To ask you why so many children have anxiety these days

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Why is today's parenting producing youngsters with so little resilience?

LolaSmiles Because you're saying that attending these activities doesn't give the child an opportunity to socialise. I'm wondering how many solitary activities there are to be ferried hither and zither. It's sad there's no opportunity for them to socialise at school either, DS1 and DS2 enjoy their breaktime socialising (with their friends, they go to different schools). DS2 likes an after school bus gossip with his mates, DS1 gets taxied.

It sounds like you have a few tiger? Parents, verging on emotional abuse, if they're able to enforce their teens to keep on with activities they don't want to do. I'd love DS2 to join something formal, but he's utterly resistant.

I guess also for some what is seen as extra, is where their career ambition is. There's a few pupils who compete at high levels at DS2's school, so there's often FB posts from the school praising their achievements. There's probably a fair amount of ferrying involved, as we're semi-rural and training at 5am isn't going to happen without parental support.

Obviously parents shouldn't be expecting allowances from school if their child's activities aren't leaving enough time to do homework. But again, isn't that a parent in the wrong rather than a child lacking resilience?

Why is it a parent in the wrong? I had a really significant hobby outside school in my teens. If I decided not to do my homework afterwards because I was too tired that was my fault not theirs. Teenagers need to take responsibility for their own decisions.

I don't really understand it. It is sad.

BUT, they say that 1 in 4, so 25% of adults have had a MH issue. So it's obviously an issue, more talked about? More recognised?

"Not necessarily. The self harming, grooming and sexuality difficulties I know parents had to deal with had nothing to do with the amount of time beingonline"......bet it did. It's well known that grooming occurs on line, and there is a very well known case where a young girl committed suicide recently and her father is taking this to Facebook, Instagram etc.. ..have you not heard about this?

Teateaandmoretea because it's the parent asking for a pass on the homework not being done.

The YouTube video re millennials in the workplace is the most interesting imo. Part of parenting is about preparing your children for life and at my workplace there are many examples of young people who are disillusioned with the reality of life and still rely on a huge amount of support from their parents. I’m not saying this is wrong, but they seem to struggle with believing in themselves and how to deal with setbacks.

I really hate this buzz word “resilience.” It’s shorthand for “put up and shut up.” I’m deeply suspicious of anybody who uses it. Children shouldn’t have put up with things they don’t find tolerable. Most kids are pretty normal mine are happy to say what they like or don’t, and what annoys them. That doesn’t mean they aren’t resilient it means they have boundaries and are happy to stand up for themselves.
This whole mental health drive in schools is also suspect. Our primary school recently partnered up with a very basic at best mental health charity who’s workers think it’s a great idea to give out mental health questionnaires to the children’s containing many many leading questions which would make anybody think they were worried. The kids then need to see the worker. Now that is worrying. Fishing for anxiety creates anxiety kids are very suggestible. Also anxiety is being sold to kids. I saw a range of teddy bear toys a bit like build a bear at one of the mahout holiday parks this summer, one of the girls ones was called “Anxiety” the elephant. Seriously. It’s part of a trend. People are making money out of it.

Sorry that should say one of the major holiday parks.

The case I know of wasn’t. Of course I know about online grooming but it isn’t to do with how much time they spend online. You can restrict your child to an hour and a half a day and they still encounter dangers.

DobbinOnTheLA
There's a massive difference between chilled social time between friends and the socialising through an activity. They're not the same.
It's important to have age appropriate time to socialise indepdently. It's absolutely ridiculous seeing threads on here where parents won't let their kids go play football in the park, or can't walk to school etc.

Some are tiger parents, others let their kidd do whatever activities and make excuses for why their child can't do all sorts.
Others push the fear of the world into kids where they are generally worried about getting a bus somewhere at the age of 15.

We get calls saying "DC can't do their homework this weekend because we were at their grandma's on Sunday" as if somehow their child doesn't need to learn time management.
Not: "actually DC it's your job to manage your homework and if you can't stay on top of things then something has to give so you can manage your time".

Parents are a hugely important influence in terms of their children's development. Students are in school for 6 hours a day, term time only. The rest of their time they're with the adults in their home life. To downplay the influence of parental behaviour would be foolish.

I think that one of the worst things we can do, when it comes to anxiety in children, is not actively give them the message that it's okay to make mistakes, and that it's okay to fail. Because we all do it, and we all need to do it to learn.

I think fear of failure is one of the most emotionally crippling things a person can have.

There is so much pressure put on children to succeed now, to pass every test, to excel in every extra curricular activity, to be outstanding. To look great, be clever, to be popular, to be interesting, to be good at sport, artistically talented. . . and if their parents aren't doing it, then social media is. Which means that they internalise these messages, and feed them to themselves.

