Anxiety in Children: The Ultimate Guide to Helping Your Child Cope

Inside: A detailed look at anxiety in children, symptoms of anxiety in children, and 12 detailed steps to helping your child put the ice on anxiety.

Did you know?

Anxiety is the most common mental health concern for kids AND adults.

It affects 20% of children in one form or another.

Isn’t this crazy?

But:

Today I have something that will take away that feeling of standing idly by on the sidelines WISHING there was something you could do to help.

And that something is:

An epic guide to anxiety for children.

And the best part?

You can start right implementing these anxiety strategies right now.

What Anxiety in Children Looks Like

Anxiety in children comes in all shapes and sizes.

There is no one size fits all here folks.

It can look like a well-behaved, mild-mannered kid (and will often go unnoticed) or it can look like the defiant, misbehaving child (often getting a diagnosis like ADHD).

So:

It’s important that grab our specks and really look at underlying motives behind certain behaviors.

A few examples of how anxiety in children can show up (and often it looks like something else):

• Anger or agitation
• Negative thinking
• Sleep issues
• Controlling behavior
• Avoiding activities, people or events
• Rude and/or defiant behaviour

The main reason anxiety shows up as one or more of these behaviors is that when an anxious feeling crops up (or a situation that can’t be controlled, or the outcome is uncertain) what often follows is a powerful emotional response.

And how your kids respond to that powerful emotional response can be any of the above.

Anxiety in children can be a real challenge, on a number of levels.

(If your kiddo is prone to anger outbursts, you might want to check out this resource — 55 quick calming techniques kids can use anywhere).

So:

Watch for these signs in your child and if you think your kiddo could be suffering from anxiety. Read on my friend.

Our one of a kind Kids Anxiety Kit is now available. With over 80 pages filled with exercises, quotes, lessons, worksheets, coloring pages, and more, you will help your child begin to overcome their anxieties and start to love life again.

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Six Symptoms of Anxiety in Children

Physical Responses

Kids with anxiety can suffer from upset stomachs, headaches, dizziness, and excessive sweating (to name a few of the possible physical responses).

These physical responses are VERY REAL to your child and also very scary.

Watch for these anxiety in children symptoms:

Behavior

You might observe powerful tantrums, crying, clinging, whining, and assurance seeking behavior.

Often kids with anxiety will be labeled as the “bad” kid or the child with behavioral problems.

Cognition

Your child might think endless negative thoughts, (like the sky is never blue, it’s always grey) or they might have negative thoughts that always win the arm wrestle over their positive thoughts.

Dependance

Does your child depend heavily on you to guide them through certain situations?

Are they developing their own internal compass? Do they need to develop resilience?

Functioning

• Are they coping daily?
• Making friends?
• Going to school?
• Sleeping okay?
• Resisting homework?

Does My Child Have An Anxiety Disorder?

The most important thing to remember here is that ONLY your Doctor can diagnose an actual anxiety disorder.

Having said that, there are a few ways you can narrow down whether a trip to the doctor is necessary:

An anxiety disorder is when your child experiences anxiety or worry more often (meaning most days or for months at a time) and with more intensity than other children the same age.

If this is true then your child may have an anxiety disorder.

Another important factor is if there is SIGNIFICANT disruption in your lives on an ongoing basis.

For example:

• Refraining from sports or other groups or activities
• Not wanting to participate in typical childhood experiences
• Sleep issues
• Trouble doing homework
• Issues making new friends
• Not wanting to try new things
• School issues
• Social issues

Sometimes you might feel confused not understanding what’s wrong with your child and hoping they will outgrow certain worrisome behaviors over time, only to be disappointed when your child becomes more debilitated over time. Consider anxiety or excessive worry as the culprit and get some help!

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The Effects of Anxiety in Children

When talking about anxiety in children (or even adults) we should remember:

The good news:

• Anxiety is COMPLETELY normal – everyone experiences anxiety at one point or in one form or another
• Anxiety is NOT dangerous – it may be uncomfortable, but it’s not going to hurt us
• Anxiety shouldn’t be avoided – kids need to learn how to cope and handle these feelings not avoid them

The bad news:

• Anxiety CAN take-over – your child might start opting out of normal childhood experiences

Anxiety can feel a bit like not being invited to the big end of year bash that everyone is going to. It’s isolating and lonely.

