Does Your Teenager Suffer from Anxiety? Learn Five Daily Activities That Will Reduce The Anxiety In Your Child's Life
Lisa Schab, MSW, LCSW, a licensed clinical social worker with a private counseling practice in the Chicago suburbs, discusses her new book, "The Anxiety Workbook for Teens: Activities To Help You Deal With Anxiety and Worry."
One in four teenagers suffers from mild to serious problems with anxiety. In this interview with Commitmentnow.com, Lisa Schab, LCSW, author of The Anxiety Workbook for Teens discusses the thought patterns and cultural pressures that ignite anxiety in teenagers.
Commitmentnow.com: Do many teens experience anxiety? If so, why? Is this a growing problem?
Lisa Schab, LCSW: The average teen from an intact family with no major traumas experiences some degree of anxiety just by going through adolescence. During this developmental stage bodies are growing and changing in new ways, hormones are affecting mood and new sexual desire, social pressure to “fit in” is high, and the desire to separate from family causes both inner and outer conflict.
Beyond the “normal” anxiety associated with these major changes, unease is also exacerbated as the world becomes a less secure place. A high divorce rate splits families – which are the main source of every child’s security. A troubled economy and high unemployment rate makes the future less certain for adolescents peering into adulthood.
Global competition for places in higher education make college requirements stiffer, putting pressure on teens to excel not only academically but in activities and community service as well.
Advanced technology brings real life violence, hardship, and corrupt leadership right into the palm of a teen’s hand. Glimpses at the world beyond school and home can raise the anxiety levels of the most secure kids.
Commitmentnow.com: As a social worker, what do you find are often at the root causes of a teenager's anxiety?
Lisa: As mentioned above, normal adolescence is a time of major changes in many areas. Anxiety is created when we tell ourselves negative thoughts about these changes, or the world at large. In general, teens tend to experience anxiety for issues with:
• Family (divorce, family member illness, abuse, conflictual relationships)
• Friends (romantic and friendship relationships, social acceptance, peer pressure)
• Academics (pressure to get good grades, get into college)
• Self (self-esteem, body image and body changes, confusion or uncertainty about identity and future paths)
Commitmentnow.com: What are five things a parent can do to help ease their child's anxiety?
Lisa: Parents can help a child to manage anxiety by:
1. Helping them to understand where the anxiety comes from and identifying the thoughts that cause it to rise.
2. Helping them to recognize, label, accept, and validate their feelings.
3. Helping them find healthy ways to express their feelings.
4. Working on their own emotional health so they can model healthy coping skills.
5. Creating as emotionally secure a home environment as possible
Commitmentnow.com: Tell us about your book, The Anxiety Workbook for Teens. What was your goal in writing the book? What type of exercises does it have that can help a teenager with their anxiety? What about this book makes you the most proud and satisfied?
Lisa: The goal in writing the book was to provide a comprehensive, teen-friendly, practical handbook of research-based, effective activities for readers to use to manage anxiety.
The exercises offer help from mental, emotional, physical, social, and spiritual arenas. They vary widely, from cognitive – or “thinking” – activities, to relaxation skills such as breathwork and meditation, and physical considerations such as diet and exercise.
What I feel best about is that there has been so much positive feedback about the book, from both teens and the adults working with them.
Commitmentnow.com: One of the activities in your book is you invite the reader to draw a picture of themselves standing at the door of their bedroom first thing in the morning, and then to draw all the things outside their bedroom that makes them feel stressed.
Can you explain this activity to us and why doing something like this can begin to ease anxiety?
Lisa: This activity is designed to raise the reader’s awareness of what specifically they are anxious about. The suggestion of drawing is used to give them an additional vehicle besides words to learn about themselves.
When we can “see” a situation instead of just “hearing” or “describing” it, we often gain new information or new insights about it and our relation to it. Often just understanding more about our anxiety will help it begin to diminish.
