How to Support Highly Sensitive Kids with Fear and Anxiety

All right, parents. I feel you. I had to write today because this is a tough nut to crack, but I had amazing success this morning and want to share it.

Fear and anxiety, especially in the highly sensitive child, is often masked. It looks like disobedience, defiance, anger, opposition, surliness and a whole host of other undesirable qualities. It can be easy to miss and it IS really hard for parents. Sometimes anxiety just looks like anxiety! And it can show up as fear about the proverbial molehill and you want to scream: IT’S NO BIG DEAL!

Except that It is to our highly sensitive child. It really is and it’s inside of them. If they know anything, they know it’s there…

So parents, I’m here to tell you that there is hope. I’m not going to start with “it’s important to get a handle on our own fear and anxiety” because I know we know that already (ok, so maybe I did just start with that…forgive me!) BUT equally important is that we start thinking about anxiety as energy - energy in the body that is looking for a way out… looking to be moved through the body. The tips below offer some ideas about how to do that and they work for us grown-ups too, by the way.

This morning, anxiety struck my kid big-time. After a minor disagreement with another camper yesterday, my little one was ready to call it a day and skip the rest of the week. Below is the 3-step roadmap we used to shift the energy. Today, all three worked together amazingly, but sometimes you may only need one or two. *Important to note: you may have to use some incentives to get your kid - who likely feels flooded - to go along with the following. You will figure out what works for your child and they will eventually figure out that doing this stuff is worth it. Personally, I have no problem offering a small bribe to try something new.

Three Steps to Move Fear and Anxiety through the Body

1) Tapping. The first thing we tried this morning was tapping. If you’re not familiar with tapping, please have a look. It’s about repeating affirmations while tapping on certain parts of the body, supposedly meridian points. To begin, It’s good to give the fear a number - with an intensity level from 1 to 10. My child started with a 10 this morning. We (reluctantly) tapped on some of his fears around going to camp and were able to bring it down to a 7.

2) Shaking it out. Trauma specialist Peter Levine recommends shaking as a way to move energy through the body. This can also look like dancing… in the past, it has made us both burst out laughing. Today, there was again reluctance around doing it, but we forged ahead and it brought us down to about a 5. And I really like how this video explains it all.

3) The 20 second hug. Drs. Emily and Amelia Nagoskis explain the 20 second hug in a podcast with Brene Brown and how it decreases the stress response. I swear, these long hugs have been transformative for us. They are slow and deliberate; and every few seconds we take a deep breath together. By the end of 20 seconds, a wave of near-peace has settled over both of us. Today, this brought my child’s fear intensity down to a 2 or 3.

It’s important, I think, to emphasize how major today was. We went from a near panic-attack to my kid feeling relatively confident about going into camp today, talking to the other camper and resolving the problem alone… whaaaa…?

To say I felt proud is an understatement. To say, I felt relieved is an understatement. Which is why I want to share this information, because I can imagine that many parents are desperate for tools and a sense of hope. I can also imagine that many times, we don’t even recognize when fear and anxiety are driving our child’s behavior. So I hope this post is helpful and offers some ideas for how to move forward.

Good luck, parents. It can be hard as hell… but hopefully, we all come out better, stronger and wiser.

Good Things Happen After Bad Things

This is not a product placement nor an ordinary piece of chocolate. Rather it's a small symbol of redemption wrapped in shiny red paper; a reminder that good things can happen after bad things and they often do.

This past weekend, we were at a hotel celebrating our twins almost birthday. At the beginning of dinner on our first evening, a waiter's arm came into unfortunate contact with some part of my son's body, which resulted in a sticky aperol spritz spilling all over him and his clothing. My startled boy immediately burst into tears and made his displeasure somewhat (ahem) well known.

While the waiter cleaned up the mess, my son and I went upstairs to change clothes and I asked him about how he thinks the waiter might be feeling.

"He might feel a little stupid," we agreed, acknowledging that that's not exactly the best way to feel.

Back at our now clean, dry table, the waiter was laying out our food when he turned to my son:

"Are you still mad at me?"

"Actually, I was never mad at you," my son answered, quite truthfully.

A few minutes later, the waiter returned with this Kit Kat bar and a bag of gummy bears, presenting them to a once again very surprised little boy, though this time in a much different way.

