to come up with a plan and you and your child are aware of the plan.
Make the unknown known. The unknown is a threat to the brain and can cause a lot of anxiety. Explaining the steps to what is in store for your child is important and helps them adapt and manage their feelings better. So let’s be predictable!
Model how you deal with anxiety for them. Children learn from watching us as parents. Therefore, showing them how to deal with anxiety in a calm way is crucial.
