With a global pandemic, deepening political divisions, and 24/7 access to news, the world has become an increasingly anxious place. Children are not immune.
According to the American Psychological Association, the number of kids experiencing clinical-level anxiety has increased from 11.6 percent in 2012 to 20.5 percent in 2022. Local therapists have seen the same thing in their own practices, saying anxiety is currently the number one issue they are seeing in their young clients.
Fortunately, there are many ways parents can help their kids avoid and learn to manage anxious feelings.
Causes
Social isolation, falling behind in school, fear of germs, and mortality are examples of pandemic-related stressors leading to anxiety.
Even as life is starting to return to normal, State College-based child psychologist Peggy Nadenichek says, “It’s a ‘new normal,’” and it feels slightly unfamiliar to kids, who tend to feel a lingering sense of uncertainty.
In fact, some children fear that any bad thing they see on the news could turn into a global disaster that affects them, much like COVID did, according to therapist Jennifer Johnson, of Room to Grow outpatient mental health therapy practice in State College.
On top of those factors, concerns about security and school shootings give many children a general feeling of not being safe, says Nadenichek. In addition, there are social pressures and issues that arise from the constant consumption of social media.
Whatever the cause, anxious children often cannot verbalize what is going on within themselves.
“They don’t know what’s wrong,” Nadenichek says. “They’re just feeling unhappy and stressed.”
What to look for
Nadenichek says some of her young patients have told her they think parents need to do a better job of finding out how their kids are feeling. But if kids don’t know how to verbalize it, how can a parent identify if their child is experiencing anxiety?
Ask open-ended questions. Pamela McCloskey, of McCloskey Counseling Services in Milesburg, says, “Instead of ‘How was your day?’ I suggest, ‘What was the most interesting thing that happened today?’ Or, ‘What was the funniest thing that happened? Anything scary happen today? Anything weird?’ You’ll get more information by asking a question like that.”
Look for physical symptoms. Anxious children often exhibit psychosomatic symptoms, such as headaches, stomachaches, and loss of appetite. They also may have difficulty falling asleep or experience nightmares. If any of these become frequent without any apparent physical cause, that could be a red flag, McCloskey says.
Listen for self-criticism. If a child is becoming very critical of themselves, saying things such as “I can’t do anything right,” “nobody likes me,” or “I’m so ugly,” that is another indication that the child is struggling with something, McCloskey says.
Take note of changes in behavior. “Parents may notice some changes in children that maybe used to be happy or outgoing, and now they are withdrawing,” Nadenichek says. “Look for changes in their mood, or if they’re making poor choices.”
Check with the school. Guidance counselors and teachers who see children every day often notice changes that might be concerning and can be great resources, Nadenichek says.
Reducing anxiety
Anxiety is unavoidable, and according to Johnson, it’s not always a bad thing.
“Anxiety is actually useful. We have to learn from things that scare us,” she says.
Still, there are some ways to help prevent kids from feeling too much of it.
Be aware of your own influence. “Kids pick up on parents’ nervousness. Parents are always modeling, even when they don’t mean to be,” Johnson says.
McCloskey agrees. “Children who are very anxious tend to have parents who are very anxious. Parents need to look at themselves and say, ‘Am I contributing to this anxiety?’”
Give children a sense of control. “Along with the pandemic came a feeling of a loss of control,” Nadenichek says, and someone who has limited control over their surroundings can feel more anxious. She suggests giving your child control over as many age-appropriate things as possible, like choosing what clothes to wear or deciding what to have for lunch.
Get kids out of their rooms. “Do things together as a family, and get kids involved in something, whether it be sports, band, dance, whatever. I think parents should try to see that their kids have balance in their lives.Don’t let them spend all of their free time isolated in their room or in front of a screen,” says Nadenichek.
In addition to providing balance, getting kids involved in activities helps them fulfill the all-important need to be socialized, Johnson says.
“Kids need to be socialized. It’s been so hard during COVID, for really legitimate reasons. But kids learn so much from their friends, and also from the kids they don’t like. We are made to learn from other people,” she says. “There’s nothing worse than a lonely child who isn’t developing social skills. So think about how you can encourage that.”
Teaching coping strategies
When anxiety does strike, it is important for children to learn techniques for dealing with it.