"You're so kind," my son told him in a quiet voice.

And we had our proof: good things can happen after bad things and they often do.

When You Want It To Last Forever

Lately, I have had moments with my children that feel nothing short of magical. A small hand slips inside mine with a voice that says, “I am so lucky to be born to a mother I really love” and I respond with “I’m so lucky to have a son/daughter I really love” and we have a mini-blissed out moment of parent-child bonding.

At age six, it feels like, I have entered the sweet spot of parenting. They are old enough to…. (get their own glass of water, wipe their own bottoms, etc); but they are young enough to… (snuggle inside your arms; fill up with joy after they haven’t seen you in a day).

These moments are gorgeous and endearing and the very best of raising other humans.

And yet these moments are also tinged with the tiniest bit of sadness. Vulnerability-master Brene Brown says that often in such tender moments - when everything feels just right - we humans are waiting for the other shoe to drop…. so much is our resistance to happiness. For me, it’s a little bit different. Rather, it feels like right alongside joy is the subtle taste of ephemerality. The knowing that the end is already in the beginning. Or in the middle.

This is nothing new, of course, just the good old yin and yang of the human condition. A Buddhist would say my wanting such a moment to last is a form of grasping. And grasping is a form of suffering.

So what is one to do? Brene says that allowing ourselves to feel joy is connected to a practice of gratitude. Indeed, it seems she is right. We need to notice and cultivate a sense of appreciation when it’s all going our way; give ourselves permission to savor. However, I also think tasting the end in a beginning or a middle is a feeling that sometimes just needs to be acknowledged, felt and allowed. It is, after all, a sort of grief, a burden of these oh-so-wonderful and oh-so-complicated human bodies. Our children will grow up, these lovely moments will pass into other ones, and yes, some day, we will all be parted in some form.

Denying the pains of being human doesn’t make them go away; it just tends to make us numb out or distracted or addicted. In my preferred way of practicing, we gives ourselves space to feel it, to honor it, then we move into gratitude or another life-affirming practice.

Wanting it to last forever is human. But allowing those feelings just to be - with kindness - is pretty darn close to divine.

If We Want More Women in Engineering, Our Boys Need to Dance

The other day I was having a conversation with a friendly gentleman I met at the playground by my children's school. I mentioned that we were looking for a classical dance class for our son.

"He likes it. He wants to give it a try."

"That's not normal," the man responded kindly.

"You don't think so?" I asked him. "My sense is that all kids want to sing and dance but cultural norms make it harder for boys than for girls."

"Oooh...?" he responded, open to hearing my take.

I'm not sure if I succeeded in changing his mind, but I was reminded how tough it is for boys… still… to dip a toe into anything considered too "girly."

As the twin brother to a rhythmic sister, my son has wanted to dance since he was a very little boy. But unfortunately, over the years, his confidence about pursuing it has simply diminished. At least where we live now, (Vienna, Austria) dancing, and especially ballet dancing, seems to clearly fall under the domain of "girls' stuff."

As my son wistfully watches his twin glide away to dance class, he is left to choose from what's left over: soccer, tennis, a musical instrument or two. Of course, dancing is in no way a feminine activity (eg, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly,or Justin Timberlake), but peer pressure can keep young boys fully excluded from the natural and human inclination to boogie. A friend told me how at her child's school, students were given two options for an elective: either drumming or ballet (don't ask me why those two.) Two boys chose ballet, she shared, but once they found out they were the only two, they immediately backed out. The impulse to "fit in" is just too strong for most young children to go against the herd.

Meanwhile, a few years ago, I took my kids to a very basic engineering class (more playing around than anything else), which included about fifteen boys and two girls. Looking around at all the testosterone in the making, I was utterly shocked. It seemed simply impossible that with all the awareness about gender bias in tech, the room was teeming with boys, and had so few girls.

"Is this typical?" I asked the young woman working there.

"Unfortunately, it is," she answered.

