Helping Your Child Overcome Separation Anxiety - Book Review

Just finished reading this book. At least two of my three girls are affected by Separation Anxiety as I was as a child. (I may still be but I think we have learned to adjust as adults.) This may be why I must carry everything in my purse and never be without it.

The book is packed full of good information. Only it reads as an instruction manual or a government document. I guess I'm just getting used to reading the self-help books that sound like friends talking together.

I found no great insights from this book. The thought that did come from it for me was that I keep reading these books in hopes that I will stumble on the "ah-ha" moment that I did not think of myself yet. So I got to wondering if I am really the good mom I hear people tell me that I am. Maybe I am doing a good job and not letting my girls fall behind the curve. With the imaginative things these girls think up, I don't know why I ever think these thoughts. Maybe I just read enough that I have collected enough knowledge that I do know what I am doing without even knowing it.

This is one of the reasons that I chose to start this blog; to share with the world the things my girls and I do to survive day after day. Like the little reading nook I have created in the playroom. They just spent the last half hour in there looking at and reading books together...nicely.

When it comes to separation anxiety, I make sure that I hug them alot and I hold their hand when out walking. I created a worry stone necklace for the eldest because she needs to hold onto something to feel safe. Since reading this book, I thought that I might need to make and sell these to other moms who are going through the same things that I am.

I started leaving a scrap of paper on her desk and every day I write a new heart on it for her to look at during the day whenever she starts to feel stressed. I walk her to school every day and pick her up every day. We talk about what the day is going to hold and what happened during the day. We discuss how to avoid situations and what she could have done to make the situation better. I talk to her teacher daily about what is going on or what went on the day before. Extremely thankful for the wonderful teachers that she has had so far and how helpful they have been to her.

We take moments out at random to do little things that I know she enjoys and that no one else can be included into. When my hubby was working in Florida (3 weeks out, 1 week home), I started her on journaling her feelings. She couldn't write words yet, so she would write the picture and then tell me how it made her feel and I would write them and tell her what it is that I wrote. That way if she was feeling that way again, she could see the word that explained that feeling, along with the picture.

I will still search and try to figure out the latest issues that these girls are going through. I already started studying for when they hit the teenage years. As I have learned so far, the girl you have at 2 is going to be your teenager. I am in for a doozy of teenage years. It's a good thing I have 10 more years before they are all teens.