Overparenting, technology leading to anxiety in children as young as six 

CUH sees referrals of children as young as six years old who are suffering from anxiety

Twenty-five-year-old Amy Morgan remembers all too well what it was like to be a teen with anxiety.

Colman Noctor, a child and adolescent psychotherapist who works with St Patrick’s Mental Health Services in Dublin says he has never met so many anxious children and parents in the last five years.  And while Covid-19 isn’t helping “being told to keep away from people, not to go there, not to share things when we are already anxious is not good and I do worry about the long-term repercussions.” Over-parenting and technology seem to be driving the anxiety amongst our young children. “It tells us that children nowadays cannot cope with the pressures and also in some ways that our children are lacking in resilience”.

I wonder whether we have over-sanitised our children’s lives, that we haven’t introduced them into disappointment or frustration

What Colman notices most is that “children are growing up too fast, so issues which we would traditionally see with a 14-year-old for instance, around eating disorders, we are seeing in 11- and 12-years-olds. The pressure on children to be older/younger he said is creating much more pressure but a natural resilience not to be able to brush that off is a concern, he said.

“I wonder whether we have over-sanitised our children’s lives, that we haven’t introduced them into disappointment or frustration, or that we over-invested in external variables and under-invested in their own sense of internal variables, like their values as little people”.  Due to the phenomenal demand for psychotherapeutic support services in the last number of months, Colman put together a podcast series called Asking4aParent to support parents of children with anxiety and low self-esteem.

Dr Peter Dineen, Consultant Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist at Cork University Hospital said suicidal tendencies (overdose, self-harm or suicidal thoughts) and anxiety are the two most common reasons for referrals — we see between 30 to 40 cases each month, and while some children can be as young as six years old the majority he said are young adolescents aged 14 to 17 years old.

The anxiety he said can vary from a child struggling with a challenging physical illness, to worrying about problems in their daily life, to a psychiatric anxiety disorder.

Children with physical illnesses he said can have increased anxiety and this could be where a young person might take on responsibility for aspects of care, such as diabetes or cystic fibrosis. Anxiety can emerge with periods of low moods, irritability or stress, and other so-called affective symptoms.

Colman Noctor, a child and adolescent psychotherapist.

Most often he said children do not need to be treated with medication but instead with supportive counselling or psychotherapies like play therapy, music therapy, or art therapy. “We match the therapy to the child’s developmental age and progress then to psychotherapies, including cognitive behavioural therapy or systemic family therapy if needed.”

Technology is not all bad, says Noctor. “With screens, it is a case of quality over quantity. We could clean up the internet entirely, yet we would still have cases of young people spending hours watching YouTube clips of cats on skateboards… my view is that we are asking children to regulate their own desire in a world that is manipulating their desire and this is both unfair and an unreasonable expectation. I could spend an hour on YouTube learning a song on a guitar and I could spend an hour on Instagram looking at other people’s profiles and feeling utterly miserable."

Twenty-five year old Amy Morgan remembers all too well what it was like to be a teen with anxiety. 

“For me, it was performance anxiety and it kicked off in fifth year. I was really good at maths as a young teen and suddenly I was finding the senior maths curriculum really hard. The transition added immense pressure. I would faint and at times suffer chest pain. At one time, I went to the hospital to have my heart checked, as my doctor was concerned. It was a confusing time as I didn’t know exactly what anxiety was and certainly didn’t realise it could be this extreme. I would talk to my brother Daniel as he is calm and would provide that rational perspective that someone with anxious thoughts can find hard to grasp alone. That’s the key, talking and realising it’s not as bad as you think”.

The pressures are huge today, so there is a real need to ensure children have access to people they can relate to

Amy is studying for a Diploma in Mental Health Awareness online. Her goal is to develop and host mental health education workshops in schools with her own business, Mazzi. She grew up in Kinsale, Co Cork but lives now in Essex. 

“The pressures are huge today, so there is a real need to ensure children have access to people they can relate to. It is about empathy and not sympathy. And she agrees social media is not helping. 

“Nowadays, social media is not only all about physical image but also social status. It’s not just kids. Some parents feel this need to share everything about their children, particularly their achievements. Whilst this can be lovely, bear in mind, too much may put pressure on that child to succeed in every department which is a lot of pressure. Therefore, this influences their mental health.”