Admittedly, I have since seen a few more girls at engineering, but I have a theory about how this happens, at least in part. While girls have plenty of opportunity for creative expression, the boys are subtly or overtly shut out, and end up crowding into spaces where they feel welcomed: soccer, tennis, a musical instrument or two, and oh yeah, engineering. Meanwhile, if I was a little girl looking around that engineering class, I wouldn't find it particularly welcoming. In fact, it would look a heck of a lot like "boy's stuff." Yet over in ballet class, everyone happens to look pretty much like me, and I might feel a little more comfortable there. Hence, while lots of girls are freely practicing their creative expression through dance, lots of boys are becoming the next CEOs of future tech companies.

Personally, I happen to think both are really important, but we are still living in a world that bizarrely and stubbornly pushes young kids into gender boxes. And everyone loses.

Simply put: if we want more women in engineering, our boys need to dance.

Yelling At Kids Is a Misuse of Power

Every parent is a leader, even if we don’t consider ourselves such, and that means every parent has power. It may not always feel that way, but actually we have a great deal of power and influence in at least one very important relationship. So what do we do with our power? How do we wield it? Are we even fully aware of it? Without doubt, there are many ways we use our power that ultimately benefit our children, but there are also ways that we may be misusing our power. This post is about one of them: yelling.

On one hand, it’s kind of not debatable. Yelling at kids is a misuse of power. We’re big, they’re small. We’re responsible; they’re dependent. When they’re very small, they’re incredibly dependent, relying on our benevolence, generosity, decency, ability to manage stress, emotionally regulate, etc...

On the other hand, nearly all of us have done it. I have yelled at my kids. You’ve probably yelled at your kids. Most people have yelled at their kids. But it doesn’t change the basic premise that yelling at kids is a misuse of power. That’s not to say that all yelling in all circumstances is a misuse of power; if our kid is running across the street and a car is coming, we yell, “STOP” and sometimes we raise our voices to get their attention or emphasize a point. But the kind of yelling that sends shots of cortisol rippling through their bodies, often short-tempered and triggered, is a misuse of power.

This is especially so when our kids are small. As far as they’re concerned, we’re pretty much the most powerful person in their known universe, the supplier or denier of everything they need, want or seek. Or as this article puts it, “parents are humans twice their (children’s) size who provide everything they need to live: food, shelter, love, Paw Patrol.” (alas, my kids too loved Paw Patrol…) The author suggests replacing yelling with humor. I haven’t done it all that much but when I have, it’s been surprisingly effective at diffusing a tense moment. Connecting with empathy, before correcting or directing, has also worked really well. And sometimes I just need to feel the sting of an agitated feeling or hold my breath (for a count of five), until the frustration passes.

So if you’re going to yell at your kids, or if you have, try to forgive yourself and I’ll try to forgive myself. This raising human beings stuff is tough business and we are surely going to slip up. In fact, we’re meant to slip up, so we can learn and grow and evolve. along the way. Along the way, let’s show ourselves plenty of kindness. But let’s also own yelling at our kids for what it is: most of the time, it’s misuse of an incredibly valuable power.

A Regular Day in Vienna

The kids both wake up later than intended and I suppose if I'm being honest, I probably did too. I pack four snack boxes, for two morning snacks and two afternoon snacks. Normally, I'd hope that they would pack their own backpacks but knowing that there won't be enough time, I need to do it. I prepare two breakfasts, I lay out two sets of clothes and normally I'd want them to get themselves dressed, but again knowing the time crunch, I need to do that too. I try my very very best not to push them, not to pass on my stress, not to lose my patience or my cool unnecessarily. How terrible is it if we are late for school one day? It's not worth the sadness and defeat that would inevitably arise if I snap at them. But still, I try to rush them along; to encourage them; to coax them. And eventually all three of us are dressed and ready to walk out the door. We arrive at the tram stop. We wait the 6 minutes that the monitor says it will take for the tram to come and as soon as the six minutes expires, another eight minutes mysteriously appears. Dammit. We're going to be late anyway. We go back to the house, pick up their scooters and rush all the way to school. After I drop them off, I remember I need to go to the grocery store, but I can't remember what I have to buy and meanwhile my head is churning.

It goes something like this:

"I know I wanted to get rice crackers and pretzels but what else..."

And then it goes like this: "I wonder why my friend didn't call me to check in on me after I sent that message? She must have known I felt vulnerable."

And then like this: "That is so weird how everyone was invited yesterday but me."

