{"id":233,"date":"2025-09-04T20:30:03","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T20:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/?p=233"},"modified":"2025-09-04T20:30:03","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T20:30:03","slug":"separation-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/2025\/09\/04\/separation-anxiety\/","title":{"rendered":"Separation Anxiety"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to a new year of school. As we settle into this new year some children (and parents\/caregivers) may be feeling a range of emotions. All feelings are completely ok. Some children may feel a little anxiety especially with the change from being with family in the summer to being back at school. Separation anxiety is a real fear that something bad will happen when a child is away from their parent\/caregiver.<\/p>\n

What Separation Anxiety can look like:
\n– clinginess or refusal to separate
\n– Tears at drop off or long before drop off
\n– Tummy aches and headaches
\n– Night time fears
\n– Excessive worry that something will happen to a loved one
\n*These are behaviours that let us know that our body is on “high alert”<\/p>\n

How you can help:
\n– create a goodbye ritual (ex. walk to the outside of the class, a hug, and reassurance that you will see them after school)
\n– use a transitional object (a note in the lunchbox, a special stone, a family picture etc.)
\n– Keep good byes short and sweet
\n– Reassure with predictability (ex. “I will be back after the bell rings after school”)<\/p>\n

What Not to Say:
\nSince we want to validate our child’s feelings, we want to avoid these phrases:
\n– “You’re fine”
\n– “Stop being silly”
\n– “There’s nothing to be afraid of”
\nWhat to Say Instead:
\n– “I can see that this is really hard for you”
\n– “You’re safe and I will be back”
\n– “It’s ok to miss me, I’ll miss you too”<\/p>\n

Separation anxiety is not a weakness in your child or your parenting. We can hold space for our child’s big feelings and gentle goodbyes to help them with their separation anxiety.<\/p>\n

Here are a few visuals of evening routines, morning routines, and tips for separation anxiety.\"\"\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to a new year of school. As we settle into this new year some children (and parents\/caregivers) may be feeling a range of emotions. All feelings are completely ok. Some children may feel a little anxiety especially with the change from being with family in the summer to being back at school. Separation anxiety […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8715,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8715"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":237,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions\/237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sd41.bc.ca\/brentwood-counselling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}