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Helping you child Understand Anxiety & How to Deal with it.

Added Sep 12, 2021 •

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today I'm doing a presentation particularly on anxiety and helping your child work through their anxiety and understand how to cope with it and the reason why I decided to focus on anxiety today is because that's an issue that I'm still a lot of children experience right now just because of covid or being back to school there's a lot of changes right now so often times and children those changes do themselves and anxious behaviors okay so this is what we're going to learn about today and it's how to talk to your child about their worries and anxieties normal childhood reactions to anxiety supporting them and using safe and healthy skills to manage their feelings these are called coping skills and how to get more help if you feel like you're not equipped to support your child in this way and you just need some more advice or guidance in addition to me I'll share some other ways that you guys get more support so I like to start their lesson with this mindfulness activity because this is an activity that's really helpful to use with your children as well and I find it very relaxing but if you're driving or operating heavy machinery do not do this because it does require you to close your eyes so I'm going to have everybody who's comfortable close their eyes and take a deep breath in no exhale when were deep breath in and one more slow exhale and I want you to picture a castle in your mind a castle notice if it's made of bricks or stone or wood notice where your Castle is Maybe on a hillside routed by fields of grass or maybe it's on a cliff next to the ocean just take some time and really picture this tassel and when you're ready I want you to go inside your Castle and notice how you enter maybe there's a big drawbridge that comes down and you walk through the front door may be flying over head through window once you're inside the castle going to take a moment and you're going to look around start exploring the castle and notice what you see if there's room go inside the room notice the different colors that you see how you feel imagine who lives in this Castle a moment to really explore the castle go in the different rooms take notice of everything when you're ready we're going to get ready to leave the castle you going to go out the same way you came and as you walk out the castle look down and notice what shoes you're wearing go up your body and noticed what clothes you're wearing all the way up to the top of your head and slowly leave the castle same way you came and once you're outside you're going to turn around and look at the castle and when you're ready you know open your eyes so that I like to share that coping tool because it's a mindfulness meditation and children have an amazing imagination so it's Austin's fun after you do this activity is there stealing overwhelmed you're anxious gives them a chance to take them to a place that's a little bit less stressful than where their mind might be in that moment and it calms them down and you can explore this castle with them and you know what to hold dialogue with store they can stay over king and queen lives in the castle or maybe a Dragon lives in the castle and just sort of let them run with that and have that moment with them where they're sharing their experience their imagination with you and this is super helpful with chew then who are having trouble sleeping at night a lot of times anxiety manifest in children laying awake at night or waking up in the middle of the night and go back to sleep if you guide them through this meditation is going to call them they're anxious thoughts and will help to slip into a deeper sleep so and it's also an adult Club it should I think it's a great the great way to relax okay so I'm going to share with you some physiological responses these are also called somatic complaints to these are things that we do with our bodies or children do with their bodies that are observable. in response to anxiety so you might see them feeling nervous or they might be overly attached to you they might be holding onto your leg when they come to school or just you noticed I'm feeling tense and Restless Austin they have a sense of Panic or impending doom that something terrible is going to happen they might say it feels like the heart is racing they might be breathing quickly or shaking or sweating you might also see that they just generally feel really weak and tired definitely you see children having trouble concentrating or paying attention so you might think that your child's like just goofing off in class but if they have anxiety it might look like that but they could really just be having trouble paying attention because of the nervous thoughts that are in their mind and again having great thoughts over and over again a lot of time you see kids go to the nurse's office. butterflies in their stomachs you'll see them either feeling really hot or really cold sorry my computer is not letting me keep on they might say that they're feeling dizzy they might have joint pain or muscle pain sometimes adults also have then and again trouble falling or staying asleep at night these are few types of common anxieties diagnosis and children that maybe you've heard about and if you have any questions let me know separation anxiety that's related to obviously being separated from it is necessarily have to be a parent but it can be somebody who's a sense of safety and comfort to the child's social anxiety may be being nervous about being in class around so many people or going to a park or any sort of public set I've seen a bit of this because of covid and quarantine these children grew up in a very sheltered environment because it wasn't safe to be in large public settings and now that things are slowly opening up to a child who was three men the pandemic started and now they're in kindergarten this can be over stimulated again overwhelming and it can manifest and social anxiety generalized anxiety disorder is just ruminating worried quite a lot of things fall under generalized anxiety disorder obsessive-compulsive disorder I'm sure many of you have heard of assets