Anyone dc got a childhood anxiety disorder ?

[shavmcv]

Does anyone have a dc with a childhood anxiety disorder ? I think dd might have one but not really sure what to do now .

Talk to your GP. They should be able to advise you/refer you. (At one time I was worried about this...and there are places like this that specialise in childhood anxiety)

www.berkshirechildanxiety.org.uk/

Thank you Pleasenap.

. Can I ask why you were worried ? What behaviours was your dc displaying ?

My dd is 23 months she has sensory integration disorder and terrible anxiety to the point where she becomes physically sweaty and hot when shes anxious. She attends a CDC at present but we have no anxiety diagnosis as yet as still under assessment

My DS had a mild choking incident at 5yo - but this lead to him developing a bit of a food phobia and him being very anxious in general. Not helped by me not knowing what to do and also being incredibly worried by the whole thing. Anyway, we tried our lovely GP's suggestions first, took our time and it all blew over eventually.

My dd has a terrible fear of being left on her own . She goes into screaming fits if her teacher leaves the classroom , or if she can't see an adult .

It's become so severe that she struggles to mix with other children (I like because she feels less secure with them, and if she goes to play it may lead to her not being in view of an adult)

And she has developed self doubt and lack of self worth . She says she doesn't want any friends and by the way she has been talking it's like she feels she's not good enough to be their friends .

She does get the company of other children their are kids of my friends and. Cousins that she is very comfortable with and will interact and play great with - but there is a limit to what she will do .

There is also a bit of a detachment problem with me as well - which wasn't always there . She is 6.

I see what you say about the chucking thing I have been trying to think if there is anything that would have set this off - I've never lost her anywhere etc .

Dd went through a very anxious phase around the ages of 4 - 6. She compulsively pulled out most of her hair, displayed OCD symptoms, chewed her nails and cuticles until they bled and suffered from transient tic syndrome.

We went to see the GP to show her the bald scalp, the bitten and bleeding fingers and told her about the OCD tendencies and the almost constant ticking.
The doctor advised us to wait and see and just treat her normally - there was not one specific thing she was anxious about, she was just a bundle of anxiety generally. Tbh I think they may have been at a bit of a loss as to what to suggest....

So we waited and ignored it as much as possible. (hard when your dd is at the dinner table flapping one arm like a chicken continously)

She is now 8 and a half and we have not seen any tics for almost a year. Her OCD appears to have vanished (she can now walk in a straight line instead of one step backwards for every 10 forwards) and her room is now a constant mess as opposed to the military precision with which everything was lined up. She has not pulled her hair for over a year although her nails and cuticles are still red raw and bitten until they bleed. Her teachers at parent's evening said she was bright, happy, confident but had a tendency to take things too much too heart and to get incredibly upset very quickly.

But on the whole, she is improving

Sorry if this does not help you.

My dd1 who is 5 now was a very anxious child. She has always been very clingy to me and hated loud noises, crowds etc and would panic if she smelled smoke or heard a siren. She was miserable. I couldn't take her to the park as she was afraid of the noise the crows made in the trees. She hated going into town because of traffic noise.

She has other issues too - her socks have to be inside out among other clothes issues. She will only wear clothes of a certain texture.

I took her to a play therapist about 6 months ago and her progress has been amazing.
She is visibly more relaxed. She will run around the playground and climb everything and talk to other children. She would only go on the baby swings if I stood with her and wouldn't try anything else.

She would panic if a child approached her.

All this has much improved.

She still has some problems but they are improving with time.

We are now in a place where she is looking forward to starting school.

Our whole family is more settled and happy than before.

If you are concerned I would advise you to seek some help. I worried about dd all the time and we were all tense and upset. The play therapist we found is so lovely and dd enjoys seeing her. She does not realise it is because she had problems.

HTH

Thank you it helps to even just know we r not the only ones going through this . What does play therapy involve ? That sounds like something dd would go for . What I try to get her to open up I get "I don't want to talk about it" - I jokingly say she has teenage angst already but inside I am worried sick .

My 4 yr old dd2, seems to suffer from anxiety, in some ways she is happy, confident and very popular at school. But when she is unsettled or anxious, she freaks out. Since having them myself I would say it is like a full blown panic attack, she goes cold and sweaty, her eyes look bloodshot, she looks as though she has lost her way, it is so upsetting.

I would say it started for her when I had ds, a year ago. I was away for 8 days as he was in scbu, and she often talks about it. After I cam home, we moved house and her older sister started school. I think the combination of things led to her being very unsettled, and she started having enormous meltdowns if we went a different route home from school, or town. If we went into town, she would only walk on one side of the road, or go to one shop. She stopped wanting to leave the house. It was awful, dh had to work different hours so he could do the school run, and I had to get a double buggy so that we could go into town with her. Even then she would rip the straps off, and throw her self into the road if we were doing something she didn't want to do.

She is a lot better now, but still has anxieties about going to the toilet (she will not go,until she is practically shaking on the floor), she also has trouble sleeping, I end in her bed a lot, and she is up for the day at 5.30.

I worry sick about her, and spoke to the gp, but she felt that we should see how she gets on at school and take it from there, maybe refer to a child psych if the problems continue.

I am absent for the actual therapy so haven't seen it in action. It involves a lot of role play and using toys/musical instruments etc to work through the child's feelings.

For example, dd does lots of play with musical instruments because of her issues with noise.