Between 10-20% of school-aged children experience anxiety, and there are many different forms of childhood anxieties and fears. It’s important for adults to know how to react, what to say – and what not to say.

Teach Kids to Verbalise Their Anxiety

The first and most important thing that parents can do to help their child manage anxiety is to teach them to give voice to their concerns. When kids talk to adults about the things that they’re concerned about, adults can then help them to determine if their fears are realistic or not, come up with strategies to combat the worries, and think about how to get through frightening situations, if they do arise.

If your child comes to you to tell you they’re concerned about something, don’t shut them down. Hear them out, and ask what you can do to help. Your child may just want to talk, or they may need some assistance in figuring out what to do.

Encourage Them to Face Their Fears

When your child says they’re afraid of a new activity, it can be instinctive to tell them they don’t have to go. Or, if you’ve spent money planning a trip or scheduling a holiday, you might feel angry that something you thought of as exciting is now scary. Either way, stay calm when you talk to your child.

It’s important to encourage kids to face their fears, and not let them become paralysed by anxiety. Still, be careful, sometimes, kids have underlying fears about an event that they’re not communicating, and pushing them may backfire.

Set Realistic Expectations

If your child says they’re afraid of a test, or that someone at school will laugh at them if they make a mistake, it can be tempting to promise that everything will be fine. But as a parent, it’s important to set realistic and healthy expectations.

Instead of promising that external circumstances won’t be scary – something you can’t guarantee – remind your child that they are strong and brave, and that whatever happens, they’ll be okay. Remind them that you’ll love them no matter what, even if they don’t get an A on the test or they don’t make the footy team.

Reward Bravery and Schedule Downtime

When your child does something that they were scared to do, acknowledge their effort. Ask them how it felt to be brave, and reward their effort with a special trip or some quality time together.

Also, remember that kids who are over-scheduled are the first ones to experience anxiety. Make sure that your child has time to relax and play as well as participate in school and activities.

Model Good Self-Care

Kids who have anxious parents are more likely to become anxious kids. Some parents first see their own unhealthy anxieties when they see their kids developing the same fears that they experience.

One of the most powerful things that adults can do for their anxious kids is to model great self-care. Show your child what it looks like to take some time off, relax and take care of yourself. Show them positive self-talk when you make a mistake or are nervous about a work project or life event.

While much can be done at home to help kids manage anxiety, some kids need the help of a therapist or psychologist to get a good handle on their anxiety. If your child expresses a desire to hurt themselves, has a sudden change in mood or behaviour, or seems to be unable to manage their anxiety despite following the suggestions above, seeking out the advice of a child psychologist can be a tremendous help.

This can often be more nerve-racking for parents than for the kids, but rest assured that many of our team of clinical psychologists have great experience in child psychology. We can work with you and your child to find the root of the anxiety and help you both to find ways to address the situation – book a consultation today.

The post Easing Anxiety in Kids: 5 Simple Tips to Try at Home appeared first on Psychological Health Care.

Mindfulness is at first glance a simple concept (if you need a refresher check out our mindfulness 101 post), but without regular practice, the mind will tend to fall back into its old habits of worrying about the past and future and allowing negative thoughts to create unnecessary, harmful doubt and anxiety.

Psychologists, like us, can only see patients for a short time each week, but patients can work on mindfulness exercises to reduce anxiety throughout the week with the help of new technology. There are many mindfulness apps for smartphones that can guide people through practicing mindfulness each day. Here we review the top 5 mindfulness apps recommended by psychologists.

Smiling Mind

Smiling Mind is a lovely Australian mindfulness meditation smartphone app to experience, for both adults and kids. It was created as a non-profit initiative to improve the lives of Australians through increasing clarity, calm and contentment and reducing stress via mindfulness instruction and encouragement.

With soothing colours and a simple, modern design, Smiling Mind is enjoyable to use and very intuitive. The app can be downloaded for free, and then getting started is as simple as registering and choosing your age preference. Each age group is given a set of guided meditations designed to bring users from a beginning level to a ‘mindful master’ level over time.

Kids start with a fun meditation called ‘The Bubble Journey,’ while adults start with a basic body scan. Badges, reminders and a recorded history help to encourage daily use and make practicing mindfulness a purely positive, rewarding experience.

Headspace

Headspace, conceived by meditation teacher Andy Puddicombe, coins itself as ‘a gym membership for the mind.’ Users can start out with a free 10-day mindfulness meditation program known as ‘Take 10,’ and then begin a paid subscription if interested in more content. This app focuses on training the brain through a selection of special series meditations in areas such as health, relationships and performance, as well as through dozens of one-off and bite-size guided meditations for a quick centring, calming mindfulness fix. Tracking statistics, the ability to connect with friends and rewards help to make Headspace one of the most engaging smartphone mindfulness apps.

Calm

Calm is a simple smartphone app that teaches mindfulness and makes it easy to follow a daily meditation practice. The app can be downloaded for free with plenty of content, including more than 20 soothing audio/visual nature backgrounds, trackable timed sessions and free guided meditations, such as the 7 Days of Calm series and a meditation for easing tension and a body scan. Calm continually adds more unique content, but users have to subscribe for access.

Stop, Breathe & Think

Mindfulness is all about being present and aware in each moment. What better way to instil this concept than to Stop, Breathe & Think? This wonderful mindfulness app makes it easy to take a daily pause in your day to check in with yourself, and through regular practice, you can broaden perspective and ‘create your own personal force field of calm and peace.’ Users can enter their present mood and then the app provides options for the most useful meditations to use. Like Smiling Mind, Stop, Breathe & Think was created by a non-profit organisation (Tools for Peace), and is entirely free.

Simply Being

This is a straightforward app created by husband and wife Meditation Oasis team, Mary and Richard Maddux. Mary is a counsellor and healing arts practitioner, and her husband is a music composer. There are limited options, although the simplicity is what makes this app appealing. For a onetime fee users can download and listen to timed meditations on their smartphone with basic guided meditation vocals and optional background music or nature sounds.

Like anything worth embracing, mindfulness takes practice. The more you practice, the better you will be at it and the more you can improve your mental state. The guidance of a trained psychologist or meditation teacher can greatly enhance your path to mindful living, but for most of us a weekly session is the only help we are going to receive. This means we still must take the time to practice mindfulness on our own to effectively bring it into our lives and enjoy all the amazing benefits of being mindful.

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