of compulsive disorder rocd that's if you see your child like repeatedly wash my hands or flipping a light switch off and on or having to line things up in certain order or maybe they have to say something three times its Austin repetitive behaviors pushmatic stress disorder PTSD you also see a lot of anxiety responses in and phobias that could be like a fear of vomit a fear of spiders just series of specific categories so some common triggers for anxiety in children like it's similar to what we talked about with separation anxiety it could be being away from parents or caregivers there's other anxiety that could come out but maybe your child's observing arguments or fights at home maybe they're worried about your family's safety right now with covid-19 time refining children are worried about them family members getting sick because maybe they're observe something on the news or they've heard a story from somewhere and so that sort of manifest in their minds that just manifest in their mind as I think it let me just pause and turn on my lights re if I don't move long enough my lights then changing schools there it is full can also be a definite sugar for anxiety for students it could be that they're new to coming back to school maybe they're afraid of following the rules that they feel like they won't be able to follow the rules and it can be intimidating to them of course children's names having about getting good grades speaking in front of their class feeling overwhelmed by homework or being afraid of being at school or just not playing at home and then of course Pierce so peers can send a trigger for anxiety because kids feel like maybe they don't spit in they might be afraid of making friends maybe there's a particular student that the child sees the boy they could be afraid that they're going to I'm get used and of course code so a lot of covid related anxieties were staying out and that could be you know family members getting sick themselves getting sick they could be afraid of getting hurt being embarrassed or generally just their physical appearance if they feel like they don't fit into what's normal so I talked a little bit about how we could recognize lady and children by like observing them and this is more how they might be expressing so we talked about them worrying that something bad's going to happen but they also might be Define you or their teachers wine with rules or expectations they might be over planning Dimension having trouble falling asleep or staying asleep they might be isolated just like wanting to be left alone because they're overwhelmed an over-stimulated so it may hard for them to be in a social setting even if it's just with a small group of family members at home definitely having uncontrollable thoughts and thoughts of worried that they can't control and it's often common that the children are going to be unable to communicate how they're feeling so you might see them like falling apart at home because they have so much anxiety all day at school and they're trying so hard to keep themselves together at school because they don't want to be in bed in front of their peers that when they get home they might just crumble because it's a safe space for them to express themselves a style so you can see them feeling irritable or angry or having negative thoughts and that comes just from not really knowing how to verbalize your feelings and process them in a healthy way just feeling overwhelmed and stressed out can lead to a child maybe just being triggered pretty easily jebaited to anger you might observe they might procrastinator refuse to do their homework if their homework is just to anxiety-provoking of the stork is doing very provoking they might just put it off and they look like they're just refusing to do their school work and they're being defiant but really it could be Underneath It All that it's just too overwhelming for them so it's easier to just put it aside I mentioned having trouble focusing and concentrate feeling out of control I mention trouble paying attention and of course it's a particular setting if like they have social anxiety or pgsd associated with something that happened there going to avoid that particular trigger which could be a person or place whatever it is that cause that causes them to feel anxious and you'll see them having excuses to avoid those particular people or environment you know how can you help your child if you're seeing any of these symptoms what can you do to win in the home with your child how to help them understand it and overcome so if you're seeing these triggers help you child understand what those triggers are so if they're afraid of going to school or if they're afraid of certain social group that's called a recess or something because maybe somebody there is upsetting them then you're going to help them understand I see that you don't want to go to recess anymore and you you're trying to stay in the classroom will what's happening Aries is there something that's happening that's making you upset like why don't you want to do it so you're just exploring it any sort of sugar exploring with your child because they might not be able to connect what's triggering them to the feelings of anxiety they might not realize that they're triggered in a particular setting or by a particular person so you're just going to explore it with them help them understand their emotions a little bit better you also want to normalize it because everybody gets anxiety sometimes and if they don't understand that what they're going through is something that my mom and dad how to sometimes when it's something that a lot of people feel sometimes they might be overwhelmed I think there's something wrong with them but you can help them make sense of their emotions by making a normal and sometimes to know anxiety for kids you self-disclose so you might share minor things that make you anxious or that made you anxious when you were a child so many people have anxiety for taking attacks are meeting new people it could be maybe something happened when you were or when your child's at the park so they're nervous to go back to the park so you're going to normalize they're going to stay all that makes sense last time we were at the park you fell off the slide so