Aibu to think that a lot of kids are extremely anxious after lockdown?

[MrsHookey]

I've got one child who seems extremely anxious since lockdown. Anecdotally it seems like a few kids I know are like this. Is this a wider thing? Are mumsnetters finding their children have become anxious since March 2020?

@bookworm14

I should add that this was in no way a reaction to/fear of covid itself, as I’d always made clear that the risk to her and her immediate family was minimal. It was a reaction to lockdown taking away virtually everything in her life overnight and making it illegal for her to go to school or see her wider family and friends.

Yes to this too. I have to remind people that while they were able to go out to work and to meet a friend for a coffee and a walk it was actually illegal for my child to see anyone else outside of the house.

Trying to explain why there was a police car waiting outside of the park to possibly catch children like him who were, god forbid, trying to meet their friends to play was a particular low point of the lockdowns for me.

I am a chair of governors

Our safeguarding referrals are up 274%

That is not a typo

@bookworm14

Of course the lockdowns have caused huge issues for kids. My now-6 year old became anxious, volatile, frightened of an increasing range of things, and refused to engage with online learning. She is much better since returning to school but we still have residual issues with anxiety (she hates being on her own and is reluctant even to go to the loo by herself).

When I posted on MN about this during the first lockdown I was told it was my fault for ‘projecting’ my own anxiety on to her, and that if I just modelled a positive attitude she would be fine. There are some people on here who should be ashamed of their behaviour during the past 18 months.

Yes I agree some of the dismissal was very off

Our school reports that there has been. I believe this. However some schools have now stopped homework to allow for those who were struggling. This bit I don't agree with. whilst struggling children now need support, which they clearly aren't getting, capable children still need to be pushed, so that they too are not thus disadvantaged even more by this terrible covid.

My children had no issue with lockdowns and have been delighted to be back at school.

However, I never stopped bringing them to shops/mixing with children outdoors and turned off all radio and television (except for Netflix), so that they rarely heard the word Covid. We never used hand sanitiser either and we washed their hands a normal amount.
I realise we were lucky, as we did not need to be particularly careful, due to vulnerable siblings or parents in our household.

My DS is noticeably less sociable / more withdrawn than pre Covid

Hard to know if its age appropriate or due to Covid, but he talks a lot about all his friends having anxiety

Again, hard to know if this is really a concern, or if teenagers have always been rather anxious and they just express it more than we did

I try to be sympathetic without fuelling it

Not in my experience no. None of my friends kids have suffered any effects either.

I spoke with the HV recently and she said she is seeing the impact that past lockdowns and general doom and gloom has had on young children.

I feel sorry for them. All the way through this, the media and general public talk alot about how it impacts adults, vunerable people, the elderly etc. with little reported on what it has actually done to children...the future generation. I really hope things improve in the next couple of years for everyones sake, but more so for children.

Very much so. Work in FE and is just an explosion in terms of numbers. No outside help anymore as all overwhelmed

No effect on my 3 year old but my 5 year old is definitely behind socially and displays really erratic behaviour like hitting herself and scratching herself.

My 5 year old niece (yr 1) is going down a school refusing path, and who can blame her? Her entire school experience has been completely fucked.

We have had an idyllic lockdown- we spent most of it in the paddling pool or in the forest at the end of the garden, I'm a stay at home parent and the kids were too young for homeschool to be a thing. IMO it's not the lockdown that's done it- it's the not being sure whether we are allowed to hug granny, it's the "give people space honey", it's the "no we aren't doing the Nativity, masks on, no reading volunteers cant come in, walk in single file 2 metres apart in a one way" type restrictions that are affecting their psyche now I think.

Absolutely, one of mine has been really affected

I remember the first day my ds13 went back to school after lockdown. He came home and his actual words to me were "it was so good just to hang out with people my own age". Poor kids..
I'm still so angry about what they have been put through

My 2 teen ds's haven't been affected, not have any of their friends, but we are grateful for that.

Yes. I think mine has developed some sensory issues because of it. I've tried getting a diagnosis. it's a bloody joke for young people getting mental health help

@blue12345

My children had no issue with lockdowns and have been delighted to be back at school.

However, I never stopped bringing them to shops/mixing with children outdoors and turned off all radio and television (except for Netflix), so that they rarely heard the word Covid. We never used hand sanitiser either and we washed their hands a normal amount.
I realise we were lucky, as we did not need to be particularly careful, due to vulnerable siblings or parents in our household.

