You’ve Got Dragons: An Upcoming Story Time at Wasatch Family Therapy
It is tough being a kid. Kids' rational brains (or "upstairs brains" as Dan Siegel calls them) are not fully developed yet, while their emotional brains (or the "downstairs brains") run the show. For kids who experience anxiety, they have an extra layer of difficulty in managing their emotional brain.
My colleague, Amy Lambert LCSW, and I are hosting a one-day workshop for kids ages 6-11 who experience anxiety in learning how to help themselves increase their ability to access their rational brains, meaning they will be better able to problem solve what to do when they feel overwhelmed by their anxiety.
Anxiety can present itself in many forms, and this group is open to kids with any type of anxiety. Here are some examples of how anxiety can show up in kids:
Separation anxiety (worrying about what may happen to themselves or their loved ones when physically separated from one another)
Social anxiety (worrying about how they fit in and what others think of them)
Generalized anxiety (worrying about anything and everything, often engaging in procrastinating behaviors)
Perfectionism (worrying about being imperfect and struggling to manage failures)
Panic attacks (feeling intense waves of anxiety, sometimes for no known reason, that can be scary and make kids feel out of control)
Specific phobias (worrying about very specific things, like seeing blood, needles, flying on airplanes, or any other specific type of worry)
Obsessive-compulsive related worries (worrying about things that they know may not make sense but still feel compelled to worry about them anyways)
Anxiety in response to another mental health diagnosis or a medical condition (anxious about being autistic, having ADHD, missing school or social events for multiple medical appointments, etc.).
Amy and I are specifically using bibliotherapy, or therapy using books, to support kids in learning about therapy techniques, because kids are better able to understand themselves and the world through play and storytelling. Play is a child's most fluent language to understand and express themselves.
Bibliotherapy has the following benefits for kids:
It helps children identify their own symptoms of anxiety.
It helps children identify, through characters, situations, and other aspects of stories, different perspectives about their own relative experiences.
It gives children hope that while they may feel stuck with their anxiety, there is hope to learn how to manage their anxiety.
It supports children in learning to validate themselves in their experiences with anxiety.
It helps anxious children learn about social skills when managing their anxiety.
This workshop will be so fun for kids because they will not be required to just sit and listen. We will be engaging kids in an interactive expressive arts activity to support them in staying engaged while we read the story, and we will explore ways in which they can apply the concepts in the story to themselves individually. Kids can then take home their creations as reminders of what they learned from the group! To schedule your child for the group, please call us at 801.944.4555 or email info@wasatchfamilytherapy.com.
References:
Lenkowsky, B. E., & Lenkowsky, R. S. (1978). Bibliotherapy for the LD Adolescent. Academic Therapy, 14(2), 179–186. https://doi.org/10.1177/105345127801400204
Mehdizadeh M, Khosravi Z. An inquiry into the effectiveness of bibliotherapy for children with intellectual disability. Int J Dev Disabil. 2018 May 7;65(4):285-292. doi: 10.1080/20473869.2018.1466509. PMID: 34141349; PMCID: PMC8115521.
