12 Signs of Child Anxiety – and What to Do About Them

Key takeaways

1. Childhood anxiety affects millions of children and often manifests differently than in adults, appearing as behavioral problems rather than verbal expressions of worry.
2. Understanding your child’s anxiety helps you recognize behavior as communication and choose effective support strategies rather than punishing symptoms.
3. What are signs my child has anxiety? Look for increased emotionality, irritability, clinginess, regression, social withdrawal, sleep problems, perfectionism, and physical symptoms.
4. You can track your child’s anxiety symptoms by keeping a symptom journal noting behaviors, timing, and patterns to help identify trends and distinguish anxiety from other issues.
5. Support your anxious child by responding with empathy instead of punishment, validate feelings without enabling avoidance, and prepare for feared situations.
6. When should I seek professional help? If anxiety impairs daily life – affecting sleep, appetite, or preventing enjoyment of normal activities – consult a pediatrician or therapist.

 

[Note: This post was originally written in the context of COVID-19 lockdowns, and was updated in March 2025]

 

Childhood anxiety now affects millions of children across different ages and backgrounds. As parents, we may struggle to tell the difference between normal childhood worries and clinical anxiety symptoms that require attention. When I noticed my own daughter following me around the house and becoming unusually clingy, I initially misinterpreted these behaviors. Then I realized they might actually be signs of anxiety.

 

Children experience anxiety differently than adults. Their symptoms often manifest as behavioral problems rather than verbal expressions of worry. From separation anxiety and generalized anxiety disorder to social anxiety and specific phobias, these conditions can significantly impact a child’s development, learning, and overall wellbeing.

 

Our bodies are wired to keep us safe. When children sense danger or feel insecure, it becomes nearly impossible for them to function normally. This means they struggle to learn effectively and may revert to behaviors they had outgrown years ago.

 

Young children rarely have the emotional vocabulary to understand their feelings.  Even if they do know, they might not be willing to tell us their feelings.  This leaves parents with many questions:

• How do we recognize anxiety symptoms in children?
• What level of anxiety is developmentally appropriate?
• What strategies can help anxious children cope?
• And most importantly, how can we ensure we’re not unintentionally making their anxiety worse?

 

Understanding the clinical signs of childhood anxiety is crucial because they often differ from adult anxiety symptoms. Most children will experience some form of anxiety during their development. It’s essential for parents to learn effective coping strategies they can teach their children to overcome anxiety – tools that will serve them throughout their lives.

 

Why Understanding Child Anxiety Matters

There are two main reasons to learn more about your child’s potential anxiety:

1. Recognizing Behavior as Communication

Children rarely come to their parents and explain their worries. Rather, their anxiety comes out in ways that may look like ‘behavior problems’ that should be ‘fixed.’  This is a big reason why I don’t believe it’s appropriate to use tools like Time-out to address children’s ‘misbehavior.’

 

Researchers agree that we shouldn’t use tools like Time-out when children are dysregulated.  But if the vast majority of children’s ‘misbehavior’ is actually dysregulation, potentially caused by anxiety, when is Time-out ever appropriate?

 

Understanding that anxiety might be causing your child’s challenging behaviors may help you to reappraise the situation. Parent Diana reappraised her daughter’s behavior during our conversation on permissive parenting.  I was intentionally ‘rude’ to Diana, and she agreed that I was “dismissive” and “disrespectful.”  Then I provided some context for my rudeness, and Diana reappraised my behavior, and saw it as understandable.  She allowed me some grace, instead of feeling so frustrated about how I’d spoken to her.  (Jump to the 26:51 timestamp to go right there).

 

When I see that my daughter’s behavior is a result of anxiety, I can empathize with her.  This meets her deep need to feel heard and understood.  Even if nothing else about the situation changes, simply feeling heard can be enormously helpful in managing anxiety.

 

2. Choosing Effective Support Strategies

Once we’re more aware about our children’s experiences, we can choose strategies for helping children cope with their anxiety that are more likely to be useful. Often child anxiety is viewed as a behavioral problem to be solved.  Interventions may reinforce “good” behavior and ignore “bad” behavior.  The problem with this approach is that it never deals with the root cause of the anxiety. The behavior may change, the actual underlying feeling probably has not.

