{"id":2822,"date":"2020-02-26T19:29:06","date_gmt":"2020-02-27T00:29:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/?p=2822"},"modified":"2022-03-14T19:58:26","modified_gmt":"2022-03-14T23:58:26","slug":"take-control-of-anxiety-for-your-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/take-control-of-anxiety-for-your-kids\/","title":{"rendered":"Take Control of Anxiety for Your Kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nearly one in three kids ages 13 to 18 now meet the criteria for an anxiety disorder (2018, NIH).\u00a0 32% of teens report persistent feelings of sadness or loneliness (2018, CDC).<\/p>\n

There are many factors that contribute to this escalation.\u00a0 There is screen addiction and the constant comparison to unrealistically \u201cperfect\u201d lives of peers on social media. There is bullying, school shootings, lack of sleep, the pressure to achieve, the media and political turmoil.<\/p>\n

Many of these environmental factors are out of our control.\u00a0 As anxiety mounts in society, it mounts in individuals and families.\u00a0 It is cumulative, and passed down from parents to children, generation to generation.\u00a0 The attitude or action of one person in a family or group affects everyone else.\u00a0 If you are in a relationship, you know how that works!\u00a0 In couple therapy, we ask individuals to imagine what their own contribution to the conflict might be. It\u2019s important to think about how one\u2019s behavior is received by the other person. So, what might be the main reason we are seeing more anxiety in children? They are absorbing our distress!<\/p>\n

Often, problems within the couple relationship impact the children.\u00a0 Not having the cognitive skills to communicate how they feel, kids can act out their anxiety in disturbing ways.\u00a0 If family anxiety gets high enough, the impact can be serious.\u00a0 The focus then becomes on the child.\u00a0 Ideally, we would address the anxiety we carry as adults before it impacts the child.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s important to understand the difference between fear and anxiety.\u00a0 Fear happens when the source of the dread is a threat that can be identified as something present or imminent.\u00a0 As Jeffrey Brantley, MD describes in Calming the Anxious Mind (2007), \u201cWhen the feelings of dread are not so clearly associated with an identified danger or threat, they are called anxiety.\u00a0 It is felt deeply in the mind and body in the present moment.\u00a0 It seems to be in response to something threatening, but hazy, something vague or far away.\u00a0 You cannot identify the danger, but you feel the fear anyway.\u201d Mild anxiety is normal.\u00a0 It can even enhance performance.\u00a0 It can also warn of a danger, or point toward useful action.\u00a0 The higher levels of anxiety, however, can interfere with daily life.<\/p>\n

Following stressful environmental factors (such as those mentioned above) and biology, the most important influence on our ability to handle stressors without a moderate or high anxiety response is the family environment.\u00a0 It affects our self-perception, view of the world as threatening or supportive, level of self-confidence, and sense of control.<\/p>\n

The good news is that there are successful ways to address anxiety before it is passed down to the kids.\u00a0 It takes practice and insight, and should usually be done with the help of a therapist.<\/p>\n

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  1. Recognize the pattern<\/strong>.\u00a0 Make a chart to keep track of what triggers your anxiety.<\/li>\n
  2. What is the situation?\u00a0 Who was there?\u00a0 What were you doing?<\/li>\n
  3. What was going through your mind? What images did you have with these thoughts?<\/li>\n
  4. How were you feeling before this thought, how did you start feeling after the thoughts?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
      \n
    • Correct cognitive distortions<\/strong>. Once you recognize the pattern and what triggers fear, you can consider whether there are any cognitive distortions in your thinking.\u00a0 Most of us have a negative bias, where we give a lot more weight to the negative possibilities.\u00a0 Psychologist Aaron Beck, who developed the cognitive therapy concept in the 1960s, called this irrational thinking pattern, \u201cautomatic thoughts\u201d because they are immediate and reactive in nature.\u00a0 The process requires examining the rationality and validity of the assumptions behind your thought patterns.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
        \n
      • Find the \u201cCore Fear\u201d.<\/strong>\u00a0 Todd Pressman describes how this can be done in his recent article, Deconstructing Anxiety, Counseling Today, Jan. 6, 2020.\u00a0 He believes that there is a deeper source or fundamental thought at the root of our anxiety.\u00a0 Once we have found the core fear, we must decipher our \u201cchief defense\u201d which keeps us from functioning fully and freely.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
          \n
        • Establish a mindfulness practice<\/strong> of letting go and bringing relaxation and non-judgmental attention to the present.\u00a0 Jon Kabat-Zinn, who developed mindfulness-based stress reduction, made it available to all of us through a daily practice.\u00a0 Try reading \u201cMindfulness for Beginners\u201d or Calming You Anxious Mind, by Jeffrey Brantley and Jon Kabat-Zinn.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
            \n
          • Accept mild levels of anxiety as part of life<\/strong>.\u00a0 Uncertainty and discomfort are part of living.\u00a0 They are signs that we are moving forward, taking necessary risks in order to grow.\u00a0 Sometimes we perceive normal signals as unacceptable.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

            If you have an anxious child, the chances are that one of the parents is anxious.\u00a0 Taking these steps can break the cycle.\u00a0 Your children tend to assimilate your style.\u00a0 You can message to them when you\u2019re nervous about something and model how you handle your distress.\u00a0 This way, they (and you) expect worry to show up and have the tools to use it constructively.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            Nearly one in three kids ages 13 to 18 now meet the criteria for an anxiety disorder (2018, NIH).\u00a0 32% of teens report persistent feelings of sadness or loneliness (2018, CDC).<\/p>\n

            There are many factors that contribute to this escalation.\u00a0 There is screen addiction and the constant comparison to unrealistically \u201cperfect\u201d lives of peers on social media. There is bullying, school shootings, lack of sleep, the pressure to achieve, the media and political turmoil.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2832,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2822"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toryjoseph.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}