Social Anxiety

Please post anything you find my dyslexic daughter deals with depression and social anxity. She is in counseling but is also on meds for depression and social anxity. We have see a great improvement since starting meds.

Good luck
Margaret

You did not state the age of your child or if he/she has any other types of learning disabilities. These are a few of the websites that I ran across.

www.childpsychology.com/emotiona.htm
www.social-anxiety.org
www.childanxiety.net/
www.schoolpsychology.net/

I hope these will be of some help and good luck.

Carla

Thank You Carla! I will look at these sites. My daughter is 9 and in the 5th grade.

Thank you Margaret for responding. My daughter was born with the umbilical cord wrapped tightly around her neck, twice. She was a little delayed with sitting and walking but then so was my first child. Her language didn’t develop normally, though, and at age 3 I took her for a hearing test. Her hearing was normal but her auditory processing was not. She began receiving speech and language services privately then and in kindergarten started receiving services at the elementary school. She was diagnosed at Age 5 with multiple learning disabilities. The psychologist who tested her predicted that she would be in an LD classroom by second grade. The psychologist was wrong. He didn’t know what a perfectionist my daughter would turn out to be. She had trouble with both auditory and visual processing, visual-motor integration, attentional issues, sensory motor integration. She ate pencils down to the graphite in 1st grade because of the stress. By 3rd grade she hid all incomplete schoolwork in her desk rather than disappoint the teacher by turning it in that way. She avoided contact. She always had trouble approaching a teacher and telling her she needed help or didn’t understand. She still struggles at age 19 with her language problems. She has a moderate language disorder. She is of average intelligence and can read normally but has a hard time pulling everything together orally and in writing. She has an awlful time trying to write anything. She has had social difficulties all through school and had only a few “occupational” friends who were also social outcasts or not interested in being social. She was having to work so hard all day to compensate for her weak areas. When she was in fourth grade, I requested that she be retested by school psychologists, confident that they would offer services to help ease the academic pressure. Her behavior at home was very often volatile if you asked her to do anything or just asked her a question. Because her inner code of conduct wouldn’t allow her to act out at school, she bottled up all her frustrations and feelings of rejection and would unleash them on me and my husband. Mostly me because I was home when she got home from school. The school tested her and found significant (to me) learning “difficulties” but said that she was doing well academically. She was an average student. They said, “Our hands are tied. She’s going to have to fall flat on her face before we can offer services.” They also offered their opinion that the reason she was volatile at home was a problem in our home.

When my daughter got to middle school, she began to be tortured daily with verbal abuse. She was ridiculed for everything - her clothes, her shoes, the way she walked, her expressions. She was called “stupid.” I knew that some of this was happening and tried to comfort her when she would cry about it. I went in and talked to her counselor at school who also suggested there might be a problem at home. After all, her teachers reported no problems with her at school. They said she was a “sweet girl who never caused any trouble.” They never once stopped to ask themselves why she didn’t interact with the other students in class or why she would rather get a bad grade than approach them for help. I told my daughter I was going to go to the principal. She begged not to because she said the tormentors would find out who got them in trouble and things would get worse.

My daughter now attends a private sped ed school paid for by the public school system. Her future is still such a scary thing for her to think about. She is still depressed and overwhelmed by anxiety at times (even though it doesn’t always present as anxiety). She has been on medication for depression for 3 years. She recently tried to come off one of her medications with the physician’s approval and was deeply depressed within 2-1/2 weeks. The medication was Wellbutrin which you can apparently discontinue “cold turkey”. She was not only put back on it but the dosage was doubled. She also takes Zoloft. I still think that the medication is not right. She rarely leaves home to go out into the world other than to school. She will go to the movies or dinner with my husband and myself but she has no friends and is very reclusive during any unstructured time (weekends, breaks from school, summer, etc.) She had one job last summer for three weeks at a landscape nursery. She hated it because she the supervision was too loose. She needs outside structure because she has a hard time organizing herself. She also said the other employees avoided her and she believed that they went out on their breaks and made fun of her.

The local DRS office (Dept. of Rehabilitative Services) is working with her to help her prepare for what comes after high school but she very often sabotages efforts to help her. She is stuck and afraid to move forward. She is not mean, evil, nasty, dangerous or a drug abuser. She is a sweet, scared girl.

Sorry this has been so long and I can’t believe that I spilled my guts in such a personal way on the Internet but I thought that the only way someone can help me is to know the “big picture”.

If you just want to talk or have some advice, please respond.

