Anxiety has no age limit and it seems to be quite prevalent amongst children of all ages intoday’s world. Moreover, it can be difficult to know whether a child is suffering from anxietybecause symptoms can sometimes overlap with other disorders such as a learning disability orthings such as ADHD or ASD.
If a child thinks they are not good at a particular subject, such as maths, then the days theyhave maths, they may have a stomach ache thinking about it. They may make excuses in order tomiss a lesson which impacts even further on the problem. They will struggle with the homeworkand so on. This could seem to you to be a learning disorder, such as dyscalculia, when in factit is purely anxiety.
Similarly, being preoccupied with thoughts can also look like a focus issue, but your child maybe internally occupied and simply worrying about anything. Anxiety and ADHD, at times, oftenlook very much like each other, and it takes a discerning eye to figure out which one it is.And, to complicate things further, sometimes there can be a little bit of both.
Anxiety in children can be caused by a frightening experience or event. Parents may not realisetheir child is suffering from such an experience as, to them, an event might seem insignificantbut to the child it could be so disturbing as to lead to anxiety.
Here are some signs to look out for if you think your child might be suffering from anxiety:
Check our article Tips for Calming Kids, to find some ideas on what you can do to help yourchild through anxiety.
