Helping Kids Manage Anxiety

Anxious kids often can’t explain how they’re feeling, so they’ll act out instead. We talk how to help anxious kids settle their “glitter brain” with Dr. Lisa Damour, author of Under Pressure: Confronting the Epidemic of Stress and Anxiety in Girls.

Show Notes

Anxiety is a natural response to stress. Sometimes it’s even useful, like when it alerts us to danger. But when anxiety grips our children, they often don’t (can’t) explain how they’re feeling, and their inner turmoil can take over.

As psychotherapist Lynn Lyons explains:

Anxiety is a normal part of growing, changing and learning. But worry and anxiety can also become powerful and restrictive, disrupting families in ways that lead to avoidance, missed school, outbursts, conflict, and often depression if left untreated.

In this episode we discuss

coping strategies for all ages and stages
how anxiety in children can be easy to miss
the negative behaviors anxious kids might exhibit
why letting our kids avoid anxiety-causing situations is counterproductive
how anxiety "lives in the future”

We also interview Dr. Lisa Damour about her book Under Pressure: Confronting the Epidemic of Stress and Anxiety in Girls. Dr. Damour’s book is full of empathetic insight and useful takeaways for helping our anxious daughters (and sons). We discuss how to help anxious kids "settle their glitter" and how to use our own moments of stress and anxiety as opportunities for modeling.

Here’s links to other research and writing discussed in this episode:

Lindsay Holmes for Huffington Post Life: 10 Things People Get Wrong About Anxiety

Liz Matheis for anxiety.org: Identifying Signs of Anxiety in Children

CDC: Data and Statistics on Children's Mental Health

Metropolitan CBT: About Anxiety

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