 

There is no silver bullet to blissful family life.  First, I’ll share 12 signs your child may be experiencing anxiety.  Then I’ll suggest some strategies to help you support your child, which may help you to meet more of your needs as well.

 

In some cases, professional intervention may be necessary. This article cannot be viewed as medical advice. Throughout this article, I hope to show you how to identify anxiety and decide when the time is right to seek professional help.

 

12 Signs Your Child May Be Experiencing Anxiety

1. Increased Emotionality

Emotional symptoms of anxiety are very common. Children may be excessively worried about themselves, friends, or family. They may worry about events before they happen, and they may worry about events that could happen.

 

2. Irritability

It’s hard to remember that irritability is a symptom of anxiety. This is a symptom that can sneak up on us. More frequent tantrums, outbursts, and whining could all be described as an increase in irritability. Many parents understandably find these behaviors quite irritating! But trying to get the child to change their behavior doesn’t actually address the root of the problem.

 

3. Clinginess

When COVID lockdowns started and my daughter followed me all over the house, I thought she was missing her friends and teachers. As time went on, I noticed that she wasn’t talking as much about her friends and teachers, but she still wanted to hang on me – which got pretty frustrating.

 

It wasn’t until I started researching for this post that it dawned on me—this clinginess isn’t just missing people – it could be an indication of anxiety. Her recent clinginess isn’t a surprise when I consider how different and confusing life has become for her.

 

After the World Trade Center Attack, researchers studying public school students in New York City found that rates of Separation Anxiety Disorder (SAD) increased.  They concluded,  “SAD should be considered among the conditions likely to be found in children after a large-scale disaster.”

 

4. Developmental Regression

Regression is so tough for parents. After working for months to get your child to sleep through the night in their own bed or use the toilet consistently, suddenly the problems are back! It’s so tough to maintain your composure. (Remember to be mindful!)

 

When children are confronted with something new or stressful, regression is a very typical reaction. Expressing empathy for your child – who also worked very hard to move past this behavior – is helpful in this instance. Let your child know that when things change, it’s normal for kids to ‘forget’ things they’ve already learned.

 

Even if you’d strongly prefer that they not do the regressive behavior, try to accept the child in front of you.  When we compare ourselves to other parents who’ve got their act together, we often feel shame.  (And that shame doesn’t help us to get our act together.)

 

When we compare our child to their siblings, or theoretical children who don’t do this annoying thing, they may feel shame.  (And it doesn’t help them stop doing the annoying thing.)  When we accept them as they are, they grow up with a sense of right-ness in themselves, knowing that they are lovable exactly as they are.  Many of the thousands of parents I’ve worked with wish so badly that their own parents had been able to see them in this way.

 

5. Social Withdrawal

Even shy children typically engage with close friends and family. Pay attention if your child seems to be engaging less frequently with familiar people or avoiding family activities.

 

Withdrawal on its own doesn’t indicate that a child is anxious. There is research that indicates withdrawal has a connection to anxiety and other mental health concerns. We also know that social connection is one of the key resilience-building strategies. Withdrawal from social connections could have negative consequences later on.

 

6. Apathy

When children lose interest in activities or foods they usually really enjoy, it’s a sign that something might be wrong. This is a tough problem because if you ask the child to explain their change in attitude, you’re likely to just get a shoulder shrug in response.  It isn’t necessarily anxiety, but it could be. It’s worth exploring with a qualified professional.

 

7. Problems sleeping

Difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep, possibly due to nightmares, is a significant red-flag for anxiety. Difficult sleep can also compound the effects of anxiety because we don’t function as well without proper sleep. If your child is having trouble sleeping, chances are high that they are or will start to display other symptoms simply because there is so much overlap.

 

Difficulty sleeping could be caused by factors other than anxiety. Exposure to blue light (screens) before bed and bedtime routine inconsistency can all cause sleep disruptions.

 

8. Appetite Changes

A change in appetite might be hard to identify since children are always growing and the things they like can change from one week to the next. Appetite can fluctuate under normal conditions.

 

A change that is significant enough to make them lose weight, especially if they are very young, will require intervention. Get in touch with your pediatrician if your child is losing weight.

