My Daughter Is Afraid of EVERYTHING!

HI- you should really try Dr. taylor, he does homeopathy at The Pettygrove clinic in NW Portland. He has helped my son tons! Please go see him.

Hi, J.! You might ask your doc. or the counselor about sensory integration issues. I've had students in the past with sensory integration disorder, and they had great success with Occupational Therapy and Sensory Integration therapy. Often children with some of these issues are so overly sensitive to sounds, visual stimuli, even someone brushing up against them, that it is terrifying to the child. It might help bring back a quality of life that will work for both of you! Good luck!

My daughter just turned 3 last month and had started having HUGE fears about the month or two prior. I'm talking fears that was getting her so worked up that it was like she was having panic attacks. She has a huge imagination and both her day care lady and doctor said they haven't seen other kids that have such big imaginations. Her doctor said that basically she is highly intelligent and knows things and can dream up things that are more like a 4-5 year old. The problem is even though she is very advanced, emotionally she is very much a 3 year old.

All of this also coincided with me being totally stressed out with my job and working 14-16 hours a day for over a month (I'm a WAHM). Certain books scared her to death. Also, she would constantly freak out, run to me and beg to be held because different things were chasing her. I was at my wits end and bedtime was the worst.

First, the best thing we could do was acknowledge the thing frightening her. If we said things like it wasn't there or it was just pretend, things would get worse FAST. Next we would tell the things to go away or get out. Then we taught her how to do that too - it wasn't enough, but the key was to teach her that she has the power to get rid of the things that scare her (and it did help). Also, I told her she didn't need to get scared for me to hold her... she could just ask me anytime. That helped a lot. Before bed each night she will tell us if there's anything that needs to leave and see say firmly, "Get out dragon! Get out snake!" etc. while opening the door for it and pointing out.

She's still not totally over things, but for the most part it has gotten A LOT better. Her doctor said that if the worst of it lasted for over a month, to go see a counselor. Luckily, they did get better.

My main recommendations are to look at what is stressful in her life, help her manage her stress and talk about things that are bothering her. Once my job calmed back down, she got a lot better, quickly. In fact, pictures in books that I had to cover up with post-its (so she had control over them) have now been un-covered. She also is the first to tell people that things that are a little scary to her are just pretend (you should have seen her when we went trick-or-treating).

Next, teach her how to be in control of the situation. Let her know you are always with her to help her and love her, but that ultimately, she has the power to get rid of the fears. Tell people what things to avoid (seeing them will not make it go away faster).

I really feel for you. It's definitely not easy and it's so distressing seeing your child freak out over little or imaginary things. I hope she starts feeling less afraid soon. :-D

My daughter was the same way. Some of it a child will outgrow as he/she experiences things. One thing that helped for us was reading books that tied into the idea of conquering fears. We would talk about those things throughout the day interspersed into conversations. Sometimes I would talk to my daughter's stuffed toys while my daughter was keenly watching and we would talk about our fears. For instance, I would tell the bear about how I also used to get scared going to the mall when I was a little girl and tell them more about what happened that helped me not be scared anymore. My daughter would listen and you could see the tension melt off her face. We kept building on those thoughts and experiences. When it was time to start preschool, I spoke with our local librarian and she recommended a dozen books or so for us to read. We read them every single night for about a month. We learned some tools to discuss her fears and addressed them head on. It really was a lifesaver. Perhaps you have a local library you can check out as well for help. The children's librarians often have lists of great books on every conceivable topic.

Best of luck to you. I know it isn't easy, but it will get better. Take care!

All of the things she's afraid of are VERY common fears for her age. Anything that seems unrealistic or disguised is too hard for them to grasp. They want to see faces, not costumes. I'm on the board of my daughter's preschool and we we're just discussing entertainers for our spring festival, and many of the things you mentioned we're brought up as scary to preschoolers. Just continue to validate her feelings while teaching her what these things are and why they aren't really scary!

