Negative thinking child

[Indecisivelurcher]

Hello, so my Dd age 6 is a very negative thinker. As an example today she got confused and went to after school club, when I was picking her up. She was in tears when I collected her and didn't want me to tell anyone. Then at bedtime she got into a state and it took almost 2hrs for her to drop off. I think she felt embarrassed and she was worried people would think less of her. Has anyone got any experience of this, and any advice?

Just in case bump

I used to be exactly the same. Still am to some extent. Has taken me years to train my brain not to do this kind of thing: can still get tense and cringy over some embarrassing situation that happened 30 years ago. No idea why this happens but over the years I've got better at focusing my brain away from it and have also got good at turning embarrassing situations into non-embarrassing ones, something I need to do because I get so upset.

Comfort and reassurance are good.

Thanks for replying @corythatwas. Would you have any advice for your 6yo self?

Depends on what you think she is able to process.

I think for me it would have been useful if someone had said, 'Yes, this is not that unusual, our brains get worried and start thinking something silly that happened was really important when it wasn't, and that kind of thinking goes round and round until it makes you hurt. It doesn't mean anything's wrong, it just means your brain has got stuck a bit and you need to get it going again. We can do that: we can tell our brain "I'm not going to think about that any more now, I'm going to think about this other nice thing instead" '.

That sounds like it. Last night she spent 2hrs crying that she just wanted the thought to go out of her head. But she was too worked up to really try / didn't know how to.

I read some tips about trying to practice positive thinking in every day life that I might try to put into practice. Such as everyone saying something they're pleased about or something they did well at dinner.

Positive thinking is good.

As for wanting a thought to go out your head, I've always found that is particularly hard around bedtime because as you start relaxing you lose control over your mind a bit. So some kind of routine where you think about something nice and relaxing might help. My dd was taught to visualise a nice beach. Saying to yourself "I'm not going to think about the other thing that upsets me, I'm on this beach now".

Thank you. We have done visualisations before to help with sleep problems and she has a children's meditation cd, last night it just wasn't helping tho. I think I'll view all this as life skills that will take time. I just want her to be confident in herself and happy.

She's got a good mum there to help her- and she herself is confident enough to show you how she feels. I never did. Spent a lot of time having to reinvent the wheel because I couldn't ask for advice from other people.

Should say though that this tendency to anxiety hasn't stopped me from being confident and happy in other ways. I still have a public-facing job that I love, a happy marriage, good friends. I just know that, like having a dodgy leg or a mild visual impairment or something, this is something I have to work around.

Then again, lots of children are anxious around six and just grow out of it, not leaving a trace.

She's been like this since she was 1, visibly so. Age 4 was the worst so far. We've all learnt some mechanisms since. Thank you for your wisdom @corythatwas