Specific Anxiety

[Guest guest]

Does anyone have an experience to share in which their child (or themselves)

developed an anxiety toward a specific situation? My son (12), treatment (Lyme

& Bartonella) for almost 1 yr now, is currently severely nervous before math

class. Once before it was the football coach and before that a certain teacher.

I see a pattern in the personalities that upset him but those people were also

presenting new/challenging information. I'm not sure what his trigger is--

person or performance. His fear will start the night before and is almost panic

attack-like. I (Lyme & Babesia) suffer similar anxiety and am hopeful it will

end soon.

I was just looking for other similar experiences or any suggestions.

thank you,

Elaine

[Guest guest]

My son (7, Lyme & Bartonella) had a very similar anxiety with an art

teacher. Art is one of his favorite things, be he didn't want to go to

school on art day. His homeroom teacher helped him through it by going with

him to art class and helping him. Same thing with a soccer coach. He has a

lot of general anxiety too, when he is feeling poorly. He clings to me - my

sticky child.

--Sue

_____

From:

[mailto: ] On Behalf Of ecckwalk

Sent: Monday, January 04, 2010 8:41 PM

Subject: [ ] Specific Anxiety

Does anyone have an experience to share in which their child (or themselves)

developed an anxiety toward a specific situation? My son (12), treatment

(Lyme & Bartonella) for almost 1 yr now, is currently severely nervous

before math class. Once before it was the football coach and before that a

certain teacher. I see a pattern in the personalities that upset him but

those people were also presenting new/challenging information. I'm not sure

what his trigger is-- person or performance. His fear will start the night

before and is almost panic attack-like. I (Lyme & Babesia) suffer similar

anxiety and am hopeful it will end soon.

I was just looking for other similar experiences or any suggestions.

thank you,

Elaine

[Guest guest]

Elaine,

As far as I see things, you're in good company.  Specific phobias seem to be

very common with Lyme/Bartonella, particularly in younger children.  Because I

specialize in trauma/anxiety tx, I often receive referrals from parents

needing assistance with managing their children's anxiety.  I've yet to have a

case that has not had underlying Lyme or other TBI involvement when the onset of

the anxiety has been very sudden.  That's pretty concerning on many levels.

Here in RI we are hyper-endemic for Lyme and TBI's and in my opinion, it's

changing the landscape of our state in many ways.  Anyway, you might consider

finding a clinician that specializes in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to

assist.  That person would work with you and your child to assist with

relaxation and training the brain to interpret particular stimuli in a less

threatening way.  One approach that I often use with children is " worry

time " .  Such time needs to take place for

about 30 minutes each day and paired with a pleasurable activity for the

child.  How it works is that parents are taught to conduct worry time daily

for the 30 minutes prior to the child's engagement in a fun, exciting

activity.  For that 30 minutes the parent helps the child to worry about all

the terrible things that could happen related to the specific person and/or

situation.  This sounds counter productive but it really works.  Also, the

tendency is for parents to minimize the child's anxiety during the worry time

but actually, the parent should help them make it as terrible as possible. 

The idea is that the brain gets bored with the input and begins to internalize

it as dull and boring over time.  For example, when the football coach was the

object of anxiety, you might say, " OK, before you can go play in the snow, we

have to worry about Mr. . "   Then you guide him through the worst possible

things that he thinks could come

up with Mr. .  Add to them by saying things like, " Oh my goodness, he

could make you do 100 push ups!! " and add a lot of affect to such comments.  At

first the child will buy into it in terms of the anxiety, but later, he or she

will become very impatient and say things like: " Do we really need to do this?

I'm tired of worrying about that.  I want to go play now... " .  The trick is

you have to do it consistently and for that length of time or else it won't be

effective.  Also, traditional CBT can be helpful in retraining the child that

" thinking differently means feeling differently and behaving differently " . 

This is work that really needs to be guided by the therapist and practiced at

home.  For my own children who had SEVERE anxiety, I used guided meditation

including use of books by Maureen Garth that walk you right through it.  I

would do this every night with them before bed to assist with sleep and the

nightmare issues.  Another

idea is bilateral stimulation (tapping acupressure points - there are lots of

books on this) or EMDR which helps one side of the brain to better process info

that's stored and interpreted with anxiety on the other.  Like anything else,

you need to find what works for you. In some cases, it's been helpful to

consult with a psychiatrist about meds for anxiety when it's been so severe

that it's been paralyzing for the child.  And it can be - as it can with

adults.  I have had a number of adults present to me with abrupt onset

panic/anxiety attacks which have been immobilizing to them.  Again - Lyme etc.

Best of luck in finding what works.  My heart is with you.  It is so

incredibly difficult to see this happen to your child.  I'm devastated daily by

what I see in my day job as the supervisor of clinical social work for a large

school department, and in my private practice, primarily with Lyme patients, at

night. -Not to mention with my own family.

Hang in there!

Kim  

 

________________________________

From: ecckwalk <ecckwalk@...>

Sent: Mon, January 4, 2010 8:40:53 PM

Subject: [ ] Specific Anxiety

 

Does anyone have an experience to share in which their child (or themselves)

developed an anxiety toward a specific situation? My son (12), treatment (Lyme &

Bartonella) for almost 1 yr now, is currently severely nervous before math

class. Once before it was the football coach and before that a certain teacher.

I see a pattern in the personalities that upset him but those people were also

presenting new/challenging information. I'm not sure what his trigger is--

person or performance. His fear will start the night before and is almost panic

attack-like. I (Lyme & Babesia) suffer similar anxiety and am hopeful it will

end soon.

I was just looking for other similar experiences or any suggestions.

thank you,

Elaine

[Guest guest]

to me that sounds like a stressful situation more than a " specific

situation. " And that will definitely make his lymes symptoms worse

due to the fact that stress can make healthy children and adults sick

by itself. I would try to reduce all the stress in his life. Not to

mention he has puberty to deal with. Hopefully his treatment cures

him soon!

Suzanne

On Jan 4, 2010, at 7:40 PM, ecckwalk wrote:

> Does anyone have an experience to share in which their child (or

> themselves) developed an anxiety toward a specific situation? My son

> (12), treatment (Lyme & Bartonella) for almost 1 yr now, is

> currently severely nervous before math class. Once before it was the

> football coach and before that a certain teacher. I see a pattern in

> the personalities that upset him but those people were also

> presenting new/challenging information. I'm not sure what his

> trigger is-- person or performance. His fear will start the night

> before and is almost panic attack-like. I (Lyme & Babesia) suffer

> similar anxiety and am hopeful it will end soon.

>

> I was just looking for other similar experiences or any suggestions.

> thank you,

> Elaine

>

>

>