Unlock Your Child’s Calm: A Parent’s Guide to Anxiety

Anxiety in children manifests in different ways, from excessive and persistent fear, emotional distress and irrational outbursts, fear sleeping alone, constant nightmares or persistent worry and crying. While anxiety is a common emotion, it becomes concerning when persistent and debilitating to the extent that your child cannot perform normal day-to-day activities.

Understanding the Roots of Childhood Anxiety:

Several factors can contribute to anxiety in children:

• Excessive Social Media Engagement: This can trigger feelings of inadequacy through social comparison or expose children to cyberbullying.
• Domestic Discord: Frequent yelling and arguments within the home by parents, caregivers, or relatives create an unstable environment.
• Traumatic Experiences: Divorce, bullying, abuse, the loss of a loved one, or exposure to violence can significantly impact a child’s mental well-being.

• Major Life Transitions: Moving to a new school, house, or even country can be sources of significant stress.
• Academic and Performance Pressure: Excessive pressure to succeed in school or at extracurricular activities can lead to heightened anxiety.
• Exposure to Negative News: Constant exposure to disturbing news and events can be overwhelming for young minds.

In the age of social media children are becoming more exposed to what is happening around them. This includes both the positives and negatives such as unrealistic expectations of success created by child actors or social media influencers. They also become aware early of the inequalities in the world. It’s worth noting that in previous generations, many adults did not gain this awareness until much later. Growing up in a relatively sheltered environment often allowed for a happier, more carefree childhood, a “cocoon of blissful happiness” as some might recall. Creating such a protective environment is significantly more challenging today. Even with strict limitations on technology use at home, children often encounter it at friends’ or relatives’ houses.

According to research by the National Library of Medicine, there is an average 20% increase in anxiety disorders among adolescents with the highest prevalence rate among adolescents aged 15-19 years of age. As a parent seeing your child struggle with anxiety or any mental health condition must be hard, but you don’t have to journey alone. Here we’ll share some helpful tips on how to help your child cope with anxiety. These include:

1. Identification: Recognize the common signs and symptoms of anxiety. Prompt identification allows for early intervention, preventing symptoms from escalating.
2. Validation: Acknowledge what your child is feeling rather than dismiss or downplay their symptoms. This will help them open up more and trust coming to you for support when they feel anxious.
3. Providing Coping Tools: Teach your child coping skills such as positive affirmations, replacing negative self-talk, journaling and/or writing on a piece of paper their worries and ripping it up. (Our Budding Leaders program offers various tools for teens and pre-teens on dealing with Big Emotions. Register for our upcoming camp HERE.)
4. Seeking Professional Help: when it comes to diagnosis of an anxiety disorder, it’s always best to speak to a professional. If your child’s symptoms worsen or require additional assistance, seek support from a trained mental health professional. (For Family or Child psychotherapy services, please fill out the form HERE.)

At the core of our Budding Leaders Program is the belief that no child should ever feel so helpless or hopeless that they lose focus, drop out of school, succumb to negative pressures, or contemplate self-harm. If you suspect your child is experiencing anxiety, please reach out to us by completing the form found HERE.

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