How to help anxious child making decisions

[Blimeyblighty]

My 13 yo is an over thinker. She really struggles to make decisions.

for example tonight the weather is lovely, and she could go to her usual extra curricular activity, or miss it and go to the beach. This sends her into an absolute spin, she has a meltdown & cannot cope. The upshot of it has been she has cried and freaked out, the rest of the family has gone to the beach & I have stayed at home with her. Another example was whether she wanted to watch an international rugby game or play in a match. That went on for days as the day of the clash grew nearer, but generally the issue is with spontaneous choices - there wouldn’t normally have been a beach trip this evening but her brothers friends are all meeting up so we were taking him down there anyway.

I’ve tried making the decision for her, telling her what she will do, but that doesn’t really help her in these situations - although one of the things she will wail is that nobody is helping her decide. I don’t really know how to coach her along in making a decision like this when she’s conflicted about her two options.

I am quite similar by nature. What’s helped me was a therapist asking me what the worst thing that could happen in either scenarios would be, eg would I be going against my values, would anyone’s life be in danger. Generally, the answer is no- no one’s life is in danger, it doesn’t really matter which I choose. Then, the therapist showed me that I could choose to stop being in this fight/flight panic mode by making a decision, accepting it might not be perfect but better than remaining paralysed by indecision.
I’m still indecisive sometimes but am a lot better at saying no and choosing what I want to do.
Is it possible your daughter feels she has to be pleasing others with her choices? I know part of my problem was being a people pleaser and hating “letting anyone down”.

She sometimes will struggle if she knows her choice impacts on someone else yeah. It’s also really really hard against the clock. This evening she had to decide because her brother needed to leave, she actually didn’t decide as such but was in meltdown so the decision was made for her.

Honestly? For me, I use the Claude app. Sometimes I know what I really want to do deep down about something but talking to other people doesn’t help me unravel my tangled thoughts. I just want to get my thoughts out of my head and Claude provides me with a way to speak to “someone” who is truly impartial and is able to help me come to my own conclusions and make decisions. The AI has an incredible ability to understand the points you’re making even if it comes out in a jumbled mess. It’s genuinely really helpful. Using the voice chat is very quick compared to typing what you want to say.

What if I don't make this decision is always the question I ask myself when I get decision paralysis?

I can get it over things as simple as do I want tea or coffee. If I don't make the decision I don't get a drink. If I make the decision and get it wrong I get a drink that I might not enjoy as much as the other drink but I like both tea and coffee and my thirst will be satisfied either way.

So with tonight the options were two things she enjoyed but the consequence of no decision was staying at home and doing nothing. It has taken a lot of practice to get to the point of managing it with this type of event so I'd start off with much much smaller decisions.

For me it is so so much worse when my mental health is not great and I'm struggling with low mood and/or anxiety.

There was a difficult time when I had an eating disorder as well and it would take me forever to decide about what to eat but then if a part of it wasn't right or possible that would be it I couldn't eat even though the other perfectly valid option was still available.

How is she doing otherwise?

This sounds quite extreme OP, is she ND? Maybe suggest she sticks to her usual routine/preplanned activity if she's unsure ie extra curricular activity/play in match. I think it's something that needs discussing with her when she isn't in a dilemma, maybe get her to think about her priorities, ie fun, consistent routine, learning new things, novel experiences etc and what's most important to her - and how those things could help her to choose, also talk to her about how there is no 'perfect choice'.

She isn’t ND, as far as we know, although she has always been a sensitive highly strung child, a few sensory quirks, this sort of thing etc. She has never been easy to parent. She’s doing really well at the moment though in general, happy at school, confident with her peers etc. Just this sort of thing flaring up - not even every week, maybe once or twice a month.

I can’t offer much advice I’m afraid, OP. But am very interested in the replies as I feel I am quite similar to your daughter and always have been. Hopefully less inclined to meltdowns as I’m 37, but I become totally consumed by some decisions. I’m happy with little decisions, and oddly enough totally fine when it really is imperative to make a choice (I’m a doctor and deal with life or death decisions quite easily). But I am paralysed by the sort of decisions that fall in between the extremes. Where to live, where to go on holiday, what car to buy, which school to send my children to. It’s debilitating and it drives me mad! If I have one of these decisions “pending” I am almost unable to do anything else because it occupies my whole brain.

I wonder if, for me, this is a pathological feature of perfectionism? I so need the decision to be “right” that I become unable to make any decision at all. Could this be the case for your daughter?

It’s interesting you say that @Cannotchooseee as was thinking last night about how DD (who wants to be a vet) is really great in a crisis. She has strong practical problem solving skills. There is something about these situations which she can’t manage, I think it’s partly FOMO too.

I'm another that's great at decision in a crisis. My mum calls me the person you call when you need to get stuff done as I can come into a situation come up with a plan and set it in motion.

I'm a scientist and have had to be reactive and problem solved on the fly. That I can do with ease. Convincing myself that the prep I had done to start the experiment and that my plan was appropriate can be debilitating. The first step is always the hardest. Once I started saying to myself, I'm not going to start the experiment I'm just going to go into the lab and start gathering the bits I know I definitely need. My head was in the game and the decisions about the details that I had been struggling with started falling into place

I'm the same with house work, but more so. It makes very little difference what I do first but the decision of what to do takes way longer than the activity. Some times I just have to start doing. I find going and making myself a drink helps. The action gets me out of my own head and then I can start looking around the room and I might go oh that washing needs putting away. Once I'm upstairs I'll do some other jobs up there and before I know it I have made several decisions and I'm less blocked.

Going back to last night, would it have been helpful to go through what she would have needed for the extra curriculars and the beach. Start gathering the bits for both, it might crystallise them from ideas to reality and one of the two might then see more appealing.