maybe we're nervous about going back there but this what can we do to make sure that we're safe and be more careful when member all the times you didn't fall off the slide just things like that but obviously you're not going to disclose anything serious about anything that makes me anxious because you don't want to increase your Chow anxiety by making them feel worried or concerned about you or other issues so I like to share this is a lot of words here on the side so disregard this cuz I'll just explain it all in this image a lot of people don't realize or don't know when people's brains actually stopped developing does anybody know how old we are when our brain stop developing you can type it or shout it out we had a response of 28 okay 21% 24 25 you guys are pretty pretty clothes that your brain actually doesn't stop developing here 25 years old so sometimes people expect children because they your child may be there you're 9 years old and it can be super logical with you when you're having a conversation normally and you can think you might be thinking like why doesn't my kid understand that you know this isn't a big deal are they shouldn't do this because there's such a logical person sometimes but children actually have their brain is not fully developed yet so it's hard for them to go from their logical responses to their emotional response and back and forth so if you see that child's really upset and they're crying or maybe they're angry and are slamming their arms on the table but they're very wrapped up in whatever emotion they are experiencing then that's not a time when you can be logical for that logical with them and you can expect them to be logical from you in that moment and that's not because they're choosing not to be your they're choosing to be difficult it's because neurologically their brain isn't developed enough to be logical when they're big National because you can't go from your upstairs Venture downstairs bring back and forth like that until your brains fully developed like you slowly can do it over time but if if you see your kidney really upset then just be emotional with them say I'm so sorry I see you're really upset right now that's really frustrating that what happened and I'm sorry let's take some deep breaths hug them help them calm down and monster in a peaceful calm state of mind that's when you can bring in the logic but they're not going to be receptive to anything logical that you're trying to share with them when they're in this emotional state and sometimes I talked to parents and I didn't realize that in frustrating for them so just just keep that in mind that it's not that they can't be logical in the moment or that they don't want to be logical in the moment but that neurologically they can't okay so sometimes children have anxiety attacks or panic attacks this might look like you know that child breathing really stay in their hearts racing feeling like they're going to die it's very somatic so you'll see a lot of it coming out in their body and they're going to have racing thoughts so a way to help your child calm down if you're seen or anybody if you see that they're having a panic attack is remember that you can't stop it you're just going to be a calming influence around just like I mentioned neurologically you can't if your child thing you know why I didn't do it something Terrible's going to happen and you know that it's not logical you can't change them in the moment when they're having a panic attack was just going to calm them and be emotionally supportive them you're going to keep yourself, you're not going to freak out and lose it around them you want to show Tommy actions and common emotions are going to leave them and taking some deep breaths just sit with them if it stays take them for a walk somewhere that's peaceful and quiet but want to minimize their feelings or make them feel like their feelings aren't valid because in that moment their feelings mean so much to them and they're very valid to them and that's not have time to stay worried about that that's the time to say oh my God I see how upset you were let's just sit here and take some deep breaths and calm down and we will process it and talk about it when you're, little later and let them know that this feeling of being panic and anxious will pass because these usually past and you know 10 to 15 minutes just redirecting and calming down and just sitting with them and being a peaceful present will let his panic attack or anxiety passed it won't last forever I need to remind them so some these are some simple coping skills to help children relax are things that they can do that you can do to support your child reminder child. of course I can talk to a trusted adult at school which might be a teacher or yourself or another family member at home taking deep breaths I'll share some breathing exercises with you in a later why but when people are anxious if they're whether or not they're like showing it in anger or fear their breathing might change they might be or if they're worried and change of breathing increases anxiety because you're not getting enough oxygenated blood in your body and when you teach your child to take deep breaths and I'll share with you the breathing exercises that actually helps them calm them physically and neurological because no longer are they focusing on whatever it is that's making them Panic they're focusing on regulating their breathing so you're physically helping them by oxygenating their blood which is going to calm them make them feel better but neurologically you're also stopping those thoughts that are triggering their anxiety by making them focus on the route being creative with your child you know giant dancing listening to music writing in a journal is there other things that can help your child but of course it depends on their interests and what they're drawn to in those moments going for a walk outside that can always be relaxing tell him to move around and stretch sometimes anxiety makes our muscles feel tense and turning into your senses ask your child if you noticed that their thoughts are very overwhelmed and focused on things that are up ask them to be more present to help them be more present in the moment and we're grounded in the moment so to stop