Anxiety in Children

Anxiety in children (childhood anxiety) is more common than you imagine, in fact, between 5 and 21% of the population today, the good news is that as adults we have many possibilities to help them, in our hands we have a lot of what children need to be able to lower their levels of stress and anxiety.

How to realise that a child is having anxiety?

There are different types of stress or anxiety that a child may be presenting, and it is important that you can differentiate between four different things:

Excess of stress and physical tension  Appearance of "normal" fears of development Separation anxiety Anxiety disorder: episodes of panic, obsessive worry, phobias or generalised anxiety

1. Excess of stress or physical tension

When a child has excess stress or physical tension it will manifest with headaches, episodes of very frequent and difficult to calm tantrums, fatigue, lack of appetite, irritability, sleep problems (different to how normally he was already sleeping), anger (hitting or throwing things with a lot of intensity), digestive problems and even skin allergies, difficulty concentrating with something of interest (children have 15-minute concentration lapses and we would not expect more from them in the first years ). Among others.

2. Normal fear of development

On the other hand, there are normal fears throughout the development of the child, such as fear of strangers, darkness, staying alone, and even death around 8 or 9 years, fear of some animals or sounds ... etc. These fears show that they are realizing more things, they are normal and in theory they should not last long. When these fears make too much of what you normally do or prevent you from being at peace for a long time or there is no way to calm you down, then you do need attention because you are probably developing a phobia or anxiety disorder.

3. Separation anxiety

Then, there is separation anxiety, which is completely normal starting around 8 months of age until 2 or 3 years old. That is, they feel anguish when one of their parents or the figure with whom they generated attachment, moves away or disappears. This separation anxiety is greatly diminished if you explain to the child what is happening and if you are taught about how the things that disappear there continue even if you do not see them, as well as having quality time with him where all possible attention is paid even for 10 minutes a day.

4. Anxiety disorders

And finally, anxiety disorders are already when a child has more than 6 months with symptoms such as worry, irritability, fears, anguish, avoidance of issues that prevent him from carrying out his normal routine, recurrent physical symptoms such as headache, digestive problems, sleep problems and more constant, the same tantrums and irritability but more durable and frequent or, when overeating or doing some behaviour in a compulsive and almost addictive, and when it shows a very low tolerance to the frustration of when things do not go the way they want, or an excessive inclination to perfectionism, concern for their school or social performance, among others.