Exploring how to support children stuck in anxious, obsessive thoughts. Learn practical strategies to address these doubts with curiosity, openness, and kindness, helping your child separate reality from imagination and develop healthier coping mechanisms.
Exploring how to support children stuck in anxious, obsessive thoughts. Learn practical strategies to address these doubts with curiosity, openness, and kindness, helping your child separate reality from imagination and develop healthier coping mechanisms.
Project Parenthood is hosted by Chelsea Dorcich. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
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Do you wake up to a child getting stuck on a thought or idea, starting questions or statements with, maybe, What if, and they can't seem to let it go. What happens when our kid’s brains get stuck on anxious, obsessive, or intrusive thought? What can we do as caregivers?
Hi, welcome back to Project Parenthood. I am your host, Chelsea Dorcich, Licensed Marriage Family Therapist in California. I am here to join you on your conscious parenting journey, bringing more curiosity, openness, acceptance, kindness, and non judgment along the way. My goal is for us to accept what is out of our control, and Commit to improving our parenting life and discover better outcomes for ourselves and our family.
Today's discussion, we'll be looking at anxious and obsessive thoughts. I will be referring to them as doubts for the remainder of the episode. A doubt may sound like, maybe, I might be, it could be, or what if, maybe our dog will die if I eat grapes for lunch and he gets one. What if I get sick from touching that door handle?
A mascot could come up to our seats. The store could close early and we won't get in. Once our kids get stuck on a doubt, they may turn to compulsions. Something they do to get their doubt to go away. They think a certain thought, they ask questions, they check on something, they clean, they ruminate. Our kids get a doubt.
They worry about what would happen if the doubt were true. They start to feel uncomfortable and even yucky inside. Then they try to take away the discomfort. Let's discuss why our kids get stuck on doubts and how we approach the doubts. Why do our kids get doubts that stick and how do they turn into such convincing stories?
Why do our kids get doubts that stick and how do they turn into such convincing stories? A doubt will have reasons behind it. There are facts, rules, experiences, hearsay, so things they've heard, and possibility. These bring our children into a world of imagination and out of the here and now reality. And that imagination world starts to feel like reality.
So, a dog can get sick from grapes. That's a fact. We're not supposed to feed dogs a human food. That's a rule. We are not supposed to feed dogs human food. That's a rule. I saw my dog eat something off the floor. That's an experience. I heard the vet talk about a dog that ate human food and got sick.
Hearsay. Maybe my dog will eat a grape from my lunch and get sick or die. It's a possibility. It is with these reasons that a single thought can turn into a powerful doubt sequence or story. Just as we can get wrapped up in fictional stories, we can also get wrapped up in the stories our minds create.
And these stories can change the way we feel, behave, and interact with the world around us. Approaching your child's doubts. First, try to map your child's anxiety out as a family. As you start to map out your household in terms of your child's anxiety and doubts, Do so with curiosity, openness and kindness and without blame or judgment.
So what does this mapping out look like? Start to ask yourself, how does anxiety or doubt impact my child, their body, their thinking, their feelings and their behavior? Do they get a racing heart or sweating palms? Do they catastrophize? Do they seem more on edge and quicker to snap? Do they shut down outside of the house or maybe they cry more easily?
How much of your time as a caregiver is taken over by your child's anxiety or doubt? What are you doing differently compared to other siblings? Or what would you do differently if your child was not having a doubt or any anxiety? How do you accommodate? Do you use special dishes? Drive only a specific route to school?
No detours? Are you getting up early? Staying up late? Repeatedly answering questions and providing reassurance, excusing children from certain activities or classes, providing special meals, speaking for your child because they are worried or have related doubts. When we accommodate as caregivers, it can look a little bit like this.
Our child is in distress, possibly demanding something. In turn, we as caregivers feel obligated to comply. Which leads actually to more distress because the relief is only temporary and they will seek it again. And then we may start to withdraw and then the child escalates. We may even go out of our way to avoid the initial distress in which our children then are actually missing an opportunity to develop tolerance, understand what they are going through, and learn more adaptive ways to cope with their distress.
So once you have an idea of ways in which you accommodate your child, you can start to remove them. Starting with the least impactful, meaning what can you start with that doesn't turn your whole household upside down. For example, in my house, I had to realize that I needed everyone to get to school on time and myself to work on time.