What Can I Do to Help My Child With Anxiety

12 strategies are listed below and placed in strategic order. Start at step one and as your child is ready, slowly evolve through each step.

I consider this more of an anxiety program that should take you anywhere from 2 weeks to 6 months.

Do not try to complete all the steps at once.

Introduce new concepts slowly, perhaps one per week, or one a day (depending on how receptive your child is).

Don’t force it and let your kiddo set the pace (to some degree).

This anxiety plan is suitable for kids who suffer from worry (but don’t necessarily have an anxiety disorder) and it’s also suitable for kids with an anxiety disorder to use alongside your current anxiety plan set by your doctor.

Important Note:

Mindfulmazing has created an awesome anxiety kit printable workbook with over 80 worksheets that will help you execute all of the below steps.

]This workbook contains activities, quotes, information, worksheets and much, much more.

Although there are no guarantees, it’s hopeful to say you won’t feel quite so helpless anymore, you now have a plan to help your child.

Use your workbook to follow along and complete each activity with your child (in the steps outlined below).

This exact kit has helped my high functioning autistic son tremendously!

Grab your kit here, print it out and let’s get started!

Take a Quick Peek Inside the Workbook

Anxiety in Children. A 12 Step Program to Develop Coping Skills

1. See Your Doctor

An anxiety disorder is a condition, and similar to if you have diabetes or a heart condition, you may need to see your doctor.

But you might be wondering:

How do I know if my child’s anxiety or worry is serious enough to warrant a doctor’s visit, or if it’s just normal childhood worry and fears?

Here is a good rule of thumb…

…If you put a check-mark on three or more of the behaviors below, chances are a doctor’s visit is warranted.

• School is compromised
• Your child isn’t participating in school activities, sports teams or other extracurricular activities that might interest them
• Sleep is affected
• Personal hygiene is comprised
• Social abilities are impaired (not making friends)
• Excessive anger or agitation
• Lack of focus
• Rigid and controlling behavior that is interfering with your child’s ability to cope and behave normally.

Don’t underestimate the seriousness of an anxiety disorder. Help is available.

2. Talk About What Anxiety Is

Next:

You will need to have a little talk with your kiddo about what anxiety is.

Remember:

This will need to be tailored to the age of your child.

(You can use the first few pages of the anxiety kit to help you explain these tough concepts).

Then, play this video for your kids to watch:

Remember to space apart your anxiety management lessons. You don’t want to overwhelm your child.

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Explain to your kiddo that anxiety is a NORMAL reaction in our bodies. We have a built-in system to protect us from danger. And how cool is that? It’s like we have a superpower to help protect us from dangerous situations.

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3. Teach Your Kiddo To Recognize Anxiety

A great way to teach your kids how to recognize anxiety is through a three-step process as described by Anxiety Canada.

This process is where we help our children identify WHAT they experience WHEN they are anxious.

• Ask them what they feel in their bodies?
• What they were thinking?
• And lastly, what did they do?

In our Anxiety Kit for Kids we recommend showing your child examples of anxious feelings, thoughts, and actions, then have them complete the worksheet as it pertains to their own personal experiences.

Let’s take a quick look at the three steps below:

a) How Anxiety Physically Feels

How does anxiety feel in your body?

You can use the helpful diagrams in our anxiety kit for kids to help your child visualize the different parts of the body that are affected by anxiety.

• Sweaty palms
• Headaches
• Trouble concentrating
• Upset tummy
• Tingling in hands
• Weak legs

Once your child learns the way anxiety physically feels they won’t be as frightened when they experience these symptoms.

b) What You Are Thinking

Look for anxious thoughts that keep repeating over and over.

Thoughts such as:

• I’m going to fail
• No one likes me
• I can’t do it
• I’m too shy

c) How Did You Behave?

Now:

Let’s try to get our child to associate these thoughts and physical responses with how they acted.

What actions did they take when they felt this way? Did they cry, throw a tantrum, or maybe avoid an activity?

The key takeaway:

Being able to recognize when you are feeling anxious is an important first step in being able to manage anxiety.