Dear Janet,

I too have a 12 year old son who is PDD that is an angel at school and does not ask for help but we are working hard on teaching to ask and it is very difficult but we are making small progress in that area. But when he is with me or other family members his behavior can be out of control especially right after school because I believe he had to bottle up all his frustrations from the whole day at school where he was not comfortable enought to let his emotins out. I want you to know it is not you or your family!!!! For my son having a Autism spectum disablitiy he has a lot of problems expessing and controling his emotions and he will just shut down if he feels unconfortable in an environment or situation, then when he is confortable in the environment or with the people he is around then he will attempt to express these feelings and emotions but not always in an appropreitate manner because he has such a hard time doing it. So the good news is and I am sure since your daughter is old you may have already realized this you can teach them how to deal with emotions maybe not all of them but we can help them. Last night on the way home from special olympics my son had just given the finger to another child who called him stupid and retarted. Now the other child proably had been called this by someone else and that why she thought it was acceptable but my son is real senative to being called that and got real angry and responed inapproiately by giveing he the finger so I processed with him all the way home better ways to deal with the anger and that by responding to her verbal attacts just causes her to get more angry. My son is a preteen and everyday is a challege because of the influence the other kids at school have at this age. It is very important for him to be accepted by the kids at school and he even wants old navy cloths for his birthday and holidays to be like all the other kids. I have tried to let him be like all the other kids when ever possible knowing that he is so different in other area’s. His reading/writing level is at a 2nd grade and we have tried many things to change it because his IQ is average 105 with full scale around 85. We have been in special olympics for a year now and I have seen my son and some other athletics turn into social butterflies in this group then the skill they have learned with the other athletics who have special needs using them in school to make friends. I can not say enought about what finding a group of adults or children with similar ablities has done for my entire family. My younger son has friends with sibilies with disablites. But most importantly now I have a network of close friends that face the same challeges I do on a daily basic. Its hard for teachers, family members and friends to know what we as parents of a special needs child experience every day.
See by taking the leap to open up on the internet you have meet someone that can relate to your problems and I am willing to offer whatever support I can give as another parent.

Sincerely,

Sara Battles

Reading your daughter’s story has given me some comfort. My son has a mild/moderate language disorder. He has no friends but me. He’s constanly teased at school and the teacher doesn’t do much about it. He is 11 years old in a public elementary school & he will soon enter junior school where the kids are even more creul. Please if you can give me some information on how to get my son in a private special education school, it will be greatly appreciated.

Don’t be so quick to want a private special education school for your son. It is a very safe but restrictive environment. Critics say that children don’t learn to get along with their peers and that such an environment is too sheltered. There is something to be said for that. This school placement was absolutely necessary in my daughter’s case but it is not for everyone.

Has your son been evaluated privately by a speech and language pathologist or by the public school staff? Has he been formally diagnosed with a mild/moderate language disorder?

Problems communicating can cause so much emotional pain for boys and girls such as your son and my daughter. Kids today communicate so fast and use so much body language that those with processing disorders are left behind and called “stupid” because they can’t “get with the program.” Many people today think that there is nothing we can do as a society to turn the tide and start teaching our children to be kind, considerate, respectful and helpful. I don’t think it’s too late. Nowadays you almost never see anybody making fun of a physically diabled person. Yet our children with these “hidden disabilities” are made fun of every day because they look normal and are expected to act and speak normally.

PLEASE get your son help with his language problems now because it is so critical to his self esteem.

Good luck to you.

Here are two websites that may be helpful:
http://www.mentalhealth.org/publications/allpubs/CA-0011/depress.htm

http://www.mentalhealth.org/publications/allpubs/CA-0007/Anxiety.htm

They talk about symptoms, definitions, ways to help, and so on.

Good Luck.

Dear Janet,

After years of specialist and strategies etc., my 10 yr old daughters story is the same as yours. No matter what I do things turn out the same. The school also implys it must be something at home. Thanks for sharing. Sharon Gudger

My son has dyslexia - He is in a private school (funded through the Board of Education). You must contact an attorney who specializes in this area (you must not inform the Board of Ed that you are hiring an attorney because you want them to make certain mistakes (if they don’t “cross their t’s or dot their i’s you automatically win your case). You must inform the Board of Education that the education your child is receiving is not sufficient and (by law - every child is entitled to an education which is geared to his/her ability). You must look at private schools for the learning disabled which are funded by the Board of Education (at the beginning of the process - immediately after contacting an attorney) (but not inform the Board of Ed that you are looking) - you must schedule an evaluation for your child and after evaluation takes place the Board of Ed must notify you within 30 days of evaulation and schedule a meeting with you as to results (Board of Ed usually does not come to the same conclusion regarding your child’s ability or disability as private testing - they don’t have the knowledge - they just try to convince you that they do). Board of Ed will most likely suggest special education - you say no (not acceptable) (although you will have to go and see some of the sites they suggest to appease them) - the Board will then schedule a series of meetings for you (to drive you absolutely MAD!) you must state clearly why the programs don’t meet your child’s criteria (while all this is going on you must fill out numerous possible admission forms from private schools that you are interested in (staying up until 2:00 a.m. sometimes) (in the hopes of getting him accepted - and Board approves) - you should have your child “privately tested by someone specializing in learning disabled childred” DURIING all this taking place - as ammunition towards the board - read up on your child’s disability in library for further ammunition and in the end hopefully you will WIN your case!! Your attorney will go through all of this with you as well as supplying you with a list of publicly funded schools. You MUST be a strong advocate for your child (as exhausting as it may be) - it took a year of strong will, work, etc. for my husband and I (mostly on my part - the attorney comes in at the end) but it worked. I won the case! (attorney ties up legal loopholes at the end. If you don’t have finances for attorney - beg, borrow, whatever). I wish you luck!!