Back-to-school season can bring feelings of relief for parents. After a long summer of patching together camps, vacation days and other ad hoc arrangements, reliable child care is finally on the horizon.
Kids don’t always share that sentiment, however. They may be excited to see friends, meet their teacher and move up a grade, but all of these changes can also bring worry.
“Kids preparing to return to school often face a range of anxieties, including social concerns about making friends and fitting in, performance-related stress about grades and learning new skills, and uncertainties about new routines and navigating the school environment,” Nicole Cain, a naturopathic doctor and the author of “Panic Proof: The New Holistic Solution to End Your Anxiety Forever,” told HuffPost.
Here are some signs that your child may be feeling anxious about the return to school and some ways you can offer reassurance and support.
Physical Symptoms
If your child is experiencing pain or other troublesome symptoms, you should first visit the paediatrician in order to rule out a health condition that needs to be treated, Cain said.
It’s common, however, for children’s anxiety to manifest in physical symptoms. Cain and two other experts HuffPost spoke with, licensed professional counsellor Chinwé Williams and therapist Eli Harwood, mentioned that children may exhibit:
- headache
- stomachache
- sleep disturbance (trouble falling asleep, waking during the night, nightmares or night terrors)
- change in appetite
- digestive issues
Behavioural Symptoms
Changes in mood or behaviour can also signal that a child is feeling anxious and, according to these experts, might include these signs:
- grumpiness or agitation
- temper tantrums
- forgetfulness
- procrastination
- difficulty focusing or concentrating
- defiance
- spaciness or distractedness, or “zoning out”
- perseverating or otherwise obsessing about things that seem small or insignificant
- clinginess
- regression in behaviours, such as a return to bedwetting or thumb sucking
It’s possible that your child can identify the feelings they are having but still be uncertain about the cause. Williams recounted how one mother she knew noticed that her daughter “was quieter, more withdrawn in the past two weeks and shut down all conversations pertaining to the upcoming school year. During school shopping this past week, she observed that her daughter ‘moved slower’ and, when asked, shared that she was ‘sad but didn’t know why.’”
Kids experiencing anxiety may also cry, have emotional outbursts or express “excessive worries or fearfulness,” Williams said.
Ways Parents Can Help
What we don’t want to do is to join our child in their anxiety.
“Anxiety is relationally sticky, so it is easy to find ourselves getting anxious about our child’s anxiety. They need us to be able to acknowledge their feelings with compassion while remaining steady and regulated in our own emotional state,” Harwood said.
It is helpful for us to acknowledge our child’s feelings. Note that this is not the same as validating their worries. A response such as “It sounds like you’re feeling nervous about making friends” sends a very different message than “Yes, you may end up sitting all by yourself at lunch.”
You certainly don’t want to “amplify their anxiety by pointing out all the terrible things that could go wrong,” Harwood said.
Instead, she said, use reassuring statements such as: “I know you are feeling worried about your basketball tryouts, but I want you to know that I feel confident in you and in all the practicing you did this summer. And if the worst thing happens and you don’t make the team, know that I will be here for you and we will get through that together.”
Ask open-ended questions, such as “What do you think will happen?” and “What could you do then?” to encourage kids to open up about their concerns and to offer your support. It could be helpful to mention that back-to-school worries are not uncommon and that many other kids have them, too.
Breathing exercises are a tool kids can use to help in the moment when they are feeling anxious. “Rapid and shallow breathing is a common physical sign of stress and anxiety,” Williams said. Getting them to slow their breathing can help them feel less anxious. Williams suggested teaching your child to slowly count to four as they inhale and then count to six as they exhale.
Cain suggested meditating with your child at bedtime to help them deal with anxiety and to feel relaxed. You can find a lot of guided meditations you can do with your child online, many of which take only a few minutes.
Some kids might find it reassuring to create a “to do” list for going back to school. “For younger kids (5 to 9), that might be a daily routine checklist to make sure they know the steps for getting ready in the morning. For older kids (9 to 18), that might be helping them organise their homework lists or schedule to relieve the feeling of not knowing what they need to get done,” Harwood said.
Kids can also feel proactive and practice independent skills by doing some preparation on their own, like laying out their clothes and packing their lunch for the first day.
Finally, “remind kids that getting back into the swing of things will take some adjustment for them and the family, and to be patient with themselves,” Williams said.
If your child’s anxiety persists or interferes with their daily life, and even after having a chance to talk about their feelings the anxiety does not improve or it gets worse, it may be helpful for your child to talk to a mental health provider. Williams suggested that you speak with your child’s school counsellor about finding a provider.
Missteps To Avoid
If your child expresses anxiety, you don’t want to dismiss their feelings by telling them their worries are “not a big deal” or that they “are going to be fine.” Comments like these “can invalidate their emotions and make them feel alone,” Cain said.
You also want to avoid comparing them to others, as in, “Your sister isn’t nervous, and she’s younger,” Williams said.
Though you want to be supportive, be careful not to “rescue them from their opportunities for growth,” Harwood said. “Our kids need to face the things that are overwhelming them to be able to overcome that overwhelm and see that they are capable.”
For example, it’s usually best not to “solve” the problem by allowing your child to stay home from school. Instead, you might tell them, “I know this is hard, but I believe in you, and I know you can do this.”