those thoughts and those anxieties you're going to help them tune in to their senses so stay when you hear what do you see what do you feel what do you smell and you're really going to help them be in the present not in this hypothetical world of worries where they may have been scissors fun simple grounding tools I'm going to share with you that you can very specific things that you can do if you notice that your child still anxious if a child is having a panic attack or in shock or just really overwhelmed and you noticed that they're stuck in this ruminating read thoughts this is super simple grounding technique that you can do with the you know a kid as young as three or four well into adulthood but you just say you'll take you take a moment you look around the room to do it in the classroom in the bedroom anywhere and you asked your child to notice five different objects that are five different colors around the room so based on the pictures here you might say the board is green or black actually schools are white the couch is blue the vases pink the wall is blue the bed is white whatever it is in the room that they're in but you're having them say it out loud or if you're teaching them to have this tool that they can use if they're overwhelmed at school they can stay it in their mind but they're very clear free himself into the present moment and grounding themselves where they are and that will minimize the anxiety that taking them out of that space and into this some deep in their mind where they're feeling overwhelmed the really simple really useful one this is a fun activity this is actually a place therapy technique that I really like that you can do with your child at home so it's taking a bubble break so you each get a little thing of bubbles these are something that you could keep at home and get him the 99 cent store and you actually have like a little competition that you like Wild win but you are teaching them to blow the biggest bubble possible and so when you blow a bubble you have to to blow a really big bubble you have to take a deep resin and a slow exhale to blow a big bubble if you noticed it when you're trying it if you are breathing like this the bubbles are going to be really small but you're telling a child we're going to see you can blow the biggest bubble and that's going to help them calm down because you're sort of going to be tricking them into regulating their breathing because to blow the biggest possible bubble you have to do a deep snow and hail and a slow X I'm so inadvertently you're helping them calm down and practice the breathing exercise without them realize realizing that you're doing and it's fun and let you're going to let them win more often than not it's not really like a serious competition but you want them to feel empowered that what they're doing is working so they're going to let them you know how good job like that was a huge bubble weather. It was thought you're going to teach them to use this tool to regulate their breathing these are just I'm going to share a couple more simple breathing exercises because really that's one of the best ways to calm down an anxious child I take breathing so you have them take a deep breath in with her eyes closed and as they exhale they're going to imagine they're blowing out birthday cake candles and they can make a wish and they can practice this a few times and it's a fun way to calm themselves down I really like this wedding I do this one with the kindergarteners it's elevator breathing so you imagine you have a tiny little elevator in the pit of your stomach I take a deep breath and you bring the little elevator with the tiny little people up to your mouth and your mind and then you exhale you imagine sending the little elevator of people back down to your tummy and you have them try this three or four times and both of these are helpful for kids again because you're physically relaxing Yourself by breathing but you're also stopping anxious thoughts cuz you're redirecting and refocusing them on something else and lastly this one's just a little bit more fun and active but you alligator breathe with you and you pretend your arms are in alligator so the little ones like this to but with breathing this is also something that you can teach your child that they could do anywhere they could be taking deep breaths to calm themselves in public settings and nobody really has to know that they're doing it so it's a way for them to self soothing calm themselves weather with them in the moment or they're nervous when they're in the middle of taking it and so now I'm just going to go over people that you can tell your child that they can turn to if they're feeling anxious their parents are the caregivers have them identify other family members that they can talk to maybe an older sibling or grandparent I'm of course they can get counseling I'm always available I'm here 3 days a week but available by this week my phone or email your teacher maybe there's like an after-school coach that they're comfortable talking to the principal or vice principal family friends sometimes children died defy the parents of their friends as people that they like to talk to you about their feelings and then who else so you just sort of helping your child feel like they're not alone that there's people that they can go to that can support them and help them Ashley you just stopped at home emergency lines my email address if you have questions for me is up here at the top and my phone number and then this is the LAUSD student Family Wellness plane they helping all sorts of Realms of assistance that you might need you can call them 5 days a week that's the phone number I can also help direct you if you need therapy or more services and this is a crisis line so this is for like you know suicide or some more serious issues this is a 24/7 7 days a week or so I can change the day 7 days a week crisis hotline that you can call and get the part regardless of how old you if it's and that is all I have for you today thank you so much for having me and Joe have any questions

Uploaded by Carla Miller.

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Helping you child Understand Anxiety & How to Deal with it.

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