Understand anxiety. Johnson likes to explain what anxiety is and teach children to recognize what it feels like in their body, whether it manifests as racing thoughts, a rapid heartbeat, or an upset stomach. She says when kids can understand and acknowledge it, they can effectively start to employ coping strategies.
Take deep breaths. “When anxiety takes over, that emotional part of the brain sort of takes over the logical part of the brain, the prefrontal cortex,” making it hard to focus or think clearly, McCloskey explains.
She says breathwork is a good way to help kids learn to calm down and rein in the big feelings that may have taken hold of their brains and bodies.
“One very effective thing is deep breathing,” she says. “It might sound silly, but it actually is very effective if you do it correctly. That’s taking air in, holding it, and just releasing it very slowly. … That is really the key to deep breathing—taking a nice, controlled breath. The oxygen helps us calm ourselves, and it keeps the logical part of our brain better engaged, so we’re thinking more clearly.”
Practice being uncomfortable. McCloskey says it is important for parents not to avoid situations that make their child anxious.
“Rather, have them take small steps toward the situation that may be anxiety-provoking for them. Because when you avoid it, what that says to the child and the child’s brain is, ‘Gosh, I really can’t handle that; even my parents don’t think I can handle that,’” she says.
Johnson agrees that it is a good idea to intentionally put kids into situations that make them feel uncomfortable so they can practice and become confident that they can tolerate feeling that way. For example, she says if a child has separation anxiety when they are not in the same room with a parent, you can practice by spending increasing amounts of time apart on a separate floor.
“You have to practice those things on purpose, because when the big things happen, you say ‘I know, I’ve got this anxiety, I know it’s here, but I can handle it, because I’ve had success handling it before,’” she says.
Encourage positive self-talk. “Anxiety has a lot to do with what we say to ourselves,” McCloskey says. “If you’re worried about a test and you think, ‘I’ll never be able to handle this. I flunk everything,’ you enter taking that test with that mindset, and you’re already setting yourself up to not be successful.”
Understanding the link between how our thoughts affect our feelings is at the heart of what McCloskey says is the most effective technique for anxiety: CBT, or cognitive behavioral therapy. As an example, she says, if your child has been anxious about going to school because they are afraid something bad is going to happen to them there, encourage them to say to themselves something like, “’School is generally safe. I’ve been handling it for 20-some days and nothing bad has happened, and if something does happen, there are adults there that can take care of it.’ Then they can enter the school building with some confidence, and keeping the prefrontal cortex engaged.”
Model the techniques. Since parents tend to model behavior without even trying, Johnson says they should do it intentionally to show kids how their parents handle their own anxious feelings. She offers the following scenario as an example for how to do this:
“Sit down and have dinner together, and go through your day, emphasizing some things that you’re really wanting the kids to know about how to manage something. Like, ‘I had a really tough day. The boss dumped a lot of stuff on my desk, and I was feeling really overwhelmed. My heart was racing, so I took a deep breath, and then I realized I had to take two or three, because I noticed my mind was racing. So I had a little internal dialogue and I said to myself, ‘You know what? This is not a big deal. I can handle this,’ and then I looked around my office and distracted myself by saying something like, ‘What can I see that’s orange?’”
Check out available resources. McCloskey recommends a website called GoZen! for parents of younger children (gozen.com), and Hey Sigmund (heysigmund.com) for parents of tweens and teens. Both contain a wealth of information about anxiety and how to cope with it, including free videos for kids to watch and online courses that can be purchased for a fee.
She also suggests getting online information directly from professional sites such as the Child Mind Institute (childmind.org), American Psychological Association (apa.org), or the American Psychiatric Association (psychiatry.org), rather than doing general Google searches.
Johnson recommends a book, The Whole Brain Child by Dan Siegel, as well as two podcasts: Flusterclux, hosted by Lynn Lyons, the author of Anxious Parents, Anxious Kids, and Good Inside, hosted by Dr. Becky.
Seek therapy. Even using all of these strategies and resources, anxiety may simply be too much for a child and their parents to handle without outside help.
McCloskey says, “It is important to not ignore symptoms. And I know that unfortunately there is still a slight stigma to getting mental health services for your child, but the earlier that it is addressed, the easier it is.” T&G
This story appears in the February 2023 issue of Town&Gown.
