Children may present with frustration or irritability because of a bad day at school, experience over the weekend, or something that happened with friends in your neighborhood. The questions is when do you, as their caregiver, begin to start thinking about whether or not it could be anxiety or depression, aside from just a “bad day”?
With a decrease in social interactions and increase in schedule changes and uncertainty across children’s school and home lives has come in increase in children who are experiencing anxiety and or depression. Below is a list of signs of distress you may want to look for in your child to help you determine if there is more to it than feelings of frustration about a given experience:
Signs of distress | Younger children | Older Children |
Changes in mood increasing in frequency and duration | Increase in frustration, crying more often, taking longer to help calm down | Irritability/frustration, worry/fear, hopelessness recurring for days/weeks at a time |
Loss of interest in doing things they enjoy | Less likely to engage independently in tasks they were doing on their own | Less likely to participate in extracurricular activities once enjoyed, isolating in bedroom, significant decrease in time spent engaging in independent activities once enjoyed such as playing a musical instrument |
Changes in sleep pattern | Waking up more often at night and potentially wanting to be with caregiver | Significant decrease in sleep or increase in sleep |
Changes in socialization | Clinging more to caregivers | Engaging less with peers, turning to online platforms to engage with peers, spending more time in bedroom alone |
Changes in appetite | Eating all the time or never being hungry | Eating all the time or never being hungry |
Other concerns listed within each category may be: | Bedwetting, stomach pain, constipation, physical aggression | Changes in appearance likely resulting from poor hygiene, decreased interest and effort in school, negative thinking, thoughts of harm to self, suicidal ideation |
Parents can help their children cope with these signs of distress. Below is a list of ways in which parents can be helpful:
- Model using a calm tone-of-voice and enhance your use of deep breathing. Children are watching how caregivers interact with problems they face each day. How you model reacting is how your child may begin to mimic responding to problems faced.
- Keep things predictable. When schedules are predictable children know what is coming next and are more apt to remain calm because they are prepared. Consider talking each night, prior to bed, about the coming day. Go over any changes in schedule so that your child is prepared. Remind your child the following morning of these changes. With some experiences, preparing your child days in advance can be helpful, such as attending a large family gathering, going on a trip, or getting shots at the doctor’s office. Keep a written calendar displayed in an area of the house where your child can monitor what’s coming. If there is more than one child, consider color coordinating the calendar to help each child navigate his or her upcoming plans.
- Model shifting from negative thinking to positive thinking. It can be easy for some anxious and or depressed children to hyperfocus on what could or has gone wrong. Modeling for them how to look at things from a positive perspective can help shift their thinking patterns and change the language they are using when sharing of a past, current, or upcoming experience.
- Be understanding of potential learning gaps. Be willing to utilize resources to help close the learning gaps so that your child can continue to perform at the best of their abilities in school.
- Encourage/support age-appropriate social interaction and healthy physical outlets. Social interactions and physical outlets are huge contributing factors to overall mood. Consider supporting them by signing your child up for sports, art and theater clubs, or music lessons/band. Plan things to do on the weekends to get out of the house such as going on bike rides, downloading and utilizing the Pokémon GO app, going to a museum, visiting the local parks in your area, or setting up play dates for younger children and allowing older children to plan safe activities with their friends.
- Set aside individual time to spend time with your child. For younger children this may mean uninterrupted bath time or time spent engaging in uninterrupted imaginary play for thirty minutes. For older children this may look like grabbing ice cream, sitting at a local coffee shop, playing their favorite board game or video game, or taking a long drive. Each of these can strengthen the bond between you and your child and may, in turn, support healthy social and emotional growth.
- Seek help from your child's doctor or seek therapy when you feel that your child may need more than what you can offer. These professionals can help you navigate how to help your child with significant signs of distress.