There are a couple of things I would do.
One would be to find something that can make her feel safe. For my daughter it was the bunny blanket that her grandmother made, for my son it was a monkey. Let them have this item where ever they go.
The second thing I would do is that I would sit down and talk to them.
Carmon had a great song called "God is bigger than the boogie man" and I used to sing this with my kids when they had issues. I would pray with them also.

The big thing is to acknowledge that what they are feeling is real. And it may be very frustrating, but that it is real to them.
My youngest child is now 12. But when she was 9 she would NOT setp foot into the school. She would cry, get sick, and had major panic attacks. We ended up home schooling, and keeping her home from almost everything. She was diagnosed with adjustment disorder with anxiety. Now she is back in school, helps usher at the high school for the theater, and is thriving in life.
We knew what triggered her anxiety (My husband has a rare disease and had had strokes from it.) But it could be something as simple as a tv show.
Just make sure you re-enforce that she is safe! And that you will keep her that way.
Good luck

Children are great ones for imagination and seem to like being afraid of things. Taking her out of every situation that makes her afraid is just teaching her that it is right to be afraid of it. If you can keep her in a situation and/or place when you can be there with her reassuring her, then do so. That way, she can learn that it is okay to be afraid sometimes and how to deal with being afraid and getting over it.

We are also going through something somewhat similar with our 3.5 year old. He is afraid to be anywhere new without us. He cries for what we feel like, is no reason. We try to reason with him and reassure him, but nothing seems to work unless we leave the situation. I read a great book called "The Highly Sensitive Child" (Here is their website http://www.hsperson.com/pages/child.htm). It gave me some good knowledge about my son and that sometimes these fears are unrealistic, but you're not alone. However, it doesn't help the situation right now. It could be that your daughter is sensitive to new sounds, sights, etc. Our son is very sensitive to loud noises and new feelings. He wears his socks 24 hours a day, even when it was 100 degrees out. This is the age where they still have a hard time realizing what is real and that can be pretty scary, especially when their little imaginations are running a hundred miles an hour. Can your daughter voice what she's afraid of? Would it help if she was able to touch the thing that scared her? For example..could you hold her in your arms, take her to the puppet and touch it first to show her that everything is ok and then see if she'll try it. Maybe if she sees that you're ok with things and that you'll protect her (by holding onto her) things will be ok. Please let us know what happens. I'd love to know if your doctor has some ideas about how to help. Good luck!

I'm now single momming it, so I'm going to offer a note from that perspective and my own life-path ... I have come to the conclusion that there is a certain kind of security that girls( and women) are naturally supposed to get from men (and boys)--that sense that "everything is going to be alright" and "I will [try to] protect you" ... there's a certain trust our society has destroyed in not allowing men to take care of women and women to take care of men (men need it from us for the interior world, we need it from them for the exterior).

I see that your daughters' dads aren't in their picture. At age 3 the imagination starts to take off, and if there is no man around to assure them they will be alright, that might be why things are flying so out of control ... not that I am saying "get thee married"! But is there a man or two or three that ARE reliable in your life (church? your father? a reliable father of children whose mother you are friends with?)? You are looking for someone who doesn't think the right way to bring a kid through fears is to try to teach them how to laugh at scary movies (which maybe works at some level for boys? but I really think it just breaks the sensitive part in a lot of kids) ... but rather who will just hold a child through their fears.

[I discovered this when I one day last year was in the presence of a man who made it very very clear he was telling me the world was safe and I had a right to be a full person in it ... and I realized I had always perceived this as something I had to fight for, never something anyone had just made me feel safe and accepted about ... he had no idea I think how revolutionary what he was doing was for some of the women in the room, who have been taught not to trust and that we have to stand on our own etc etc ... ]

If you don't have any men you can bring her to for safe comfort, the advice you just got about teaching her to tell the 'bad things' to go away was part of what worked for my girls (not so much the boys--which showed me that they needed the mom-support to feel safe).

I'm Catholic, so I also tried the "It's God's job" and "It's your gaurdian angel's job" tactics, which sometimes work but sometimes they need the physical 'parent' support ...

