How We Helped Our Son Slay His Beast: A Family’s Battle with Anxiety
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Anxiety arrives:
Anxiety relief for our son seemed as illusive as a shadow at midnight. My son’s anxiety symptoms reared its ugly head when he was in second grade. At first, it seemed like the normal school avoidance things that I tried when I was a kid: he had an upset stomach, a headache, he didn’t feel well . . . But the anxiety symptoms were mild and my wife and I were able to navigate around them, at first, helping him find some anxiety relief. Sometimes he got on the bus, and sometimes we had to drive him in, but he was going to school. As the year progressed, we had days when he couldn’t go to school, but that’s normal for kids . . . right?
After having him diagnosed with anxiety, we realized this was not normal, and a difficult challenge faced our family; how do we help our son manage his anxiety so he can go to school like all the other kids?
We weren’t the only parents in this boat. Millions of kids struggle with anxiety, and their parents are trying to help, just like us.
Mental Health Crisis:
In fact, today, after the bumpy COVID journey we all endured, approximately 20.5% of kids now struggle with anxiety. [1] Imagine that you’re a teacher, maybe a novice teacher, and you have a class of 25 kids. 1/5 of your students will be struggling with anxiety, and that doesn’t factor in the kids with depression, ADHD, or behavioral challenges. I don’t know how teachers are able to do it . . . give a teacher a huge next time you see them.
Our son’s anxiety started long before COVID. When he started showing symptoms, about 11.5% of kids had anxiety which was up 20% from 2007. [1] In fact, anxiety has been steadily rising for decades. Adding to the anxiety battle for kids is the shortage of mental health providers.
The CDC estimates that 41% of kids with anxiety cannot find mental health services.
That represents about 2.5 million kids suffering with anxiety without any professional help. [2]
The Kaiser Family Foundation estimated that in 2022, 47% of the US population was living in a mental health workforce shortage area, with some states requiring an influx of up to 700 mental health practitioners in order to remove that designation [3]. This can mean little to no anxiety relief for millions of kids. There just aren’t enough therapists out there to treat all the kids who are suffering from mental health challenges.
The shortage of mental health professionals is a huge problem. Long wait lists exist just to be evaluated by a psychologist. In addition, many insurance plans cap the number of reimbursed sessions a therapist can meet with a child, forcing the parents to pay for additional sessions themselves. And if the nearest therapist doesn’t take your insurance, then the parents must pay for everything, which can be extremely expensive. For lower-income families, that isn’t an option. Add to all of this the fact that parents will likely need to take time off work to take their child to see a psychologist compounds the economic challenge. Each of these factors adds to the problems being heaped onto our children [4].
Struggling with Anxiety Meds:
We were lucky. We lived in an area where there were many options available to us that were covered by our insurance, and my employer as well as my wife’s were flexible with our schedules.
As our son’s anxiety symptoms became worse, we turned to meds; let me tell you, that’s a whole adventure in itself. You see, everyone reacts differently to anxiety meds, so you don’t know which one will work for your child. A low dosage is used initially, and if you aren’t getting the anxiety relief your child needs, then you go up in dosage, but it’s a slow slow process. It takes weeks before you can tell if the current dosage is working, and months to reach the max dosage only to find out this med doesn’t work for your child. Now, you must slowly ramp down, which is weeks and weeks, until you can try a new med. Ok, so, you’ve spent maybe 4-6 months trying a drug only to find out it doesn’t work; no anxiety relief. So, what’s next? Well, you try the next medication and cross your fingers, all the while, your child is suffering.
During this time, I felt like a failure.
I was supposed to be protecting my child, but instead, I was forcing him to go to school while he was having a panic attack every day. It was likely the worst period of my life.
After going through many therapists to find the right one who could help us get to school, we landed with a psychiatric nurse who understood the pharmacology extremely well. She put our son on the right meds, and as before, we ramped up until . . . it kinda worked . . . for a while. The anxiety symptoms seemed to fade for a bit; we thought we’d won until our son needed an increased dosage. We’d reached the max level of med, and we’d gone through nearly all the options. The next level of meds were extremely strong, mood-altering things that sounded terrible.
We Chose a Different Path:
This was seventh grade and going to school had been a lesson in frustration, panic, and tears. I quit my job, and we started homeschooling; our son finally found some anxiety relief. We found an online school, enrolled him, and he thrived. His anxiety symptoms nearly disappeared. We backed off on the meds and eliminated some completely. My son was happy. The thing that made this choice possible was that we could afford for me to quit my job and stay home with him. I know for most families, this isn’t an option, and I wish I had a magic solution for you . . . but I don’t. This was what worked for us, and we kept at it all through middle school and high school.
Now, our son is a junior in college and life is good. Does he still have anxiety incidents, sure. He’ll never be cured. No one is cured of anxiety, you just learn how to manage it while living your life.
A couple of years ago, I asked my son what it felt like during those tumultuous times. What was it like in his head? When he described the overwhelming sense of fear and dread . . . I was shocked. I had no idea as to the level of his suffering. As an author of 26 books for kids, I knew I had to write about this.
I Started My 27th Book
I started my 27th novel, Facing the Beast Within: the Anxiety of Cameron Poole. This was a middle-grade fantasy novel for kids aged 8-13, but I suspect older kids will enjoy it as well. I gave Cameron my son’s anxiety symptoms, letting the reader brush lightly against his anxiety.
While writing the book, I worked with a team of child psychologists and mental health professionals.
I wove the anxiety coping strategies they teach to their patients throughout the story. So the reader gets to see Cameron fail, initially, at dealing with his anxiety, but at the end of the story, Cam must not only confront his anxiety, his Beast, but also stop an army of mythical monsters from taking over the world.
I think kids who struggle with anxiety will see a kindred spirit in Cameron. Maybe they’ll see a glimmer of hope that’ll keep them trudging forward against the wave of anxiety that is crashing down upon them. I hope parents will see these coping strategies, which I have no doubt their child’s therapists are also talking about in their sessions, and be able to help their child apply the techniques. The most important thing, I think, is Facing the Beast Within allows for a non-threatening conversation about anxiety. For us, when our son couldn’t make it to school, we’d try to talk with him, but he’d just shut down. He didn’t want to relive the panic attack, anxiety symptoms, tears, or feeling like a failure. Those discussions were likely very threatening to him. But if we’d had this book back then, we could have instead talked about Cameron’s failure. The discussion becomes about the character instead of the child, yet the teaching moment is still present.
It is my hope that kids will gain some benefit from reading Facing the Beast Within. Maybe they’ll find the courage to face their own Beast just a little, maybe go one more step before turning around, then try two steps the next time.
~ ~ Winner: 2023 International Book Award for Children’s Fiction.
~ ~ Winner: Mom’s Choice GOLD Award
~ ~ Winner: 2023 NYC Big Book Award for Children’s Fiction
Facing the Beast Within can be found at nearly every online bookseller. Click HERE to find it on Amazon.com
Learn more about Mark’s books HERE.
Young writers . . . did you see my writing tips? Click HERE to see them all. Teachers, feel free to use these mini-writing lessons with your students.
Mark
- https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2782801
- https://www.cdc.gov/childrensmentalhealth/data.html
- https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/mental-health-care-health-professional-shortage-areas-hpsas/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D
- https://courageouskidscounseling.com/why-is-it-so-hard-to-find-a-child-therapist/#:~:text=Many%20therapists%20do%20not%20work,are%20experiencing%20and%20discuss%20solutions
