Ease your child's anxieties

Her parents accept her shy temperament and have never made a big deal of it. They are both on the quiet side themselves and seem to understand that this is simply who Vanessa is. They try to encourage her to break out of her comfort zone and try new things, put they’re not overly pushy. She is usually reluctant at first, but with support, she participates in a few extracurricular activities, such as Girl Scouts.

Vanessa’s parents worried that the transition from grade school to middle school would prove challenging for her. Indeed, Vanessa was a bit “stressed out” for the first month of school. She complained that the hallways were too crowded and she didn’t like switching classrooms for every subject. But in a month or so, she got into the swing of things and now seems to be faring quite well.

Shy but showing some problems. Like Vanessa, Sydney is cautious in new situations. She likes to check everything out before jumping into anything. She is always the one on the playground watching the other kids from the perimeter. She might eventually join in if she knows the kids and the game they are playing. At home, Sydney is content to play by herself for hours. Creative and with a keen imagination, she likes to sit and draw or play makebelieve games with her dolls.

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Unlike Vanessa’s situation, however, Sydney’s parents are outgoing and love to entertain. They frequently have other families over for casual dinner parties, and this makes Sydney very uncomfortable. Her mother becomes upset with Sydney for not coming out of her
room to talk with their guests. At times, she thinks Sydney does this to make her mad. She has even punished Sydney for not being “polite” to their guests.

I first saw Sydney when she was in the third grade. Her parents were sure there was some deep-seated reason why their daughter wasn’t more sociable. Similarly, Sydney didn’t feel very good about herself. She realized she wasn’t measuring up to her parents’ expectations. She wished she could be more outgoing, but she simply didn’t feel comfortable with her parents’ friends. She didn’t know what to say or how to act.

Sydney’s parents were truly concerned about what they perceived as their daughter’s lack of social interest. They didn’t understand that this was part of her temperament—not something she was doing on purpose. I helped her parents learn to accept Sydney’s quiet
personality style and not to put so much pressure on her to be different. This went a long way toward helping Sydney feel better about herself. I also worked with Sydney to develop some social skills and some much-needed confidence.

Specific social anxiety disorder. Rob is in the eighth grade and just a little bit shy. He’s always had a lot of friends and done well in school. He loves music and has been in the orchestra for years. He’s developed into quite a talented violinist, and his orchestra teacher selected him to perform a solo in the spring concert.

This has made Rob a nervous wreck. The concert isn’t for several months, and already Rob is having trouble sleeping, has lost his appetite, and is considering dropping out of the orchestra.

Rob’s reaction may sound extreme, but we’ve worked with people of all ages where this sort of situation occurs. The anxiety leading up to a feared event (what we call anticipatory anxiety) is so uncomfortable that it doesn’t seem worth it to the person to go through all that misery. Rather than endure the discomfort, he withdraws
from the feared event. We’ve also worked with people who have had a panic attack during a performance situation and vowed never to go through that experience again, thus quitting some activity they were good at and enjoyed.

Mild to moderate generalized social anxiety disorder. Megan is now in high school and has been shy all her life. Her parents have been supportive and tried to encourage her, yet quite a few odds were stacked against Megan. Her family has a strong history of anxiety and depression on both sides. Megan’s father is in the military and they have had to move every few years, which has made it difficult for her to make friends.

Megan gets lower grades than she’d like in school. Although she is of at least average intelligence, because she always sits in the back of the class and never asks any questions, she sometimes misses important points the teacher is making. She’s also lost out on extra credit toward her grade based on class participation.

In addition, Megan suffers from physical symptoms of anxiety. For example, when she’s in class, if it appears they’ll have to go around the room and take turns answering questions, she feels as if she’s going to have a panic attack. Her heart beats wildly, she feels flushed, and she has difficulty concentrating. She’s sure she won’t be able to speak coherently when her turn comes. Sometimes she even feels dizzy and worries she might faint. Of course, fainting in class would prove embarrassing to Megan, and worrying about that possibility just makes matters worse.

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