 

9. Physical Symptoms

Physical problems won’t always be present, but look out for several potential issues.   The symptoms we commonly associate with panic attacks can occur in children with anxiety: shortness of breath, rapid heart rate, shaking, dizziness, and sweating. They might also just seem tired or worn out most of the time.

 

Headaches and stomachaches are some of the most common physical symptoms children display. These can also be symptoms of physical problems besides anxiety, so it’s important to get them checked out.

 

10. Restlessness/Inattention

I put restlessness and inattention together because they have a lot in common. Anxiety makes it hard for children to stick with anything—mentally or physically.

 

They have intrusive thoughts about whatever they are scared about. Both inattention and restlessness are also symptoms of ADHD, so anxiety can easily be mistaken for and misdiagnosed as ADHD.

 

11. Perfectionism

Perfectionism frequently occurs in children with anxiety.  Perfectionism isn’t considered a diagnostic symptom, so a physician wouldn’t diagnose anxiety because a child is a perfectionist, but there is a significant correlation between the two.

 

12. ‘Disrespectful’ Behavior

When I use the word ‘disrespectful,’ I’m thinking of a few behaviors. Primarily, I’m thinking of ‘not listening.’ This can be code for ‘not doing what I tell them to do.’

 

The child may be distracted or unfocused. They may refuse to do what you ask because this keeps your attention on them for longer – and they have a need for connection.  

 

They may also speak to you using words or in a tone you don’t like, because they feel overwhelmed by family life and don’t know how to express this.

 

If you haven’t seen many of the other symptoms on this list in your child besides ‘disrespectful behavior,’ you will likely find the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop helpful.  You’ll learn how to set limits your child will respect – as well as set way fewer limits than you ever thought possible.

 

Tracking Anxiety Symptoms

If  you’re seeing some of these symptoms and you’re considering reaching out to a professional, try keeping a symptom journal first.  There are phone apps that make it easy to do this, or you can track in a journal. When tracking, make note of the date and time you notice behaviors. You can track incidents like crying spells or angry outbursts as well as daily trends—lethargic all day; bouncing off the walls all afternoon.

 

Keeping this journal is important because anxiety can look like other things. We’re all aware that sleepy or hungry children will inevitably try our patience. Anxiety can look a lot like sleep deprivation and hunger. To compound the confusion, anxiety can also cause sleep deprivation and hunger.

 

Within a week or two you will have enough data to identify trends. This will help your child’s pediatrician to direct you to appropriate resources if necessary.

 

Effective Approaches for Supporting Your Anxious Child

1. Treat anxiety-driven behaviors with validation and empathy

It’s easy to see how several of the anxiety symptoms can be mistaken for ‘irritating behavior.’ For example, if a child is crying ‘for no reason’ an adult might interpret the crying as attention-seeking behavior that they don’t want to encourage. This might lead an adult to ignore the behavior or walk away from the child, when what they need most of all in that moment is validation.

 

If instead we view the crying ‘for no reason’ as actually being caused by the child’s anxiety, we understand that the child is not just trying to get something from us, they are struggling to meet their needs for safety. The child might not be fully conscious of the need, or able to articulate it verbally.

 

“Back-talk,” crying, angry outbursts, and other symptoms of anxiety can be cries for help. When we see them this way, we will respond differently than if we view them as deliberate behavioral choices that we have to discourage. When we perceive the deeper cause of the behavior – the anxiety – and focus on addressing the cause rather than the surface behavior (like the crying), we realize the need for empathy and validation  in our response.

 

When we react to anxiety-driven behaviors with empathy, we help our child to develop self-regulation. Instead of quickly telling them not to worry because everything is ok, we can help them recognize and understand their emotions. This is an important step toward developing emotion regulation skills.

 

2. Validate Without Enabling

When children express anxiety, we can try not to say things that might arouse shame in them.

 

If they could do the thing we were asking, they probably would.  We can explore what it is about the situation that’s hard for them, and see if there are ways to make it easier.

 

They might be willing to go to a new class accompanied by a friend, or to try a sport that’s related to one they already play rather than something completely different.  We can allow them to take comfort objects with them when they go into stressful situations.  If they struggle with large groups of people, we might see if we can get to a party early when there are fewer people around.  We can see if we can meet a new teacher before the first day of class.  All of these actions can support children in navigating their anxiety effectively, and seeing that it can be managed.