And then like this: "Am I even prepared for this call, which is now in only 45 minutes?"

I feel frazzled, frenzied, all over the place, torpedoed with stress.

I walk into the grocery store, remembering that I need to buy snacks for the snack boxes tomorrow, knowing that it's inching toward ten o clock, wondering if all this rushing is really natural and empathizing with people who decide to homeschool. Exiting the grocery store, I begin to walk toward home. And as I'm walking, I notice my feet, purposefully, intentionally; I notice them making contact with the pavement. In fact, I direct all of my attention toward my feet making contact with the pavement. And I start to breathe.

The next one arrives quickly: "Why the heck didn't she invite me?"

Gently, I return my attention to the sensation of my feet on the pavement. And I breathe.

Then the next one: "This is so boring. I don't want to think about my feet on the pavement."

Gently, I return my attention to the sensation of my feet on the pavement. And I breathe.

"I hate these shoes. I definitely need new shoes."

Gently, I return my attention to the sensation of my feet on the pavement. And I breathe.

With this breath, my shoulders drop a little. I had been holding them upwards, pulled toward my ears. I notice that my body is housing a feeling of sadness.

Gently, I return my attention to the sensation of my feet on the pavement. And I breathe.

As I continue to walk home, I know this is why I have a practice. And I know this is what my practice is for.

***

As I arrive at our apartment, I enter the kitchen, only to be greeted by a colossal mess to clean up, including cereal scattered all over the floor. After retrieving the dust pan, I fall to my knees, to sweep it up and tears begin to fall down my face. Indeed, sadness has made its way to the surface. After I finish sweeping and crying, I splash water on my face, and open the computer, preparing for the conversation about to take place.

"At least I slept well last night," the voice inside my head tells me.

This is a different kind of thought, a glimmer of hope, almost like gratitude.

The 10am conversation goes well, and I feel composed after the morning's chaos, but still like I need a bit of mental space. I consider moving into seated meditation but the sun is shining, I need some exercise and to buy new shoes, not for me of course, but for the kids, which is often how it goes as a parent. I decide to go out for another walk. The heaviness of the morning has passed and my mind is ready for a new perspective.

The next one arrives like this: "Perhaps it isn't just me in need of comfort. Maybe my friend needs some too and I'm the one who should see how she's doing."

And then another: "Maybe she didn't invite me because she's also overwhelmed and just forgot.

And then another: "Even if not, it's not my job to control other people's choices."

As I continue to walk on, a man suddenly approaches me, speaking in rapid German.

"Can you say it in English?" I ask him. It's clear he will be asking me for money and under normal circumstances I would likely keep walking. But today is different. Recently, in our meditation class, we agreed to carry out an act of kindness before the last session. As part of that commitment, I have decided that for this week, I will give money to anyone who asks me for it. Moreover, I will leave them with a final thought: "Du bist schon" or "You are beautiful." Saying it in English would feel too vulnerable, but saying it in German feels yes, weird, but also ok.

"Do you speak English?"

"Yes, I do. I have no job," he says. Because I already know I will give him money, it's a completely different experience than when someone usually asks. I am open, receptive. I have time to pause, to look him in the eyes, to really see him. I believe him. But even if not, it wouldn't matter. I have already made a commitment, and he shows up right on time. I greet him with open arms, almost as if it were he offering me the favor.

"Well, let me see what I have for you," I say as naturally as if he had asked for a kleenex. Opening my wallet, I realize I don't have much change so I take out my last five euro bill, look him straight in the eyes, and say, "Du bist schon."

He walks away. It feels completely bizarre, a little awkward, a little exhilarating and at the same time, like just a regular day in Vienna. That night we all somehow manage to all be in bed early. But more importantly, we also wake up early the next morning. It's another day to do it all over again.

Sometimes Big Love = Big Sacrifices

(Want to listen to the audio version, plus micro-meditation? Click here.)

Sometimes the days are long.

Sometimes the days are dull.

Sometimes the time drags on and on.

Sometimes I want to pull my hair out. Multiple times a day.

And then they say something that takes me back.

“Did you know, that if I met God, I would only ask for one thing,” my daughter says calmly.

“Oh yeah, what’s that?” I ask her.

“That when you die, I can go too...”

