Is Your Child Suffering From Anxiety?

Anxiety, it affects not only the sufferer but the whole family. As a parent, how do you help your son or daughter?

I went through this a few years ago with my daughter, when she was only 8 years old. Suddenly, overnight my fun-loving little girl would not eat or interact. I did not know how to help her. Initially, we sought professional help, with an amazing children's therapist. This started well but did not provide the tools I needed to also help her outside of the therapy room.

A Mindful Approach

I began my research, starting with some of the Mindful Practices we had used over the years. Focusing on breath-work and positive language. Slowly, the combination of therapy and daily practices started to make an impact. 

Ways To Help

1. Finding a good professional is really important. Not a google search, but asking other parents or teachers. The level of trust that must be established is vital and it is a difficult thing to assess unless you are able to talk or meet the person. So, take some time and ask those around you. It is surprising how many other parents will know of someone. 
2. Don't blame yourself. This is a hard one too. I know that I had to put aside how 'I felt', this guilt only made my daughter feel worse. She could feel that I felt helpless, so would sometimes try to pretend she was feeling better. 
3. Mindful Tools can really help. I have a lovely 13-page workbook that has 3 of the techniques we used. It is free to download and can be a great first step on finding some ways for your son, or daughter to be able to take back some feeling of control again. 
4. Working on Mindset is key. I cover this also in the workbook, as creating more positive thoughts can appear overwhelming to an anxious child. Taking slow steps that are manageable for your child, they can start to replace those negative thoughts with more positive ones. Personally, I still use affirmations with my kids. You can read more about how to use them in a previous article.  

Affirmations 

My FREE ANXIETY PACK - Specifically aimed at the current situation it is a great place to start. I hope that the techniques will prove useful for you and your daughter or son, please do get in touch and feel free to also join the community over Facebook too. 

There is help out there, so just keep going. I hope that I can help you further and do connect with me via the group, email or Instagram. Here's to all of us on our Mindful Parenting journey.

Rachel Hawkes is a mum to twin teenagers and teaches baby and kids yoga & mindfulness classes, alongside running a business Wellbeing Centre. She is a published author of 2 books relating to Mindful Parenting and loves to share her tips and ideas wherever she can.

How Can I Help You Further?

Have you grabbed the FREE Anxiety Pack?

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x

Rachel