'hope some of that helps!

My son went through this phase for awhile too. He was sure there were monsters everywhere, would cry about certain things on TV, etc. What really helped for us was taking the time to explain things to him. For ex: The moon, its just this really big ball up in the sky that is kind of like a night light. We also picked up books from the library about the moon and read them. Soon enough he was over it, and saying "good night moon!" When it was time for bed. The biggest thing is we had to show him that there was nothing to be afreaid of by first acknowledging his fear, and then showing him how to conquer it. It takes a lot of patience and work, but our ped. has told us that it is usually a phase and with a little work they are over most fears quickly.

We have a fearful child too - a son - but we do not let him deter us from doing things even if it means he has to sit it out and watch. But it all started about a year and half ago when my fiancee divorced his now ex (he is their son). She likes having him skittish - it gives her power. So she does things to keep him scared like telling him that certain things are scary (zoos of all things!), but when he comes over here we hold him, tell him he is loved, and help him to understand the fear. For example we went to Enchanted Forest - he clung to me the whole time crying his head off while his two siblings had a blast. We continued to tell him everything was fake and just for fun - we did not leave. Eventually his curiosity got the best of him and he started touching some of the things (ie have her touch the puppets - let her put one on even!), and by the end he was running with the other kids. Same thing happened at the zoo and this time it didn't take and hour and half, but a mere 20 minutes before he was running from exhibit to exhibit asking us to tell him what the animals were.
Bottom line is help her face her fears, and also try to determine where they have originated. Sometimes it takes a single traumatic thing to trigger a flood of fears.
Another thing I see here is that a lot of the things you mention have to do with noise. She may have a sensitivity to noise - my son does - so we have an mp3 player with some of his favorite, soothing music to put on him in circumstances like that. He calms right down, and we just let him decide when he wants to take the headphones off (if you try this look exclusively for kid-friendly headphones! also kid-frienly mp3 players that have sound settings specifically for what a child's eardrums can handle). Sunglasses are handy too in case things are too bright. Meltdowns can occur with overwhelmed senses.
I hope you find an answer. Most of all be very strong for her, acknowledge her fears, and help her to understand and work through them.

C.

Are you or is her dad very sensitive? Does she eat a lot of sugar? Do you become upset when she does? At her?

Have you considered just confidently holding her during "melt downs" reassuring her,and then slowly re-introducing her to the fearful situations. Try not to concern yourself with what other people are thinking. Just focus on the child with confidence.

I was a fearful child who learned to master situations by facing them in spite of my fears. She needs to know that she can successfully face a fear and conquer it, or at least get past it. If she wets her pants or panics, then professional intervention is a must.

You're a good mom for wanting to handle this well.

I would examine the possibility of there being some aspect of her life in which she does not feel safe. My daughter at age 2 had a bad experience at her dad's in which he left her with a terrible person who made her feel scared and unloved. When she came home she was afraid of everything and everyone and had to be literally pried off of me whenever I needed her to let go. It took a long time and a lot of reassurance to get her back to normal. I guess I wonder if the fears are not a reaction to a larger fear or situation. This is totally just an idea, I am not an expert just a fellow mom!

When I was little I was afraid of lots of things, big afraid and my family was such that FEARS were not talked about. Then my sister was born and it became much worse because she was not afraid of anything and she was much bigger that I.

Talk to Alyssa about every fear, and have her develop plans for what to do when things go wrong. I never knew what to do when things when things went wrong.

Always accept that it is okay to be afraid, and then plan--sit at the back of the puppet show--sit on the teacher's lap, peek from behind the teacher shoulder, for instance.

Church is scary, okay, big room, many people--be with mom--sit in the back--on mom's lap--bring special toy--stay only a little while.

When I had my own children, now young adults--one a minister of 300 member congregation, and another in a MBA program at UW--very brave and independent children--I always talked to them about their environment, plans, where we were, where we were going....etc.

