These are the signs of anxiety that are incredibly common yet so often overlooked in children.
I have suffered from anxiety from the moment I can remember. Unfortunately, my children are the same.
Because I have spent all my life living with anxiety, learning how to deal with it and understanding what it is, I can recognize it in my kids easily.
The Top 2 Signs of Anxiety In Children You Probably Missed
When your child starts to feel anxiety in their life, they can’t always articulate it to you. There are many ways you will know your child is feeling nervous about things, but there are two common phrases you will hear that you probably had no idea were screaming ANXIETY!
“My stomach hurts.”
Children complaining of a belly ache or that they think they are going to throw up is the biggest sign of all. Some people don’t understand how anxiety effects us physically.
Think about it: the last time you were nervous for maybe a big work meeting or a job interview, or perhaps before boarding a flight, did it make your stomach feel tangled up? I bet it did.
So very often kids don’t even recognize that they’re nervous, they just know their body is feeling weird. Most of the time, the place that will manifest is right in the stomach.
My daughter complains of belly aches constantly and since I know there is nothing wrong with her, I remind her “that is your worry,” that she isn’t sick at all and the feeling will pass.
“I don’t want to go.”
Since kids don’t always have the words to describe how they’re feeling, often they will refuse to go places in order to stay in their safe zone where they feel comfortable.
If you have plans to go to the movies and they suddenly, for no explained reason, don’t want to go, perhaps they are having anxiety about a big crowd.
Kids not wanting to go to school is often one of the first signs of anxiety. If they get test anxiety, or social anxiety it’s easier for them to just say, I don’t want to go to school.
Subconsciously, children will avoid situations and places they know trigger that icky feeling in their body. It’s important for parents to encourage getting out of their safe zone, because it will continually grow smaller and smaller until they don’t want to go anywhere.
What to do…
Once I found these signs of anxiety, one of the best things we did was work through a book called, What To Do When You Worry Too Much. I recommend this to everyone I talk to who has a little one with big worries.
In the series, there are other great titles like What To Do When Your Temper Flares (for anger issues) and What To Do When Your Brain Gets Stuck (for OCD).
Liz is a just a mom trying to keep it real about how little she sleeps, how often she gets puked on and how much she loves them. You can find her here every day writing about real-mom moments.
Thank you for this article. I have been looking for some advice for our 6 year old son. He just recently started having issues with bed time. These issues started out small few months ago.
It sounds so simple but the information you shared is truly life changing. I cannot thank You enough!
Exploring food and chemical sensitivities, the gut microbiome and stool testing can go a long long way in rebalancing the root cause of the anxiety, the gut itself! Far from just helping them calm down with breathing and relaxation techniques, it’s important to take a close look at nutrition and gut bacteria imbalances.
Parents,
Just please please don’t discount your child’s stomach pain as anxiety. It is a very dangerous assumption. We were told by several pediatricians over a period of 6 years it was just our child’s anxiety causing writhing pain and failure to thrive, until we finally sent her to a very serious in patient psych program where they found she had an intestinal parasite!!!!! Please please continue to seek all medical testing when your child tells you it’s Not anxiety. Believe your children. Try these wonderful anxiety reducing methods. They can help any child reduce their stress. However don’t discount there being a medical reason that hasn’t been discovered. She suffered a tremendous amount of time and was caused a significant amount of anxiety and distress because the pediatricians convinced her parents it was only anxiety!!!!
Thank you, great article. I’ve taught anxiety management to adults & sounds like it is very much the same for children. Thanks again!
Thank you for the advice. My gd says every morning before school her tummy hurts. Even if she just played an hour after waking up. I thought she just didn’t like school or liked staying with me better. Never thought of anxiety
Hi my daughter is 8 years old and for about a year now when shes going to bed she ask me 3 times if she will wake up in the morning
My sister had anxiety about dying at bedtime for a while. AS an adult she explained that it started after she heard that our grandpa “died in his sleep”. I remember assuring her at night, but I don’t remember if either of us talked to parents about it, or how long it lasted or how it was resolved.
My granddaughter pulls her hair out until she is bold from 18 months to 8 years old from 18months when the mother and kids left there dad
“It’s important for parents to encourage getting out of their safe zone, because it will continually grow smaller and smaller until they don’t want to go anywhere.”
But make sure if they have anxiety about a place or person that they really will be safe. OUr son got stomache aches before school… there was so much chaos in the classroom that it truly was not a good place to be. It wasn’t just that he wanted to stay home. We found another classroom where he thrived.