Social Anxiety in 2yr old

[AmIlivingonanotherplanet]

Is anyone else experiencing what I can only describe as social anxiety in their 2 year olds? My son gets incredibly upset when we are out. To a point that we are unable to go to the park (unless there is no one else there), can't go on days out or lunch/dinner with him as he is constantly upset and will cry the whole time we are out. We can sometimes manage the supermarket, but yesterday a little girl said hello to him and he had a complete meltdown about it.
He goes to nursery and has been since January, we changed nursery in June due to a move, it is the same company and so he knew some of the staff. He has only just started to go in without tears. I just don't know what to do, we can't enjoy a day out and I don't want him missing out on these activities. We have finally been able to have family to come to the house without him getting upset. It is making us all sad.
Not really sure of the point of my post but I needed to get it off my chest!

No advice but I am in a similar position. My dd (same age) is showing similar behaviour. In our case she has had a lot of winter bugs in the past few months that has made her very unsettled and clingy. It’s very difficult. I just console myself with the fact that everything’s a phase and hopefully it will be over in the next few weeks.

Giving this a hopeful bump for you OP, as I don't have the answers either but am hoping someone else does! My 18 month old is also showing similar signs to the ones you describe. I read that it's not possible for a child this age to have social anxiety, but I honestly don't know how else to describe it!

It's really impacting on our life - I can't take him to Snappy Snaps to get a passport photo done because he gets so upset by strangers. I also wanted to take him for his first dental check-up just to check that everything's in order, but when I tried he was absolutely hysterical so I had to give up! I'm not sure what to do.

Hi

Just wondered if any of you guys had an update on how your children are getting on with this? Has anything improved?

I’m experiencing something similar with my 2 year old at the minute and would love to know if things did get better and if you had any advice on what worked?

I am also experiencing similar and it has been going on for a year. Would love advice or help.

Hi everyone!
Well, our son is now 3.5yrs and is doing so much better. Over the last month we have even stopped tears at nursery drop off.
I'm not really sure what happened. He just seemed better one day. Now he'll talk to anyone. Days out are still a bit of a problem, he will get upset easily but it isn't anywhere near as bad as before. Unfortunately, his behaviour at home has become worse, I think that he knows he needs to behave more when out and when we are at home all his frustration comes out as it is his safe space.
We started to play pretend nursery at home and I would be really positive about what I was doing it when I was being the child, we also have found him making his own lunchbox in the mornings has made him excited about the day. He now gets upset if he isn't going to nursery!!
Overall I think that the pandemic and lock downs played a huge part in his social anxiety as he was born in the October before so we didn't really go out anywhere or see anyone for a long time and if we did it was quiet with not many people about so when things went back to normal it was rather overwhelming.
Hang in there people!! It gets better 🙂

Thanks for reporting back @AmIlivingonanotherplanet I’m going through a similar thing at the moment, so it’s nice to hear there’s a chance it won’t be forever!

Ah, I have found my people! DD is 3 and went through the most extreme phase of this between 2-2.5 - could not go anywhere child centric. She is much more tolerant now but still triggered by crying children or very loud screams. She has also started having stretches of not wailing hysterically at the nursery door - sometimes she even skips in!

We found ear defenders helped when she looked like it was too loud for her.