Anxious 7 YO advice please

[DaisyDaisy77]

I am hoping for some advice or shared experiences please with regards to anxiety in younger children. My 7 year old daughter has become increasingly anxious.

Age 3-5 starting pre school and reception she often experienced stomach aches/pains when being left and was upset most days. We believed and was reassured that this was separation anxiety typical in this age group and she would grow out of it. This did fade out by middle of year 1.
The past couple of years we have noticed she has developed several tics some vocal which often arise in the school holidays when out of routine. She does not seem to particularly enjoy days out and holidays and finds these overwhelming.
Lately, she seems to be increasingly anxious about everything, Christmas, adverts on the television, even just being at home. There has been no obvious trigger for the anxiety but it is something that has affected family members although not this age.
She has been experiencing headaches, racing heart, feeling like she has something in her throat, dizziness, loss of appetite. I have been to the GP a couple of times for some of these symptoms but have not got very far which may be because of her age.

She is a lovely, funny and kind little girl with nice friends and hobbies and it’s so sad to see her experiencing this. I will take her again to doctors but now also looking for advice on any alternative therapies and to learn of other peoples experiences please.

That's upsetting for you both. Do you think there are signs of neurodivergence you can see in your dd?

When I was a child of a similar age I was described as “highly strung” - it’s not an expression we use any more, but I think it indicates this is a really common developmental problem. I used to get so over-excited by days out that I would vomit like the little kid on South Park!

My mum tried all sorts to calm me down but in the end I just grew out of it. One thing I did do was ballet and music lessons - I think maybe taking the exams helped me learn how to manage my nerves.

I have a dd who developed some mild tics in mid-primary and she outgrew them around age 11. The advice I was given was ignore the tics entirely. To be fair she wasn’t noticeably anxious, but she did have a phase of being very morbid (terrified of going to sleep in case she died, or we died, in our sleep).

In the Works they have little teddy monsters that will gobble up your worries - you could get her to write them on little bits of paper and feed them to the monster, or just get her to cuddle the worry monster. Having a comfort item and a strong routine did seem to help my dd.