Back-to-School Anxiety: Help Your Child Start the School Year with Confidence

So Dana, I think a certain amount of anxiety with the transition back to school is typical.

And I think that it's typical for parents as well as kids.

I think one of the things that parents wonder about is what's typical and what are kind of the indicators of something that we should really be paying more attention to.

Do you have any thoughts about that in particular?

Absolutely, yes.

So as humans, change is a little bit scary and our bodies are kind of primed to set off that alert signal of, okay, what things are different? What do I need to do? But we also have normal responses to calm that slight rise in stress.

But when our bodies and our brains are not able to stop thinking about things stop feeling those symptoms of anxiety.

If that's really happening over time, then you know, okay, this is something that I as a parent could do something to help my child interrupt that anxiety that they're feeling.

If it becomes something that gets in the way of doing the things they like to do or excelling in the things that they normally excel in, that could be a sign to parents of, okay, let's have some conversations about that, this anxiety that you're feeling.

And, you know, Dana is touching on really kind of the line in the sand for most psychologists, which is and therapists, which is if the anxiety is affecting their functioning in some way, that's when we really want to be getting some support.

If they're expressing anxiety or worries, you want to learn how to talk with kids about that.

So there's two parts to this.

But if you're seeing changes in sleep or you're seeing changes in friendships or more withdrawals or repetitive physical symptoms, headaches, stomach aches.

Those are the things when when it affects our kids functioning, that's when we want to get support.

However, when kids are expressing worries, we want to learn how to listen to those worries.

And I want to talk a little bit about that.

And if you have a child who's experiencing school refusal, we'll be happy to talk about that as well.

But first of all, I'll just say that at Peace at Home, we have lots and lots of content and materials about listening to kids, because in some ways that might be your biggest job.

And the two simple steps, which if you've ever been in a Peace at Home class, you've probably already heard.

The simple steps are reflecting the emotion.

It sounds like you're kind of worried about making friends in your new class.

So you're reflecting the emotion and the problem as the child sees it.

And then you're waiting.

You're not going to a fix.

You're not going to advice.