This was very much our approach too and the DCs (now 6 & 9) seem to have come through it all absolutely fine. We were fairly rule-observant but always did anything we were allowed to do the split second we were allowed to do it. I may be shot for saying this, but anecdotally when it comes to younger DCs the anxious ones also have quite Covid-anxious parents (and I do get that obvs some parents had objective reasons for their anxiety).

I've found that my two became less anxious as they left they didn't need to pretend to be something they aren't in order to fit in. My daughter discovered that she was more academic than she thought she was and, with her dad and grandad helping with homeschooling, found a new love of science that she didn't think she had.
She stopped playing dumb to fit in with her friendship group and knuckled down. She has now changed schools and left her large comp for a small, academically focused private school where she's a weekly boarder.

My son spent his 18th birthday in lockdown which was a bit depressing for him, but he's bounced back and decided to take some time out to work on my fathers estate before making any decisions about the future. He's very chilled and has dropped the more annoying and competitive friends that made him feel inadequate.

Professionally I'm seeing a number of children with anxiety and depression, but with some of them it is because of how their parents reacted to the lockdowns and the messages about how their lives were ruined due to the lockdowns and the pandemic. Its an unpopular view, but the children I'm seeing are all parroting what their parents have told them.

My daughter (12) has been badly affected. Last summer it was a struggle to get her to go to school. This coincided with the relaxation around mask wearing in school, she had got used to wearing them and had got anxious about her appearance so she didn't want to feel she had to remove the mask. She missed a lot of school in June and July.
This term her attendance has been better but she barely leaves the house apart from school. We have also had concerns about self harm with her.
Fortunately the school have been really good and we have a good line of communication with them. She's currently going through a Camhs course but unfortunately she isn't very receptive to it.

We’re very lucky in that DD4 has emerged virtually unscathed from lockdown - a combination of her age and our ability to shield her from the worst of the pandemic I think.

It’s a very different story with friends’ older kids though, especially teens. Several are now undergoing counselling for anxiety issues (privately, as no hope of timely MH support on the NHS). One has specific issues relating to wearing a mask in school. Lots of grades slipping and previously high achieving students now struggling with GCSEs. Also some self harming.

We’ve also been viewing potential primary schools for DD and every single one we’ve seen has described major fallout from lockdown - mainly speech and language/socialisation issues and lower starting points in the early years and MH issues among older year groups.

YANBU

The impact of lockdown on children is utterly unforgivable IMO.

@AledsiPad

YANBU

The impact of lockdown on children is utterly unforgivable IMO.

Well it had to be done. It's not unforgivable. The whole world apart from Sweden went into some kind of lockdown. Now we have to help them through the aftermath.

Please write to your MPs (particularly if Conservative) raising these issues and highlighting the lack of funding for CAMHS that has basically caused the service to collapse leaving children on huge waiting lists or in extreme distress yet not meeting the threshold for referral.

Sir Kevan Collins was hired to advise on children’s catch-up funding and recommended a £15 billion package that included extra curricular activities and sports to help children catch up socially and physically as well as academically. He resigned when the government rejected this in favour of a tenth of that to be spent on a few hours academic tutoring (the implementation of which has been a complete shambles).

You can easily email your MP here: www.writetothem.com/

Well, this thread is doing a wonderful job of reminding me why I haven’t discussed my DD’s issues on here. Plenty of support and expertise I’m sure - but too many people with an “well MY kids were fine, so if yours weren’t it’s probably your own fault.”

Thinking about it further, I think our DC have benefitted from our area just not being very Covid anxious any more. We know quite a few people of all ages (including MIL) who've had Covid here since the summer and it's been a mild illness for everyone and not much commented on bar the isolation period, so there just isn't The Fear. Everyone is pretty fatalistic about getting it sooner or later & not overly anxious (vaccine take up is really high locally). Whereas I have friends (my age, no health risks) in other parts of the country who are still very hardcore Covid-avoidant. I don't know quite what the objective difference is

@TeaForPterosaur

Well, this thread is doing a wonderful job of reminding me why I haven’t discussed my DD’s issues on here. Plenty of support and expertise I’m sure - but too many people with an “well MY kids were fine, so if yours weren’t it’s probably your own fault.”

I think it’s sad people don’t want to post for support due to this.

@TeaForPterosaur you need a thick skin when your kids have mental health issues. People who aren't in your situation don't understand. Fuck them.