10 year old daughter has HA

[Anxiousamyj]

My 10year old daughter has been freaking out about health related things for the past few weeks. She burst a blood vessel in her eye a couple nights ago during a panic attack and has been fixated and worrying about it. I took her to the eye doctor this afternoon and she was terrified and would not allow him to put the dye in her eye to check for a scratch. She screamed, cried, refused to open eyes. It was awful. She’s an unusually bright child, is in the gifted program at school. Has lots of friends as well. She started therapy last week, but she’s only had her intake appointment so far. As an HA sufferer myself, I’ve been careful to hide my fears and never mention illness worries around her. I know the suffering she’s going through better than anyone and it’s heartbreaking. She started out a couple years ago with a vomiting phobia and it has progressed into this. I’m so worried about her. Anyone have any ideas? Exercise definitely helps her, as well as being out with friends involved in an activity. She said tonight “how can I enjoy life when I know I’m just going to die?” I have high hopes for therapy, although she is pretty resistant to it. Anyone else’s kids have struggles with HA? I wonder if it is genetic!

[AntsyVee]

Sometimes it is genetic. In some kiddos, the anxiety starts very early, even before the onset of puberty.

[swajj]

You may think you have hidden your anxiety from her but children pick up on things quickly. Have you ever been anxious about her health?

[Carys]

I think it may be a symptom of her 'gifted' nature that you are seeing this quite early in her life. She probably did have the propensity to have similar personality traits to you and therefore anxiety, and she is advanced - therefore she has developed these fears earlier than they often appear, which is often in the teenaged years. Its fantastic you've got her straight into some therapy, now you can reenforce CBT type thought processes for your own HA fears by teaching her to address hers.

[Anxiousamyj]

Thanks, everyone. I also agree that her high intelligence is part of the issue. Her therapist said most elementary aged kiddos she treats for anxiety are in the top 10 percent for intelligence and IQ. I’m in CBT as well (I’m also getting my masters in social work); I know all the tricks and tips to help her, so we’re working on it. I hate it for her and hope to give her a solid set of coping skills so she can better cope as an adult. The doctor phobias she’s developed quickly are worrisome. She had to have a flu swab in January and they had to hold her down like a wild animal. The pediatrician mentioned that I should be looking into help for her anxiety, so that is what I did. I try not to freak out over her health, but I’m afraid I’m alarming her without meaning to. My husband is as cool as a cucumber about medical stuff, so I told him he can take the lead on doctor appointments with her for a bit. I think she knows I’m a bit too sympathetic and I probably feed into her anxiety a bit, even though I consciously try to avoid it.

[Loggie05]

My 12 year old niece suffers terribly from anxiety too. I bought her some healing crystals and she's been fine since. She calls them her worry stones and she rubs them when she is having bad thought. Maybe a good idea for your daughter to try. X

[tantopat]

I was around that age when I first started showing signs of health anxiety (the UK meningitis scare in 1999 was what started it for me, I believe) and I know how horrible it feels. Telling her you have it too and how you cope might actually help, as it'd show her that she's not alone with it. :) Maybe also teach her how the body is amazing at healing and repairing itself and squashing any problems that come along the vast majority of the time (My doctor at the time described it to me as the brain and immune system being like an engineer, who is almost always on top of what the problem is and has all the buttons ready to send out the repair teams at exactly the right time. When the engineer can't fix the problem, the doctors can.) Lastly, teaching her some breathing techniques and distractions may help. Once I was old enough to watch it, I'd often keep The Rocky Horror Picture Show in my portable DVD player. It did wonders helping me calm down and focus on something else at night, when I couldn't sleep and my health anxiety was at its worst. I'm not saying Tim Curry in a corset works for everyone, but her favourite film may work in the same way! :P

[Anxiousamyj]

Thanks so much everyone for the kind replies. I have a firm grip on my HA at the moment due to my CBT (which I'm almost finished with), and it's so sad to me to see my sweet girl headed down into the same torture tour. I'm trying to keep her very busy with friends and activities so she doesn't have a lot of time to ruminate about her "symptoms". Her therapy officially begins next Tuesday, so I'm hopefully we can nip this before she gets carried away. I wish my parents would have taken me to therapy when i was a child! I think it would have been helpful to learn how to cope at a young age, rather than learning it now.