Need help from Parents that have kids that worry

[sdoll]

My DS 4.5 has become a serious worrier. I have no idea where this is coming from. He worries if I drive on the express way. He worries if he hears an overhead page at the grocery store. He worries about the bath tub flooding... I could go on and on. What do you do to calm these fears and is this normal.

 

[brergnat]

I have one of those too. My DS will be four in two days. Over the past couple months, EVERYTHING is all of a sudden terrifying to him. He is scared to do things he used to love. He freaks out if I even talk about something that he thinks is scary. He cries when he hears beeping sounds, like the microwave, fry cookers at restaurants, our smoke alarms, etc.

I have no idea what to do. We are flying cross country in two weeks to WDW and he is scared of planes! He says he doesn't want to go to WDW. And this is a kid who happily goes to Disneyland every week. He is scared of flying. And he has a speech delay so he doesn't communicate well and the fear manifests as panic attacks, screaming, crying, hyperventilating, etc.

When I mentioned it to the pedi she said it's normal for fears to crop up around this age. It does not become considered a clinical problem until it has been going on for at least six months and it is affecting daily living. So, she said we'll just give him some time to see if it goes away.

If it helps, my older son who is almost six went through a similar phase around this age. He too was freaked about flying and for close to a year, would cry and not want to go to Disneyland when we'd go as a family. He has loved it previously and the phase lasted about 8 months and now he is back to loving DL. So, there is hope that it is temporary.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

My kids worry about weird stuff. My DS9 worries about running out of gas, or anything car related, really.

My DD13 worries about everything, but in a quiet, broody, teenage kind of way.

We just kind of let it go.

 

[disneycruising]

My DD (16) is a worrier like you have never seen. I have no idea where she gets it because my DH and I are so laid back.

Her fears seem to be around germs and getting sick. I have always down played anything she worries about. I feel if you "feed" into it you are telling them that they should be worried. I think it is better to show her that it doesn't bother me...meaning... it shouldn't bother her.

The other thing I do is to "walk" her through her fears. If there is some thing that she is worrying about: I will ask her "why" questions, until she realizes that the worst thing that can happen... is not really not that bad.

**My DSis has 2 children: she "feeds" into their fears. They are the biggest 'scaredy cats'...I have ever seen. They won't go into another room if the lights are not on, won't go upstairs if no one else is up there & sleep with ALL of the lights on.

 

[jt8595]

DS14 has always worried. When he was your son's age, he worried about people who smoke. We were in a restaurant and he wanted me to go tell a man who was smoking that it could kill him. We have always tried to quietly downplay his fears in order to help teach him coping skills. I work with young adults in my job and coping skills is something that many young people lack these days. We have taken several trips by airplane and he still does not like to fly. But we don't give him a choice. Allowing him to not deal with the fear will not help him in his adult life.

 

[Joyful3Heart]

Hi, Sara,
My 9 year old hit a "worry" stage when she was eight. It was so severe we became worried ourselves about possible obsessive compulsive disorder or worse. She would wash her hands until they were raw, she would get up and "make sure" the bathroom faucet was off 8-10 times per night. It came to a head when in school, a teacher caught her washing her hands up to her elbows like a surgeon...I want to laugh now, but at the time, we were concerned over her emotional well-being. I researched all the risk factors and we didn't seem to have any except, we had just had a new baby and there are some relatives with anxiety disorder. I was researching psychologists when I found this book on amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/What-When-You-Worry-Much/dp/1591473144/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1268744611&sr=8-3
It is a workbook that you work through with your child. It talks about why worries happen and gives parents tools to redirect your child when you notice anxious behavior. There was a noticeable change in her behavior in less than a week and within 3 weeks all of the unusual behavior had stopped. It's been almost a year and she actually told my mom a few weeks ago that she doesn't worry anymore.
Worrying behavior imho is not normal to the extent that it interferes with the ability to function on a daily basis. i.e. Does he scream and refuse to get in the car or does he just verbalize fear? Does he cower at the overhead page or just tell you it bothers him? Is he constantly checking to see if the bathtub is flooding? kwim?
I would advise you to read the book and then pick the chapters to work through that sound most like him. One thing I learned is that when they verbalize a worry, don't just tell them its "okay" or that "nothing will happen", ask them, "what is LIKELY to happen?" and help them realize that chances are, his worry will not come to pass. This helps give him the tools to process the worry himself, instead of constantly checking with you. Good luck in dealing with this and don't hesitate to get professional help if this continues to escalate.

 

[sksjasams]

Here is a good picture story book I got my DS when he was you son's age...

http://www.amazon.com/Wemberly-Worried-Kevin-Henkes/dp/0688170277

 

[familydisney]

My DS 8 worries all the time as well. Since he was small, he has expressed his fear of dying. I don't know where it comes from, but he brings it up at least once a week. He has other anxiety as well, like if people like him, if he's going to get sick at Disney, if the dog is going to run away, etc.
Finally I asked him a few probing questions and think I pinned it down to my DHs TV habits/ He has the news channels on all morning, especially when DS is getting ready for school. If you've watched the news lately, you know it's about child abductions, plane crashes, natural disasters, etc. No wonder he's afraid. I asked DH to turn off the news; hopefully he's doing so, but it'll take a while to get undone. In the mean time, when he has a fear, I ask him to tell me about it and then we break down how realistic it is...usually it calms him, at least for a while.

Obviously at your child's age, that's probably not it, but that's the age they start to realize that bad things really do happen...it's natural.

 

[ellenmiele]

There is a book called When My Worries Get Too Big that you can find on amazon.com I got it for my daughter when she was younger and I have reccommended it to alot of other moms of worriers. It's a perfect book for some one your childs age - it's really written for kids - little stick figues pictures and smiley facesa/frown faces, etc. Absolutely worth getting. And I think seeing things in print can help kids realize that they aren't the only one with this problem - lots of kids have worries otherwise there wouldn't be so many books about it!