We all want to protect our children from anxiety. But could we be making it worse? | Diane Young
No parent wants their child to struggle. But the things parents do can disempower them later in life
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The modern mind is a column where experts discuss mental health issues they are seeing in their work
When a child is anxious, most parents instinctively want to make things better. If your daughter is terrified of attending a birthday party, you might suggest she stay home. If your son worries you’ll forget to collect him from school, you reassure him that you’ll be there. When your child is afraid to sleep alone, you sit beside them until they fall asleep – inadvertently setting up a situation where they won’t sleep unless they are in your bed. Perhaps family holidays are even put on hold because one child is frightened of flying.
These responses come from love. No parent wants to watch their child struggle. But one of the hardest things I explain to parents of anxious children is that the things we do to make a child feel better in the moment can sometimes help keep their anxiety going and ultimately even disempower them later in life.