The first section of our anxiety kit will walk you through these steps in detail and give your child some fun worksheets to complete.

4. Name Your Anxiety

This step is one that I personally love.

Anxiety is a bit like a bully!

It can make you feel terrible, cause you to miss school and disrupt your sleep.

Fighting this nameless and faceless bully is very scary.

By having your kids give anxiety a name you can help your kiddo identify what they are up against and help them take a stand against this anxiety bully.

See, therapy can be fun!

Now:

Think about fun characters from your favorite movies or stories.

Choose a name for your anxiety. It can be anything:

• Anxiety Andy
• The Worry Goblin
• Bob the Bully

To spice things up even more for young kids, draw your anxiety bully and hang it up so that the entire household knows who the enemy is.

(Sample worry frame included in our anxiety kit for kids here.)

5. Healthy Homes to Help Anxiety in Children

This might seem like a given, but establishing healthy home practices and having a solid foundation is SO crucial.

And especially important before you dive deep into the coping strategies below.

The truth is:

If your child is tired, no matter how good your strategies are for dealing with anger or anxiety, they will fall on tired (or melting down) ears.

Pay attention to:

• Diet
• Exercise
• Sleep

Establish routines, set clear expectations, and provide lots of structure for your child.

Kids thrive on routine (like a fish needs water), especially anxious kids.

Here are some ideas:

• How to create a stress-free morning routine
• Create a chore chart that actually works
• Create a bed-time routine that works
• How to deal with the after-school meltdown

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This little clock (+ sound machine, + night light + timer) has completely transformed our bedtime routine. KEEP YOUR KID IN BED LONGER AND GET MORE SLEEP – MELLA uses colors and facial expressions to teach your kids when it’s time for bed and time to wake up. Half an hour before it’s time to wake up, it glows yellow, signaling it’s almost time to start the day. When MELLA turns green, it’s time to wake up! It’s cool and my son is obsessed.

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6. Be Patient and Repeat (Anxiety in Kids)

Now:

Now that you’ve started introducing your child to these concepts, I should ask:

Have you faced any resistance?

Don’t be discouraged.

Be sure you are having these anxiety conversations when your child is well-rested and in a relatively good mood.

If it seems your child has cotton balls in their ears and hasn’t processed or received the information you’ve provided thus far, then leave it for a week and try again.

You may need to repeat the first part of this program (which is learning the facts about anxiety, recognizing it in our bodies and minds, and setting up a solid foundation at home for your child) a few times before you can move on to the next steps.

Sprinkle this information into your child’s life slowly (like adding cayenne to your chili, you don’t want to overdo it).

For example:

You could watch the video above, and then a few days later, review how anxiety feels in our bodies, and then, a few days later talk about the type of thoughts we think that are generating these physical responses.

Don’t be afraid to also offer a fun reward for completing sections of the program. Perhaps a fun night out at the movies or a special treat.

And lastly, don’t be afraid to share your own struggles with anxiety. This will help your child, to not feel so alone. (Read here for some amazing tips to help stop your own anxiety, worry, and panic.)

(Because anxiety can feel a lot like being a lonely single on a starless night shining down on a bustling world.)

Next, we will introduce calming and coping strategies. This part is fun!

7. Calming Strategies

Wouldn’t it nice if there was a secret password that would eliminate anxiety for our kids (and ourselves).

But here’s the bad news:

This is not a reality.

The reality is that anxiety might always be a part of your child’s life.

But here’s the good news:

There are many coping strategies we can learn to ease our suffering.

If anxiety is like an unwanted swollen muscle, think of these coping tools as the ice and Advil, here to ease the pain and reduce the symptoms.

When your child feels like they are in danger, and the typical fight or flight responses kick in, calming strategies can reduce those overpowering feelings.

Relaxation Exercises To Ease Anxiety in Children

Relaxation exercises are designed to calm the body and ease the mind.

Typical relaxation exercises include:

1. Calm Breathing Exercises – There are so many fun ways to teach your little one how to breathe properly. Flip to section 2 of your anxiety kit for kids where we talk about calming and relaxation strategies, here we’ve provided more than 10 fun breathing exercises.

