How to help my boy deal with anxiety

As a mother, I can say that once we speak out loud the things causing anxiety, especially if we can get help expressing them (language and identifying things can be tumultous for young humans), it Always takes power away from the thing haunting us.

It is a thing kept in secret which can fester and oppress. 

All children eventually become aware of a messy and sometimes violent world. They are being told conflicting information constantly. Worse, they always lack perspective and context. They need to process out loud how their mind and internal self is attempting to cope. And they need to be able to do that without the wiser, more mature adult condeming or judging them or the issue. if this "sage" of an adult (parent or therapist or mentor) can guide the child objectively through all the complexities of their difficult or nightmarish thoughts, this child will always feel safe to bring these problems to this person. How many children just have nightmares from films they shouldn't have been exposed to, don't say anything, and eventually those thoughts become so warped and oppressive, they judge themselves to be horrible humans for even thinking of them to begin with? 

The world can be a very horrifying place, it can be a fantastic place, as well. But children need to know that many of the thoughts they're struggling with Do Not come from within. They are merely recieving information from the world around and trying to process it. 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/experimentations/201901/the-secrets-you-keep-are-hurting-you-heres-how

View thier mental stuggles as a math problem! Allow them to say literally anything and don't flinch. Write it all down if it helps and begin to examine where it was received, how he feels about it, present ways to veiw it, and maybe there's a Disney film or Animation where the lead character had to deal with something similar? Turn it into a quest :) 

Excellent advice.

Excellent advice.

Thank you, Turtle. I hope your nephew is better now. My son has had anxiety related to school too and that lead to school refusal and very low self esteem. His teachers were fairly understanding but not some of the support staff which made everything more difficult. I had to reassure him things would get better although sometimes they did not. I had to point that out with the Senco to make sure he was not punished for his problematic behaviour but understood in the classroom context. I guess parenting is hard for everybody but I am finding more barriers that there should be. Hopefully things will improve more and more. 

I would add that the same thing happened to my nephew, where he would lose appetite, complain of stomach pains or act in strange ways towards food i.e not eat much or only eat the corners and always leave plenty and whatever was left couldn't be taken away, even though he did not want anymore. 

We put this down to anxieties he was having at that time with school and his eventual refusal to go. This was evident at the time when anyone attempted to speak to him about school, where he would shut down or go into a meltdown rather than discuss anything related to school He did not like his new teacher because she did not have the patients, understanding or training as his previous teachers had who all handled him very well. The new teacher was punishing his Autistic behaviour without any understanding. This was the single most collapse of trust for him in his life thus far.  When there are threats or threats of of punishment for somethings you do not understand then that can be the end of co-operation on the child's part in education. It only takes one bad teacher.  The problem was he was of course too young to realise this. This teacher was the problem and not him in the grand scheme of things so in my opinion, every single thing needs to be considered with sensitive kids or those on the spectrum.

It takes great awareness which is not always easy but so necessary to realise these things at the time.

I would say in general, if there is something wrong with your child then there will always be a reason for it, just the same as when we ourselves are not feeling quite right. They are of course, little people just like us with their own lives. They just can't articulate or express what is bothering them just yet. 

Never write them off.  Just be there for them.