Many parents worry when their child starts acting moody or exhibiting negative behavior. It can be hard to differentiate between what is normal and what could be a sign of a deeper problem.
Even after a diagnosis, it's not easy to know how to respond to teen depression or child anxiety. To better understand signs of depression in teens and child anxiety and depression, check out the popular articles below.
Concerned Your Teen is Depressed? Watch for These Signs and Symptoms
As the start of the school year approaches, have you seen your first grader go into meltdown mode at the mention of school, or watched your soon-to-be kindergartner regress back to baby talking and thumb sucking? Rest assured that you’re not alone. Each fall, millions of parents deal with their children’s beginning-of-the-year anxiety. For younger children... Read more »
“I hate school! I’m not going.” If you’re like most parents, you probably take the responsibility of getting your kids to school very seriously and get angry and frustrated when they refuse to go. This can easily turn into a power struggle if you feel this is a “battle” you have to “win.” It’s all too... Read more »
Your teen prefers to sleep till 11:00am, is crabby when she wakes up, would rather talk to the dog than you, and isolates herself for hours at a time in her room, glued to her laptop. Is she depressed? Or just being a normal teenager? It’s perfectly normal for teens to be moody, irritable, overly sensitive... Read more »
Depression is an all-too-common disorder among teenagers, affecting an estimated 10 to 15 percent of teens, or 1 or 2 out of every 10. Once parents have recognized the signs their teen may be depressed and reached out to a pediatrician or counselor for an accurate diagnosis, it’s time to make a plan. The good news... Read more »
When Rebecca, now a college senior, was 14 years old, she started showing some classic signs and symptoms of depression. Concerned, her mother, Judy, began to seek an accurate, professional diagnosis. Judy, who asked to withhold her family’s last name, was fortunate that Rebecca recognized her own struggles enough to request to see a therapist. So... Read more »
When she was 14, Rebecca’s grandmother died after six months of terminal illness. At the same time she’d been watching the disease progress, Rebecca started at a new, very large, school. She joined an after-school activity that took up endless hours and proved difficult to leave even after she realized it wasn’t a good fit... Read more »
When Therese Borchard reflects on what caused the depression she’s wrestled with since the fourth grade, the 44-year-old Annapolis resident identifies two main factors: traumatic events that happened in her family, and a genetic predisposition toward depression and emotional sensitivity. “My dad left when I was in the fifth grade,” says Borchard, who has written and... Read more »
Sometimes we parents don’t think we are anxious because we are not trembling in our boots. Often there is no visible sign of how anxious we are. Yet when we look inside our heads, we notice that we spend a lot of time thinking about our kids—sometimes scary thoughts about... Read more »
Many parents are at a loss for what to do with their older children during the summer months – they may get the summer off, but you probably don’t. That leaves a whole chunk of time to fill each day. How do you know if your child is responsible enough to be left home alone?... Read more »
Is your child forgetful, irresponsible, moody and prone to daydreaming? Does he seem to lack motivation and become easily bored? This behavior could be related to SCT, or "Sluggish Cognitive Tempo Disorder." This new way of looking at certain ADHD-like symptoms in kids has been generating quite a bit of buzz lately.... Read more »