Q&A: Seeking questions for anxiety
By Gwenn Schurgin O’Keeffe, MD, FAAP
Your Kid’s Health, The Salem News
November 25, 2003

Q: Your recent article on Anxiety couldn't be more timely for me. Last summer, our family discussed a potential move that never materialized. However, since then, our daughter, age 8, has been crying forcefully and resisting to participate at surprising times: the first week of school, the first few times back at after school activities, being dropped off at friend's homes and even at the dentist's office where she was scarred to be alone. This had never been a problem before – she is usually an easygoing child with many friends and interests. In each instance, I am told that she overcomes her anxiousness rather quickly. I do wonder though if this is the beginning of a pattern...I would be interested in any book recommendations you may have. - L

A: Change and transition are difficult for all of us and young children do not have the emotional maturity or life experience to understand that things may be just fine on the other side of the river. At the same time, many kids do “grow into” nerves and start to get anxious about new things in general as they mature. So, I completely understand why you’d want to get more information – it is always unsettling when our kids have a dramatic change in behavior and sometimes it is hard to tell if there is a bigger problem at hand. Instead of pointing you to some specific resources, let me suggest a path for sorting out this kind of problem in general.

Reading up on issues affecting our children can be either a blessing or a curse. Information can deepen our understanding of a situation and be reassuring but it can also sometimes lead us astray and convince us that a problem is larger than it really is. Part of the problem with behavior and emotions is that there is an enormous overlap between conditions and the fact that there are many common emotional reactions, like transition issues and separation anxiety, also occur in more significant anxiety disorders. In children, many emotional reactions, even distressing ones, are completely normal and even expected given their age and development.

So, before you dig too deeply into reading material of any kind, I’d encourage you to talk to a few “experts” who know your daughter well to help you get a more clear sense of what may be going on with her, if at all. Two invaluable resources that come to mind are your daughter’s teachers and her pediatrician. By now, both likely have a good sense of your daughter and can help you figure out with more certainty whether your daughter’s new symptoms are a short term or a long-term pattern. And, they can both help you work with your daughter to help make future transitions a bit easier.

As for finding good medical information, avoid trendy best sellers and random web searches to avoid getting inadvertently mislead. To find good, reliable information I’d suggest a trip a medical resource center. These have become very popular the last few years and are in most large Boston teaching hospitals as well as North Shore Children’s Hospital here in Salem, MA. These centers are really special libraries with staff trained to help you find reliable, objective information and help you focus your research. They will have all the latest information on just about any medical and psychological condition you can think of including simple handouts, books, web-based information, and local resources.
Hunting for information is like playing golf – better to read the course first or risk landing in every sand trap along the way with many extra strokes to your score.

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