I also taught school for 13 years--1st grade and saw many children who were afraid. I know if you can teach them to plan, you can teach them to be unafraid.

You need to do that for Alyssa. Talk to her, be her outside brain in a sense, until she can do this for herself.

Good luck, I know this is possible.

My heart goes out to you and your daughter. As irrational as her fears may seem, they are very real to her. I hope a counselor can help her. Just a thought - is your daughter in daycare while you're working? If so, is it possible she's having some frightening experiences there? Since you are away from her for that chunk of time, perhaps there is something going on in her life that you're not aware of. I certainly hope not but it would be worth investigating. Best of luck

J. - I understand what you are going through with your daughter. My son started having anxiety so bad when he turned 2 (which is when we started him in an at home day care) and it was horrible! He would get the "death grip" on us when it was time to drop him off, but was fine when we picked him up. This has continued all the way to Kindergarten. The school had to have the councelor step in and assist us because we couldn't drop him off without tears, and fears, etc. MY recomendation - counceling!!!!! If the councelor can build a bond/trust with your daughter, she may start to come around with her fears. We have determined that his issue is anxiety, which is common in children who have other family members with anxiety. I personally do not agree with giving children medicine, but a very light anti-anxiety drug may help your daughter while you are taking her to counceling.

Good luck with Alyssa, you will be in my thoughts... Also, I tend to do a lot of research and if I happen to come across something that may help, I will be sure to send it your way...

I know it's something no mom ever wants to think about, but it's so common these days it's hard it not even consider it. Autism, they say something like 1 in 3 kids have some level of autism. A lot of kids are very low on the spectrum and with the right knowledge, having a diagnosis could really help her. What we know about autism has come a long ways and there are lots of tools out there to help. You might consider asking her doctor to send you somewhere where she could be tested. Knowledge is power. And if you go and they say she's not autistic then great, at least you know. And if she is then you will be able to get her the help she needs. And there are other things out there besides autism, you may go to get her tested and they may say no to the autism but might be able to point you in the right direction. I am by no means an expert but I've worked with children for a lot of years including multiple children with varying special needs. If there is anything I can do to hlep, if you have any questions, where to start, a shoulder to lean on, feel free. Also, if your daughter is in daycare or preschool somewhere you can alway talk to them too. They should be a great resource. Good luck to you, I hope the best for you and your family. Be strong! -R.'

Children tend to be afraid of what they don't know. Also, did she have some trauma in her life to cause this? Fear like this is a spiritual issue.

When my children or I am afraid of anything, we examine it in a safe environment. We find out information about it, we look at what it is, we touch it, smell it, feel it. That helps the fear to be overcome. If fears are not overcome, then they just get worse and worse. We also pray about it.

I suggest she be brought around the church and explained what things are. That when she's afraid of the puppet, have the puppet brought to her and show her how it works, how it feels, etc.

Have her try on some dress up clothes and costumes. If someone wears one she is afraid of, have her go up to them and see who the person really is behind the costume. Show her the costume. These things help the fears be overcome.

Do you have a prayer in church she could pray, when she's afraid? Tell her God will protect her. There are a lot of psalms about God's love and protection. Pray them with her every morning. Get her to pray more and rely on God to help her overcome some of this.

My kids got icons (pictures) of Christ and Mother Mary - it helped them a lot. This picture of Christ - the Good Shepherd is very comforting - my kids love it. See http://skete.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&amp...

Prayer drives away a LOT of fear. Use your faith. Show your daughter that because you trust God, you don't have to be afraid. In the Orthodox Church we pray, and we cross ourselves. This drives away the spirit of fear, and other evil spirits.

I am doing a research paper on Autism,this is not a "sign" or characteristic of autism, please disregard Renee C.
I am also an Early Childhood Education Major, and these fears are part of normal development. The responses about addressing fears is right on...my own daughter was deathly afraid of loose hairs(like from your head that get on your clothes sometimes)a couple of months ago, and now she puts them in the trash.(at first she tried to put them back into my hair:)