Anxious Kids, Anxious Parents: 7 Ways to Stop the Worry Cycle and Raise Courageous and Independent Children (Anxiety Series)

With anxiety at epidemic levels among our children, Anxious Kids, Anxious Parents offers a contrarian yet effective approach to help children and teens push through their fears, worries, and phobias to ultimately become more resilient, independent, and happy.

How do you manage a child who gets stomachaches every school morning, who refuses after-school activities, or who is trapped in the bathroom with compulsive washing? Children like these put a palpable strain on frustrated, helpless parents and teachers. And there is no escaping the problem: One in every five kids suffers from a diagnosable anxiety disorder.

Unfortunately, when parents or professionals offer help in traditional ways, they unknowingly reinforce a child’s worry and avoidance. From their success with hundreds of organizations, schools, and families, Reid Wilson, PhD, and Lynn Lyons, LICSW, share their unconventional approach of stepping into uncertainty in a way that is currently unfamiliar but infinitely successful. Using current research and contemporary examples, the book exposes the most common anxiety-enhancing patterns—including reassurance, accommodation, avoidance, and poor problem solving—and offers a concrete plan with 7 key principles that foster change. And, since new research reveals how anxious parents typically make for anxious children, the book offers exercises and techniques to change both the children’s and the parental patterns of thinking and behaving.

This book challenges our basic instincts about how to help fearful kids and will serve as the antidote for an anxious nation of kids and their parents.

From the Publisher

One in every five kids suffers from a diagnosable anxiety disorder.

Anxiety is the number one mental health problem in America and the most frequent reason that parents bring their children to a mental health provider.

There are seven core principles that can be successfully applied to any anxiety-related problem. While other books separate strategies based on each of the diagnosable anxiety disorders, this book presents a global plan of action with no unnecessary clinical jargon.

The authors address the biggest myths, misconceptions, and mistakes that parents and professionals make when dealing with fears and phobias – which only perpetuate the worry cycle– with tips and tools for how to avoid them.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Health Communications Inc; 1st edition (September 3, 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0757317626
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0757317620
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 11.2 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.8 x 8.5 inches