The Worry Jar Technique: Help Your Child Overcome Worries and Anxiety

Nervous-ChildIt may seem like your child worries a lot of the time and about everything. Children can worry about all sorts of things, such as safety issues, tests and school work, friends, family, health, the planet, and more. They may seek reassurance and ask you questions repeatedly about their worries. By asking you about their worry, your child may feel better for a short while, but then some time later, you may notice that your child asks you again about the same worry. This tells you that your child’s worry did not go away (as you had thought or had hoped). Click here for more information on children’s anxiety.

In this post, I will share with you about the worry jar, which is one of my favourite techniques to help an anxious child contain their worries.

In my clinical work, I have found that being creative and making the strategies concrete and come to life improves their effectiveness and usefulness, especially with young children. I encourage you to do the same in helping your child.

The Worry Jar

A Worry Jar is a place for your child to put their worries so that they do not need to keep thinking about them. It is like storing them or putting them away for safe keeping. Just knowing that their worries are contained in the jar can free your child from having to replay them in their minds.

worry-jar

Create a worry jar with your child. Find a real glass or plastic jar. Have your child decorate it (which is the really fun part) and then label it with a name (e.g., ‘Johnny’s Worry Jar’ or ‘My Worry Jar’). Once the jar is finished, help your child write down all his or her worries in a list on paper. You and your child can then cut each worry into its own strip of paper. Fold each worry and put it in the jar. Once all the worries are inside, have your child close the jar.

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Recommended Books for the Anxious Child

In an earlier post about help for the anxious child, anxious teen, and anxious parent, I discussed building your toolkit and building your child’s toolkit of strategies to help cope with anxiety. I focused on learning breathing techniques and then teaching them to your child or adolescent in order to provide you, your child, and/or your teen with the foundation and starting point for your toolkit.

In my clinical practice with young children, school-aged children, and teenagers, I often recommend to my clients and/or their parents different books that can support and reinforce the work we do together. These books about anxiety are helpful resources that can enhance learning and the therapeutic process. I thought I would share five recommendations for young children and school-aged children

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Help for the Anxious Child, Anxious Teen, and Anxious Parent

Kids and teens have worries and experience stress and anxiety just like their parents. Indeed, we can feel anxious, worried, overwhelmed or stressed at any age – young and old alike.

Sometimes anxiety may seem to run in the family. Ever notice that your child or teen is anxious just like you? That is because children are very perceptive and attuned to their parents, almost like they have antennae where they can essentially pick up and sense your moods and signals. Children watch closely your actions and behaviours and they listen carefully to what you say (even though they are busy playing or doing other things).

The upside of this is that children learn not only from what you teach them but also from observing you. You can help your child or teen, both directly and indirectly, manage and cope with stress and anxiety. I know it is a cliche, but it is very important that you practice what you preach.

Where to begin? Build your toolkit, build your child’s or teenager’s toolkit.

The first and most important tool is to change your breathing.

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The “What If” Game: To worry or not to worry?

Worries. We all have them. Some of us worry a lot whereas others worry a little. Some worries are about important and big issues and some may be about small details. Worries can be about realistic and probable events or about unlikely occurrences. Regardless of the type of worries, they can be on our minds at all hours of the day and night affecting our daily functioning and our ability to sleep.

Insomnia

When we are worried, the mind seems to take on a life of its own and we can get wound up with seemingly incessant and bothersome thoughts and questions (such as…What if this happens? What if that happens? What if I can’t do it? What if I fail? What if I had done this instead of that? What if I said this? etc). The worrying questions can not only be about ourselves but also about our loved ones, including our children (e.g., what if my child gets hurt? What if my child fails his test? What if my child is being teased at school?). The questions may seem to repeat and to go on forever…and ever. Ugh!!!!

I call it the dreaded “what if” game!

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