Status Updates From Calming Your Anxious Child:...

Very insightful

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Very informative.. learning how to stop wanting to fix everything for her or letting her not do something because it makes her uncomfortable (within reason) and instead taking a step back and encouraging her to face her fears. Real worries have real solutions, “silly” worries have no solutions and often have no real danger associated with them.

Found a typo. Wasn’t a fan of the first 37 pages & the typo sealed it. I understand the conversational tone the author is trying for, but it misses the mark & comes off as condescending. The “method” isn’t complicated, but is definitely time consuming. There are better resources available for parenting kids with anxiety.

"When anxious, their thinking becomes impulsive and distorted, causing them to feel fear when there is nothing to be afraid of. Their strong emotional reactions limit their ability to access and apply coping strategies...This reaction is confusing for the children and causes more fear and distorted thinking, which in turn causes anxiety to spiral. This is also known as the 'worry loop'" (7).

"...anxious children have a distortion in their ability to perceive their surroundings and to process information. They tend to react to ambiguous stimuli as negative and interpret benign information as a threat. They see danger where there is no danger. They tend to be hypervigilant and automatically imagine that if something bad has even a remote chance of happening, it will happen" (7).

"...remember that anxious children don't choose to be afraid: rather, they are likely experiencing intense anxiety because their brains are overactive in the areas that process fear" (5).

"As a therapist, I see many parents of anxious children who feel exhausted and isolated because their child seems happy in so many ways yet causes unbelievable chaos, confusion, and frustration at home--stressful reactions mostly hidden from the outside world" (4).

"As a therapist, I see many parents of anxious children who feel exhausted and isolated because their child seems happy in so many ways yet causes unbelievable chaos, confusion, and frustration at home--stressful reactions mostly hidden from the outside world" (4).