Commitmentnow.com: In Activity 3, you write that "peace is a natural state of being that is already within us; it is just hidden by all of the stress and tension we take in and focus on."
How can a teenager find their inner peace--and what tends to destroy this natural state of being?
Lisa: Any of the exercises in this book will begin to help a teen reclaim their inner peace. Peace is almost always destroyed by thinking patterns. Our thoughts create our feelings.
Commitmentnow.com: What elements of everyday life and activities in our culture tend to promote anxiety?
Lisa: Our culture is fast-paced. People become anxious if we have to wait for something because we tell ourselves there is something “wrong” with this. We do not learn how to delay gratification or be comfortable with quiet time.
For example, kids used to wait until they got home, had dinner, and finished homework before they called a friend on the phone. Now they are able to call, text, email, or “Facebook” their friends just about any time or anywhere. This is a new sense of immediacy that keeps our baseline adrenaline levels running on high.
We are also a highly achievement-oriented and competitive society. Whether it be with appearance, possessions, jobs, grades, or relationships, a multi-billion dollar advertising industry sends us messages about what is “good” and “bad” – and what we “should” want – to have, be, and do. Because this is business-driven, standards are set to keep people wanting versus finding peace and satisfaction with who they are and what they have now. (This goes beyond a healthy desire to grow and evolve.)
The pressure for more raises anxiety levels because it is hard to ever feel “good enough.”
Commitmentnow.com: What are five daily activities or habits that can help ease anxiety in a teenager's life?
Lisa:
1.Staying in the present moment.
2. Slowing down their life pace.
3. Physical exercise.
4. Journaling.
5. Sharing their thoughts and feelings with someone they trust.
Commitmentnow.com: What are things a parent can include in their child's home environment that will help ease anxiety?
Lisa: Physically, parents can try to make sure that the teen has a personal space, a “safe place” to go to relax and unwind.
Emotionally, parents can try to create a home where the teen feels emotionally safe and secure – provide healthy, open communication, support and stability – a “nest” that they can count on to hold them as they go through the ups and downs of adolescence.
Commitmentnow.com: What are some of the most common thought patterns that create anxiety?
Lisa:
1. Negative focus: concentrating on what we don’t like versus what we do like – about our life, our selves, our situations, our relationships, etc.
2. All-or-nothing: if we don’t do something perfectly we say we have failed.
3. Overgeneralizing: if something happens once, we tell ourselves that’s the way it will be forever.
4. Catastrophizing: “making a mountain out of a mole hill” – blowing something out of proportion.
5. False beliefs: thinking that every thought we have is actually true. (Upon examination, a great percentage of the time they are not.)
Commitmentnow.com: You write, "Your thoughts create your experience of life. Your attitude, or the way you think about things, is one of the most powerful tools you have to help you prevent and manage feelings of anxiety."
What can a teenager do who doesn't have a positive, upbeat attitude and tends to think of things negatively?
Lisa: New thought patterns can be learned. If a parent is not able to model a positive attitude, they can find a counselor or educational materials that can teach this. This workbook is only one of many resources.
The concept that our thoughts create our life is an age-old wisdom. (The biblical quote, “As a man thinks, so will he be” is often referenced.) It is the basis of many therapies including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which is the treatment of choice for many diagnoses.
It is also the basis for newer therapeutic and philosophical teachings such as those described in Byron Katie’s, Loving What Is, and Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret.
Commitmentnow.com: In working with your clients, what seems to bring about the turning point where anxiety no longer rules a teenager's life?
Lisa: This is different for every client. Change takes place when the person is ready for it, and when they are willing to work at practicing new ways of thinking and experiencing the world. For some teens this comes readily, and for others it may not.
To order The Anxiety Workbook for Teens click here.
About the Author: Lisa M. Schab, LCSW, is a licensed clinical social worker with a private counseling practice in the Chicago suburbs. She is author of twelve self-help books and workbooks for children, teens, and adults. Schab teaches self-help workshops for the general public and training seminars for professionals.
