Archive for the ‘Children’ Category
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Conquer Your Child’s Phobia
My 3 yr. old is scared of the wind. He freaks out if I open the windows in my home and refuses to go outside with even the smallest of breezes. I tell him it won’t hurt him, but I also refuse to close the windows when he’s acting like this. I encourage him [...]
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Back to School Jitters – Anxiety About Returning to School)
What if my teacher doesn’t like me? What if I don’t feel well and you are not there to help me? What if the other kids think I’m not as smart as they are? What if I can’t do long division? Can’t I just stay home? Every fall, millions of American children begin [...]
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50 Ways to Feed Your Child’s Fears: #4 Let Your Child’s Fears Scare You
Tolerating the distress that an anxious child experiences when his fears are triggered can be challenging. Some parents have particularly low levels of tolerance for the distress of their anxious child and jump in to remedy any distress by any means they can. We have discussed in the previous three blog entries the myriad [...]
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50 Ways to Feed Your Child’s Fears: #3 Argue With Your Child About Their Fears
Parents of Children with anxiety problems sometimes find themselves arguing with their child about his or her irrational fears. The child may insist that there is good reason to be afraid while the parent tries to convince the child that there is no sound basis for fear. Or, the child may throw a tantrum [...]
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When a Child’s Anxieties Need Sorting – Comment on June 5, 2011 New York Times article
Dr. Harold Koplewitcz indeed does seem to be the kind of informed advocate that our children need. Mental illness is a fact of life and very frequently has nothing to do with bad parenting or traumatic experiences, but rather with genetic predispositions. Neither a child nor a parent can do anything about the genes [...]
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50 ways to feed your child’s fears: #2
Aid and Abet your child’s attempts to avoid the situation that triggers his fears. What does this mean? It means that you help your child avoid fearful situations and or that you actually encourage avoidance as a strategy to manage your child’s distress. There are countless ways that a parent can do this and [...]
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50 ways to feed your child’s fears: #1
My previous blog entry focused on the “most important” advice I have for a parent of an anxious child: determine how you are unintentionally reinforcing your child’s fears, and stop doing that. I thought it might be useful to readers if I discussed, in detail, specific ways that parents reinforce their children’s fears. Just [...]
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Most Important Advice I have for a Parent of an Anxious Child
Learn how you may be unintentionally reinforcing your child’s fears and then gradually stop doing it.
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Childhood Anxiety Disorders are “Gateways” to Adult Mental Illness
Childhood Anxiety Disorders are “Gateways” to Adult Mental Illness – Recent statistics indicate that 9% of children under age 7 have a diagnosable anxiety disorder. This means that almost one out of every 10 children in a preschool class suffer the impact of these distressing and disruptive disorders. This statistic jumps to 30% of the population, by adulthood.
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How to find a mental health professional who can help you or your child with anxiety.
For all of the anxiety disorders, the gold standard of treatment is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. For anxiety disorders, it is the single most effective psychotherapeutic approach compared to all other types of psychotherapy and often compared to medication. Thus, when trying to locate a mental health professional, make sure that he or she practices CBT. [...]