Parenting

As parents we don’t like or want to see our children struggling. But worries, fears and anxieties are a natural part of life, and we have to understand that children go through these processes just like adults do. But as parents and caregivers, we should also be in tune with the degree, severity, frequency, and nature of our children’s fears and worries and know when a child might need some help.
In a world where technology seamlessly integrates into our daily lives, how does one raise a safe, healthy child given these omnipresent social media influences?
When anxiety disrupts a child’s everyday life, the first thing most parents focus on is finding a good therapist for their child or teen to work with. Once parents secure that coveted afternoon slot with an anxiety specialist, they breathe a huge sigh of relief.
Experts Mona Potter, MD and Kathryn Boger, PhD, ABPP recently partnered with ADAA to host an insightful Q&A webinar addressing strategies for parenting children with anxiety and OCD. This blog to addresses the most common themes that emerged from the questions asked during the webinar.
In collaboration with The Reach Institute, Dr. Wallace explains how parents can decrease the impact of anxiety on children and teens to help them function their best and find more joy in their lives.
The headlines and the CDC report are indeed alarming, but they should serve as a wakeup call to all of us. Yes, we should think seriously about why we are seeing a steep decline in the mental health of teenage girls, but we have to come together now as parents, family, friends, educators, clinicians, providers, and as a society to support, enhance and establish more preventive measures for our youth.
The digital natives we child-focused clinicians work with are simply incredible. Not only do they know their way around technology far better than many adults, but they’re also often fluid with their identity: openly embracing either their or their peers’ diverse ancestry, gender identity, sexual orientation, religions, family background, financial standing, as well as neurodivergence and disabilities in themselves and others.
If your child has seen coverage of such an event, make sure you talk with them about what they think about it and how they think it impacts their life and the world around them.  
Parent-Child Interaction Training (PCIT) is a type of therapy that involves both parents/guardians and their young children (usually ages 2 to 7). After all, parents/guardians are the ones who will see their children grow into the amazing adults they will be, and the therapist is only here as a brief part of that journey.

This blog was originally posted on Ten Percent Happier on April 22, 2022 and is reprinted here with permission