 

3. Address Fears Through Preparation

We can address our child’s fears by teaching them to be prepared. Some children will feel better understanding the safest way to respond to a crisis they are imagining. Doing a fire drill or acting out a scenario where they have to find help can be very powerful.

 

Uncertainty can be very frightening. Walking through what would happen in an emergency is reassuring for children. For example, if they are scared of you dying, you can tell them that while you have no intention of dying, they will be ok even if it happened. When my daughter asked me what would happen if her dad and I died, I told her who she would go live with. Knowing what would happen in a worst-case scenario did seem to give her some comfort.

 

4. Harness the Power of Play

My favorite tool to combat anxiety is play. During play, our brains are thinking, planning, and organizing information. The state of mind we use when we play pushes out the anxious state of mind.

 

Remember that play is a broad term. You don’t have to do pretend play or search Pinterest for ideas. You can clean up toys or eat a snack in a playful way. My daughter and I have had hours of play rolling a bouncy ball around our living room. There’s no need to make an enormous mess or an elaborate plan.

 

5. Incorporate Music and Movement

We can also fight anxiousness with music and movement. Dancing to music you enjoy can be a powerful experience. You’re likely to notice new things in your surroundings on a walk. This gives you something to think about other than the thing that’s provoking the anxiety.

 

By moving our focus from our head to our body, we give our mind a break from worry. Movement is a well-established strategy for maintaining mental health.

 

When to Seek Professional Help

To be clear, this article does not substitute for professional help. I’ve provided a few strategies that may help you manage mild symptoms of anxiety. No one can provide sound advice regarding your child’s mental health without direct consultation.

 

When I spoke to developmental psychologist Dr. Mona Delahooke, my major takeaway was this:

 

If there’s no impairment or impact on the child’s life, then you don’t need to worry. Professionals look for impairment. If the child’s life is impaired, it is time to intervene. If your child’s symptoms are interfering with daily life, I encourage you to reach out to your pediatrician or a child therapist. For example, not getting enough sleep or food can have serious health consequences. If your child is too scared or worried to enjoy a trip to the park or family game night, then the anxiety is getting in the way of their daily life.

 

If not, then it may well resolve in the coming weeks and months as your child’s brain develops and they begin to access new strategies to manage their worries. And now you have some new strategies to try in supporting them on this journey.

 

Frequently Asked Questions About Child Anxiety

1. How does anxiety show up differently in children compared to adults?
Unlike adults, children often can’t verbalize their worries. Instead, anxiety often manifests as behavioral problems like increased clinginess, irritability, or what might appear as “disrespectful” behavior. Children rarely come to parents explaining their worries directly, so our work is to see beneath the ‘disrespect’ and find ways to help the child meet their need for safety.

 

2. What are some physical symptoms of anxiety in children?
Physical symptoms can include headaches, stomachaches, shortness of breath, rapid heart rate, shaking, dizziness, and sweating. Children might also seem constantly tired or worn out. These symptoms should be medically evaluated as they could indicate other conditions besides anxiety.

 

3. Is my child’s perfectionism related to anxiety?
Yes, perfectionism frequently occurs in children with anxiety. While perfectionism isn’t used alone to diagnose anxiety, there is a significant correlation between the two. If your child shows perfectionist tendencies alongside other anxiety symptoms, it may be worth exploring further.

 

4. How can I support my child without enabling their anxiety?
It’s important to distinguish between ‘enabling’ and supporting children.  In a behaviorist-based system, we might say that a child who struggles with loud noise at lunchtime is being ‘enabled’ if they’re allowed to escape to a quieter place.  We can also see how allowing them to eat in a quieter place can help them to feel more regulated, so they’re less explosive later in the day.  Strategies like bringing a comfort object, arriving early to events (so there are fewer people around, if your child has social anxiety) or meeting new teachers before the school year help children learn to manage anxiety rather than avoid it.

 

5. What role does play have in managing child anxiety?
Play is a powerful tool for combating anxiety. During play, the brain is thinking, planning, and organizing information in a way that naturally pushes out anxious thoughts. Even simple activities like rolling a ball around the living room or cleaning up toys in a playful way can help shift a child’s mental state away from anxiety.