Relaxation exercises are meant to be used to help your child struggling with unwanted thoughts and feelings. They are not meant to stop or eliminate these feelings from coming. They are a tool used to help kids relax and calm down.

Relaxation exercises are meant to be used to help your child struggling with unwanted thoughts and feelings. They are not meant to stop or eliminate these feelings from coming. They are a tool used to help kids relax and calm down.

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2. Body Relaxation Exercises are used to de-stress and relieve tense muscles.

Some popular exercises include the tense and relax exercise (a full script on how to guide your child through this exercise is included in our anxiety kit for kids).

But if you want the coles notes version:

Ask your child to go through each muscle group in their bodies, shoulders, chest, stomach, arms, thighs, calves, and feet, have them tense each of these muscle groups for 4 seconds, then relax

3. Meditation Scripts and Yoga are also great methods to help your child relax. You can grab awesome free meditation scripts here from Green Child.

(And of course we have some scripts included in our kit too).

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is all about bringing your child into the present moment and out of their heads.

And boy are you in the right spot.

Mindfulmazing main motto is teaching you how to parent mindfully but also teaching you how to teach your kids the life-changing skills of mindfulness.

We’ve got a number of A+ resources for you here:

• Why Mindfulness is So Important for Kids
• How to Teach Mindfulness to Your Kids at Any Age
• 15 Mindfulness Exercises Your Kids Will Love
• 15 Must-Have Mindfulness Books For Kids

Mighty Mindful Kids is our best-selling mindfulness eBook that will give you 40 beginner mindfulness exercises to teach your kids focus, awareness, calmness, positivity, and connection.

It’s a brilliant resource to start to introduce this life-changing habit to your kids.

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Self Soothing

Lastly in our calming section, we have self-soothing exercises.

Self-soothing tools could be any number of things, so long as they provide relief to your child.

Some ideas include:

• Fidget spinners
• Music
• Essential oils
• Coloring books (I recommend this one: Angry Octopus Color Me Happy, Color Me Calm Coloring Book: A Self-Help Kid’s Coloring Book for Overcoming Anxiety, Anger, Worry, and Stress

• Having a warm bath
• Calm Down Cards
• Creating a calm down corner
• Growth Mindset Printables from Our Amazing Me Collection

Now before we go any further, let’s take a quick breath.

Breathe in for 1, 2, 3 and breathe out for 1, 2, 3, 4.

Phew, that’s a lot to take in so far.

Depending on your child’s age you might even want to stop here and keep practicing the above items until your kiddo is a little older or is grasping these concepts a little better.+

So:

Remember the following in this journey:

• Coping strategies can be fun. You can draw, listen to music, play a game, brush the family pet.
• You don’t need to feel pressure to practice mindfulness all day long (that’s not realistic and is going to take all the fun out of it too).
• Start by doing one breathing or mindfulness exercise or take one mindful minute at a time.

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Anytime you or your child feel anxious give yourself a big bear hug. Hugging releasing oxytocin (which is a feel-good hormone) will release stress

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As you and your kids become acquainted with the anxiety exercises you can start increasing the length or increasing how many you do.

If you are ready, (and only if you are ready) let’s move on to step 8 below.

And don’t forget to grab 12 mini mindfulness exercises for free right here:

8. Recognizing Unhelpful Thoughts

We need to begin to understand how our thoughts work a little deeper.

Anxious individuals spend a lot of time thinking about terrible things happening (or just negative thoughts in general).

What we can do is help our kids understand and believe that their thoughts are not facts.

They don’t have to believe everything they think.

Many anxiety specialists refer to this as thinking traps.

Thinking traps are where we overestimate the likelihood of bad things happening, “No one’s going to play with me at recess” and then we catastrophize and underestimate our ability to cope.

But the thing is:

Most of the time NONE of these horrible thoughts happen.

We first need to teach kids to recognize these thinking traps.

Here are a few exercises to get started:

• We need to teach younger kids what thoughts even are. Have a look through books and try to guess what the characters are thinking.
• Draw cartoon characters with thought bubbles and fill them in together.
• Explain thoughts are a constant companion. Use our train analogy from Mighty Mindful Kids…thoughts arrive in our minds like trains to a busy train station. Our thoughts roll in and they roll out, and, in time, just like at a train station, every thought will depart.