“Oh…” I answer, matching her calm. “I understand. But did you know that even if I died first, you might still feel me close to you.”

“You always say that,” her brother adds.

“I always say it because it’s true.” And because I want you to know that, no matter what happens, you’ll be ok.

Sometimes in a day that feels long and dull, that drags on and on, and I want to pull my hair out multiple times, there is a moment that is sublime.

And I remember that sometimes big love is worth the big sacrifices.

Babies Are Like Sheepdogs

Here is something I wish I knew before I had kids: that babies are essentially like sheepdogs in how strongly they are instinctually wired.

Sheep dogs desperately want to herd, small children desperately want to love and adore their parents. When sheepdogs have no outlet for herding, problems arise; when small children’s impulse to adore their parents (or primary caregivers) gets thwarted, because of inconsistency, unresponsiveness or feeling threatened, problems arise.

Small children are just aching, aching, aching to love their parents, to fold into the embrace of their unconditional acceptance. Sometimes, without even realizing it, we make this hard for them to do, to fulfill this biological imperative. But the ache remains.

So many problems, the whole world over, would be resolved if small children were able to deeply fulfill the instinctual drive to love their parents. But in order for them to do that, we have to make it easy for them. They will shower us with love, if we open the door to a safe and welcoming relationship.

Shifting into Connection: When Waiting is Hard

Today, my kid wanted to go out and play with his new toy car. He was waiting for his papa to wake up and it felt like the whining just… wouldn’t… cease. At some point, I was in the bathroom and he was outside, yammering on about how it was taking too long for papa to wake up.

I snapped at him that if he didn’t stop whining, I would take his car away, and that he should feel lucky that a) he has a new toy car and b) someone who wants to go to the park with him.

And damn, did that feel true. But when I went into my room, something else also felt true: that waiting is hard. That it’s hard for me when I really want something, and it’s hard for him now.

I went back into his room: “I hear you,” I said. “Waiting is hard. And right now, it feels really hard. But he’ll wake up soon, and it’ll be so much fun when you finally get out there.”

The whining quieted down, but most important of all: we connected.

Just like me, just like you: he doesn’t necessarily need the problem fixed: he just wants to be understood.

WWPPD: What Would a Playful Parent do?

There are plenty of times when I can be the playful parent, but usually not when my kids are being stubborn or defiant. I admire it, but so far have found it really hard to embody. Nonetheless, there are plenty of books that speak to how well it works on kids and once I saw it up close.

It was a cold evening. I was standing at the tram stop while my kid was half a block away, immobile, refusing to budge.

I was ready to bellow out something along the lines of: “The tram is coming! Get over here now!”

But a friend of mine, who was with us and has a child about the same age, walked over to him, and said, "Hey, want to race to the tram stop?”

Two minutes later, they were standing beside me and we were all getting on the tram.

I’m still marveling about it.

Children Love With Such Intensity

Flipping through the pages of one of my notebooks, I discover how my children have pounced upon it, and made their mark throughout the pages. Coming across their little scribbles and drawings is like finding an unexpected gift, the forgotten 20 dollar bill hiding in the pocket of last season’s coat.

Often they’ve left a little tribute to me, by writing “mama” somewhere on the page and I am reminded how intensely children love their parents; how they are deeply wired to love their parents, through the process of attachment. This young devotion is so whole-hearted and so pure it’s like the most delicate of all gifts, handed to the parents to safeguard for a short time.

We hold their hearts in the palms of our hands.

Last Night My Son Asked Me to Stop Yelling

“Mommy, can you please stop yelling?”

Last night, my six year old son asked me to please stop yelling. At first, I tried to justify myself, I tried to respond with something along the lines of, “Ok, but I’ve asked you to get ready for bed five times.”

And he said, “I know, but I’m just asking, can you please stop yelling.“

The part of me that knew he was right was bigger than the part of me that felt justified. So I stopped yelling, and my children got ready for bed.

This morning, at breakfast, I told him that I was proud of the way he made his request- the calm, quiet way he asked me to change my approach. And I’m also kind of proud of myself, that my son knows I am open to feedback, that he is entitled to make requests of me, and that we can reach agreements and resolutions that work for all of us.

Somehow, even at six, he seems to understand that it’s about progress, not perfection.