Therefore, any accommodations I was doing during the morning time were sticking around for a little bit, even if those were the ones I really wanted to remove. I started with accommodations in the afternoon or evening planning ahead by having dinner already prepared or having a system with my partner or sitter to maintain the routine with the other children.
And then later, as the family adapts to removing accommodations, you can start to focus on the other ones, the morning ones that are harder to take away. Using different language with your child when they are doubting or worrying. We want to avoid advice, protective or demanding language. Instead use language with acceptance and confidence.
It's easy to say, just drop it, or hurry up, or you're fine. Or maybe you're actually quickly taking away or avoiding something that keeps the doubt and anxiety growing. If we tell our kids, you just have to power through, we may be offering confidence, but not acceptance. Or if we tell our kids, I understand this is hard for you.
We offer the acceptance, but not the confidence. We can try saying things like, it's hard, but you are capable to push through, I know it. Or, I understand how difficult this is. I know you'll be okay. We can ask questions like, how can I support you? When our kids are seeking reassurance, we can use the same language and also make it clear that we will answer their question this one time or this one last time and not provide any more reassurance again.
Skills for more adaptive ways for our children to navigate the distress. First and foremost. It's not just grounding or dropping anchor, and really it's to help establish the here and now and have our children reconnect with the five senses. This brings kids back to reality and away from their imaginative story where possibilities are endless.
This reminds our kids of the present moment and what is relative. Nothing right in front of them is holding up or validating their doubt or anxiety that turned into this imaginative story. And then we remind them about stories. We have to actually remind ourselves and our children that telling stories using our imagination does not make it real.
So, have your children look at a picture or point out something wild and about. And, have your child make up a story about it. And then you make up your own story that is different, or vice versa. You model first. Next, ask your child, do our stories make it happen in real life? No. Imagining a story doesn't make it happen in real life.
And that's exactly what our mind is doing for us when we get into this, uh, And we do have to remind ourselves as parents that these stories can change the way our kids feel, behave, and interact with the world around them. This is where empathy, curiosity, openness really comes in handy. A little acronym saying that is helpful is Robert just ate fries, tacos, and pie.
So the R stands for recognize. You can pause and label what's happening, the anxiety, the doubt, the worry. The J is just thoughts. So it reminds you that you can leave them alone. They're just thoughts. A is for accept and allow instead of fighting, resisting, or distracting yourself from this anxiety or worry.
You just allow it. You accept it. F is for float and feel return to the present reality and away from the imagined future. So you kind of just allow yourself to float back to the present and steering yourself away from that imagined future that you're starting to create with your story. T is for time pass, so you curiously observe any anxiety or distress that's coming up while again going back to the present, what's in front of you.
And P is for proceed, continue whatever you are doing right there in the present. The fastest way to take away power from your thoughts, your anxiety, your distress is actually just to keep going. Another skill is to personify the anxiety or doubts. Kids can name it and draw a picture of it. So even if this is your kids have worries and doubts that are all sizes and flavors, or maybe they have the same one, it's repeated either way.
You can personify it, give it a name, give it color, give it a picture and the kids can start to talk to it. They can say, I don't have time to play Mr. Worry. I'm busy already. It gives our children the power to separate themselves from their thoughts and feelings, allowing them to notice. and accept them, but not feel trapped or controlled by them.
Last little skill is you can also establish a worry time, like a worry break. Set a few times, set up a few different times per day to designate to worrying and focus on the doubt. Often this will lead to children actually not wanting to take time away from their day to worry, realizing that it actually takes away from far better things.
When our kids get stuck in their doubt sequence or anxious thinking patterns, it can be debilitating for them and the whole family. Approaching their doubts and anxiety with curiosity, kindness, acceptance, and confidence can help support them to navigate more adaptive ways in handling their distress. If we can teach our children to recognize, They drift from reality to imagination to accept thoughts as thoughts without getting sucked in.
We can empower them to spend their days doing the things they love. That's it for this week's edition of Project Parenthood. Remember to be curious, open, accepting, kind, and non judgmental on your conscious parenting journey. If you have any questions about this episode, about your parenting journey and or topics you would like to hear more about, please reach out to parenthood@quickanddirtytips.com or leave a message at 646 926 3243. Project Parenthood is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast. Thanks to the team at Quick and Dirty Tips, Holly Hutchings, Davina Tomlin, Morgan Christianson, and Brannan Goetschius. May you be happy, safe, and protected. Healthy and strong and live with ease.