I'd hate to be in some kids heads, they must be their own worst enemy when it comes to the negative self talk. And if this is reinforced by their parents. . .

sorry VI I had given you the wrong acronym for AChiPP, that's all. BACP and AChiPP are both sources of CBT therapy. A pyschologist is differently qualified from a pyschotherapist/counsellor but they can both be trained to offer CBT.

Ah, thanks for that.

Also just on the self harming point. I recently chatted to a friend who’s child’s secondary school gave a series of lessons on self harm. Then hey presto large number of children then self harm. It’s not just online info you have to be careful of, there are various things being routinely taught to kids in school that perhaps would be better brought up more delicately.

I don't think resilience means put up and shut up at all. It means that when things go wrong (on a day to day basis rather than major problems such as bereavement/ abuse etc) you cope, get up again the next day and get on with life/ have another go.

Yes but you’re not a failure if you can’t.

Mboznz. I agree, completely

Yes but you’re not a failure if you can’t.

That kind of feeds into the other point doesn't it?

I think we need to teach children that perfection is toxic and actually not where anyone wants to be. So yeah finding stuff hard sometimes is part of that.

"Evenquieterlife33
I really hate this buzz word “resilience.” It’s shorthand for “put up and shut up.”

I really dont think that's what it means. For me it means being able to "get through and cope" without falling to bits at the first opportunity. Usually kids learn this by seeing adults behave appropriately and be resilient themselves.

The tipping point trigger for Ds1's anxiety from manageable to self-harm and suicidal ideation was how he was treated by his Yr6 teacher and the 2 TAs, so I don't really share the same outlook LolaSmiles. All credit to his secondary school who spent a year undoing the damage and making school his favourite place to be.

There’s a lot of pathologising I think. Rather than feeling that an emotion is on the normal spectrum of human feelings, there seems to be a tendency with some to think “I have anxiety” when it might well just be feeling anxious

Absolutely agree with Cauliflower and PP who also mention parents projecting their anxieties onto their children.

I was pathologically shy until I was about 25. I was bullied at school from the age f 7 until I went to university (where I discovered I wasn't a horrible person, there were other people like me) .

I suppose nowadays I'd have been prodded & poked and my shyness pathologised.

But you know, I just got on with life. Doing what I wanted to do was enough of an incentive to get over myself and my shyness - which really is a form of excessive self-consciousness. I still get nervous about some things but that is normal

Stuff I read in here about people with "social anxiety" and not wanting to go to events etc - well, I just think that there's a kind of basic selfishness in that response.

"Also anxiety is being sold to kids. I saw a range of teddy bear toys a bit like build a bear at one of the mahout holiday parks this summer, one of the girls ones was called “Anxiety” the elephant. Seriously. It’s part of a trend. People are making money out of it."
Sorry to say this, but anxiety the elephant has been around for at least 15 years. She isn't new at all.

Lola what you don't see are the parents having to deal with children having meltdowns and refusing to go to Grandma's "because I have to get my homework done and there won't be time". If I had a pound for every family weekend blighted by children's anxieties over homework I could afford extended therapy. You have a very common sense approach to life, no doubt you are a practical efficient and caring person who cannot imagine how other people can possibly not be organised and self motivated.
Let me enlighten you, some children do not have the Power to behave as you might wish them to. It is nothing to do with their parents mollycoddling them that they aren't meeting their mates in the park or filling in a list of to do's and jumping out of bed to mow the lawn. Their parents didn't make them that way, in fact their parents may be desperately trying to encourage them to socialise and find activities they like. But they cannot, because they feel too anxious to engage. They feel physically sick when they walk into a room full of people and don't know what to say or how to dress or where to sit.

I understand what you are getting at, I think downtime and self motivation is incredibly important, and self determination. But anxiety can be much much debilitating and it is not linked with putting your child in the orchestra AND running club AND Saturday drama workshop. Those things are quite likely to help the child with their anxiety (supposing you can actually get your anxious child into these activities) not make them worse.
Sometimes even getting a bus somewhere is enough to put an anxious child doing anything outside the home, and driving them might the only way to make it happen.
Fwiw I don't do any ferrying and it does build confidence to get yourself somewhere on your own steam, but you have to start small.

Kids suffering from anxiety are not failing at the first hurdle. They are on their 100,000 as regards hurdles. Every day they are encountering hurdles, some day they may have had enough. Who are we to say they should just get on with it?When you have a child curled up on the corner on the floor begging to be left alone. Snapping get on with it doesn’t necessarily help them. If they refuse what do you do then? I never have a day off work, my children have to be dying to get a day off school. I have set an example and still have an anxious child.