Panic Attack And Worried Teenagers

Depressed children have distorted ways of seeing the future, themselves, and others. Do you remember the depressive triad (worthless self, uncaring world, hopeless future) ? Now, how would you see the future, yourself, and the world if you were anxious? Probably, you would see a weak self, a dangerous world, and an uncertain future. Now, imagine how you would see things if you were both depressed and anxious. This would be quite a load on your mind! In Tammy's case, her view that she risked attack just by leaving the house was an anxious distortion. The danger outside her home was overestimated in this case.

All of the same ideas we discussed for depressive distortions apply to anxious ones too:
• Help your child examine the evidence for or against the worry.
(Usually, things aren't nearly as dangerous as what we anticipate.)
• Because worries often concern uncertain future events, you may have to look at probabilities as well. (What are the chances this will happen? What else could happen? What are the chances of that?)
• Try to emphasize personal competence. (Can you do anything to reduce the risk? If not, can you do anything to limit the worry time so worries don't control your life?)
• See if your teen can identify the worried state (for example, before bed is a common time when worries take hold). If so, encourage "catching yourself worrying" and then either doing something distracting or writing down the worry. Although it's not easy, some teens can learn to write down bedtime worries and then let them go until the morning. Also, if every worry must be written down, the activity becomes fatiguing and eventually induces sleep.
• At a calm time, you may want to discuss the pros and cons of worrying. (For example, occasionally, people can find new solutions to a problem after worrying about it, but more often worrying just causes distress and wastes time, so on balance it's not worth it.)
• Some teens will agree to a "worry time," which is usually a few minutes to half an hour where they can worry as much as they want. The deal is, however, that you must postpone worries to your "worry time" the rest of the day.
• Remember to also model good coping with anxiety-provoking situations. This is particularly helpful if your teen doesn't voice his worries to you. For example, if you are driving in snowy conditions, you could say, "This is not good. It's really starting to come down heavily, but then I've driven in this kind of weather before. I can slow down and still get to where I'm going. I can always pull over if it gets worse." Interestingly, you are not modeling fearlessness, but coping well despite your fears. Thus, you are modeling both acknowledging worry and good coping, thereby encouraging your teen to discuss worried feelings.



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