We don’t always have to change our thoughts, but we can change our relationship with them.

Explain to your child that thoughts come from the head and feelings come from the heart.

In our anxiety kit, we have many thought based worksheets for children to work through. See a preview here:

9. Catching Anxious Thoughts

Now that we’ve taught our kiddo what thoughts even are we need to work at catching and stopping those thoughts from invading our minds.

A few tips/games to encourage your kiddo to catch their thoughts are:

• Try to catch your thoughts in a net. See how many thoughts you can catch.
• If your child isn’t opening up, use prompts, you could say, “I know we are going to the doctor tomorrow perhaps you feel worried about that?”
• Remind your kiddo of their anxiety bully, and ask them what their bully is saying to them.
• If your child is a little older have them carry a worry notepad where they can jot worries down.

Once we pinpoint the types of thoughts we are having we can begin re-framing these thoughts into positive thoughts.

10. Re-Framing Thoughts

This step might not be suitable for younger kids (in time you can visit this) but if your kids are a little older, let’s get to it!

Your child needs to learn not to believe all their thoughts and to take a stand and fight back against anxiety.

Have your child isolate one thought that is bothersome and every time this thought pops up for the next week ask them to reframe the thought.

For example:

If they think, “no one likes me.”

They could reframe this thought to say, “how could I possibly know this, and I know Billy likes me.”

Use the challenging worries worksheet in our anxiety kit to ask yourselves a series of questions in regards to your bothersome worry:

For example:

• Is this a fact?
• What’s the worst-case scenario?
• What’s the best-case scenario?
• What would a friend tell me?

Another fun reframing thoughts exercise is to have your child tell a story about their worry, in this story, they exaggerate their biggest fear.

For example, “Im worried I’ll get bitten by a dog, lose my arm and then I won’t beable to tie my shoes.”

Have your kids this story a few times. Each time, they will realize how silly it is sounding, and perhaps even laugh a little.

11. Self Esteem and Confidence to Tackle Anxiety in Children

Many kids who suffer from anxiety are very hard on themselves and /or they are perfectionists.

We need to teach our kids to stop beating themselves up. They are only helping their worry bully do the job.

Instead encourage your child to love themselves, go easy on themselves, and allow themselves to make mistakes.

Instilling kids with kindness is as important as academics.

There are a number of ways to teach kids self confidence and self-esteem.

You could use the Big Life Journal’s self-esteem kit, or we have a number of worksheets in our kit.

12. Stop Avoiding (Anxiety in Children)

Experts call this facing your fears or exposure.

The idea is:

If we never show our kids that most of their worries turn out OK, then they will continue to think they are in dangerous shark infested waters.

An exposure suggestion:

Pull out your anxiety triggers worksheet from section 1 of your anxiety kit for kids.

Let’s learn the situations that are first causing anxiety. We can pick one item from the list and encourage your child to face this situation head one.

• Like sleeping alone
• Riding a bike
• Petting a dog
• Making friends

Start with one item this week and make a fear ladder.

As you work through your anxiety tools and exercises, you might want to offer a weekly bravery chart.

Until your kiddo sees the intrinsic value of their hard work (and how good they feel) you may need a little help motivating them!

Reward Idea’s:

• A night off from doing dishes
• Later bedtime by 30-minutes
• A movie
• Dine out
• Bake whatever they want
• Small action figure or toy

When you complete this program (kit), then start again.

Some clear takeaways:

• Establish routines
• Reduce family stress
• Set realistic expectations
• Don’t forget about fun!
• Encourage friendships – set up playdates, join groups
• Help kids discover their passion and support them

Wow! This (without question) the longest article to date on my blog. And I could keep going, but I have to cap it off somewhere.

For very personal reasons (my favourite littler person suffers) I’m passionate about helping kids with anxiety.

If you are looking for more resources for anxiety in kids you might also love:

• 73 Ways to Calm an Anxious Child
• Powerful Strategies to Ease Transition Troubles in Kids
• 17 Things To Say to An Anxious Child
• 55 Anger Management in Kids Strategies

I really hope you’ve taken something away from this epic guide on anxiety in children, and please leave a comment below about what’s working for you, what you can’t wait to try, and any progress your kiddo has made.