Anxiety is a natural reaction to stress “that affects our thoughts, feelings and behavior,” according to the National Health Service (NHS) of the UK. You can explain it to a child by saying it’s like a wave that builds up and then goes away. Everybody experiences anxiety at times, but it can become a problem if it’s very strong, gets worse, or doesn’t fully go away. If your child worries nearly every day, and these worries or fears affect his daily life, it could be a more serious form of anxiety. And the NHS warns that severe anxiety “can harm children’s mental and emotional wellbeing, affecting their self-esteem and confidence.” As moms, it’s our default to do whatever we can to help with anxiety when we see it pop up.
Unfortunately, there may are some things many of us do that actually makes kids’ anxiety worse. It feels like we’re helping, but we really aren’t. Making a few simple changes to how you parent your anxious kid could make all the difference. Here’s what you might be doing and what to do instead.
We allow our kids to avoid what makes them anxious.
We love our kids, and it’s hard for us when they’re stressed. The panic and tears make us want to step in and do anything to help with anxiety. Because we want them to feel better, we sometimes do the very thing that makes anxiety worse in the long term. We accommodate their anxiety by letting them avoid whatever is causing their feelings of discomfort and distress.
In certain situations, we may want to step in because it’s embarrassing or awkward. For example, it can get uncomfortable waiting for a child with social anxiety to order at a restaurant. So, we order for them. Or, if we have a young child who has trouble falling asleep in her room because she’s afraid of the dark, we may allow her to sleep in our bed because it’s easier and we’re tired! We accommodate for our children’s fears and worries out of kindness and love, so we don’t often realize that these loving acts are actually feeding our children’s anxiety.
As a result, accommodating and avoiding creates a vicious cycle.
We want to help with anxiety, so we sometimes allow our kids to avoid their stressors. But when they do that, they don’t get practice dealing with their uncomfortable feelings. Avoidance gives them temporary relief, but it doesn’t truly make the anxiety go away. In fact, the next time she has to face her trigger, the stress feels bigger. This is how the anxiety-avoidance cycle works. In the short term, there’s relief. But in the long term, there’s an increase in anxiety: more worry, more physical symptoms, an increase in desire to avoid the stressor, and a loss of confidence about how to cope, as explained in this diagram by the Centre for Clinical Interventions.
“Parents unintentionally perpetuate the cycle of anxiety by helping a child to avoid the things they are afraid of,” says parenting educator Laura Linn Knight. “Most parents don’t intentionally do this, but because anxiety often demands to be heard, and a child becomes very vocal or shuts down verbally and physically with the feeling of anxiety, a parent wants to avoid difficult behavior and thus helps avoid triggers.” And, for example, when we allow our children to skip something like the school play because they’re afraid they’ll forget their lines, we “remove the thing they’re afraid of”, and then “the child has learned that coping mechanism” of avoidance, says Clark Goldstein, PhD. The anxiety cycle then has the potential to repeat itself.
Another mistake we make: We help our kids avoid anxious thoughts.
When we reassure our kids that they’ll have fun at the party or no one will make fun of them if they ask a question, we’re not allowing them to work through their tough feelings on their own. We mean well. We see how nervous they are, and we want to make them feel better by reassuring them it’s all going to be OK. But in truth, we don’t know what will happen. And we’re again accommodating for their worries and helping them avoid their anxious thoughts. There’s temporary relief when we give reassurance, but the next time they have to face their worries, the anxiety will have grown. It’s the anxiety cycle again.
Instead, be realistic and supportive to teach how to cope with anxious thoughts.
Instead of reassuring your child that everything will be fine, support how she feels. Listen and be empathetic. But also, be honest: I know you’re nervous to raise your hand. It takes courage to do that! If someone laughs at you, it won’t be kind. But you can handle it. Expressing confidence in her ability to handle something difficult will give her courage—even if her worries come true. “The goal is not to take away all discomfort and distress,” says Khadijah Booth Watkins, MD, MPH, “but to strike the balance of empathy, validation, and support with a little nudge and a lot of encouragement.” And you are the best person in your child’s life to do that.
The more your child faces his fears, the better he’ll get at handling his anxiety. Goldstein says a child’s anxiety “will drop over time as he continues to have contact with the stressor. It might not drop to zero, it might not drop as quickly as you would like, but that’s how we get over our fears.” Continually working to dial down stress and face his fears is the hard work of building resilience. And when a child has the strength to face his fears, he breaks the cycle of anxiety.
When there’s an uptick in stress in your child, how do you help with anxiety?
