Getting through panic attacks and anxiety
Ideas for when your child goes from 0 to 60 in seconds
Hello! I hope you and your family are doing well! Today we’re going to talk about anxiety and panic attacks, and how to get your child through a panic attack when they have food and body issues. I’ll share some thoughts about how to view panic attacks and a powerful technique for soothing your child when they have a panic attack.
It’s not unusual for panic attacks to show up when your child is dealing with disordered food and body behaviors. Why? A panic attack is a symptom of intense emotional dysregulation. And if your child has eating and body image issues, they’re dealing with a lot of emotional dysregulation.
Disordered eating behaviors are a way to cope with emotional dysregulation, and stopping disordered behavior usually brings with it new symptoms of anxiety and panic. In recovery, panic shows up to say “Help! I need new coping skills!”
Panic attacks are intense and hard for parents to witness. So let’s think about how you can get through panic attacks with your child, minimize the fallout, and help them have fewer and less intense panic attacks in the future.
By definition, a panic attack is a nervous system overreaction to a perceived threat in your child’s body, mind, or environment.
This thing, called a trigger, might seem like it’s not a big deal or just an everyday part of life. But panic is physiological—it’s in the body, not the mind. When the nervous system, which is non-conscious and therefore non-rational, senses a serious threat, it triggers an automatic, primitive, and urgent response.
It’s so hard to be with someone who’s having a panic attack, but imagine what it’s like to be inside the body that’s having a panic attack—to feel like you are about to perish from fear. I would tell you what it’s like from my experiences with panic attacks, but I simply can’t find the words for such a primitive, embodied experience.
A panic attack is a physiological response to something that’s happening in or around your child. It’s not within conscious control, and it’s not a choice. Anxiety and panic are not something your child is doing on purpose or could choose not to do if they wanted to. Panic attacks, like all behaviors, are a form of communication.
Because fear lives in our unconscious nervous system, we can’t be educated out of panic attacks by reading books or being told by well-meaning loved ones that our fear is irrational. However, when we repeatedly navigate anxiety and panic next to a parent who has the patience and tolerance to witness us in the depths of our fear, our bodies can learn to distinguish real threats from perceived threats, and with practice, we can have fewer and less intense panic attacks.
Of course we would love our kids to sit down calmly over a cup of tea and say, “Gosh, you know, this is upsetting to me and I’d like you to help me solve my problem.” And I certainly hope your child gets to that point! It’s way easier than having a panic attack, but getting there will take time and practice.
For now, you can expect that if your child is struggling with stress and anxiety they will communicate with you through their behavior more than their words.
When we look at eating disorders and panic attacks as communication the question shifts from “Why are they doing this?” or “When will it stop?” to “What can I do to help my child get through this?”
If you translate the panic attack as “my child is doing this for attention” or “they’re faking it,” then you’ll respond in a way that tries to reduce your child’s emotional expression. But what we resist persists, resulting in more frequent and intense panic attacks over time.
The key to recovery is not suppressing emotions but learning to express emotions more productively. A panic attack is not a super-productive way to process emotions, but it might be preferable to your child’s eating disorder behaviors.
When you help your child navigate panic attacks more productively, you can help them build a bridge between where they are today and where you’d like them to be, which is sitting down over a cup of tea and letting you know with language rather than behavior that they feel mad, sad, or scared.
Let me know if you’d like some help getting there with your child!
Ginny Jones Parent Coach / More-Love.org
Coaching notes
Here are three stories from the last few weeks of my coaching sessions with parents who have kids with eating and body image issues:
My clients reached a major milestone! After doing modified FBT with me, their son has been weight-restored for six months and is thriving.
Another client realized that her child needs an assessment and possibly treatment for autism. We created a list of questions she will ask her child’s treatment team about the overlap between autism and eating disorders.
I helped my client draft a letter to her ex and co-parent about boundaries and expectations for eating disorder recovery because the current transition between homes is affecting treatment.
A Powerful Response to Panic Attacks
You want to raise a happy, healthy kid who can communicate with you when they’re upset. But your child goes from zero to 60 in seconds, and you feel like a tumbleweed blowing around in the wind. It’s confusing and overwhelming. You’re exhausted and worn out. Parenting a child with panic attacks is hard, but you have everything it takes to make a difference.
You want to raise a child who can tolerate distress, has grit and determination, and doesn’t melt down at the slightest inconvenience or change in routine. To do that, you need to know how to manage their panic attacks so they can learn how to process their big, scary emotions in a regulated, safe way.
This printable Guide + Workbook provides you with information, practical tools, evidence-based solutions, and actionable steps that you can use today to help your child when they hit the panic button. With practice, you can stop living in fear of the next panic attack and transform your household into a safe, happy place for all of you.
I’ve created an 8-page printable guide and workbook based on personal practice and my 1:1 coaching work with more than 100 families to help you navigate panic attacks for your child with eating and body issues. It includes information about panic attacks, what triggers panic attacks, what’s happening in a panic attack, how to reframe panic attacks, and the eight essential steps to follow when your child with an eating disorder has panic attacks.
Click on the button below to get your printable guide and start helping your child have fewer and less intense panic attacks.