DD has a chronic illness, and separately, also has anxiety. She usually doesn't ask for much, but she has a strong need for physical affection and wants to be talked through difficult moments. So I spend a significant amount of time doing that. She's very receptive to sensory stimuli, and finds comfort in plush toys and soft blankets and fidgets, little accessories to manipulate, etc, so she surrounds herself with those.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Leaving for things really early.

"Early is on-time. On time is late." -DD

This is really true. It's not anxiety. It responsible. Her punctuality may make you anxious; but, this is not something that a bad trait. She will be an asset to the workforce and gain the trust of those around her for being dependable. Support this for sure.

There's a balance. I have a kid with anxiety about being on time and it can get too extreme. I cannot rearrange my life to make sure we're at least half an hour early to every event, most of which don't matter too much.

A recent example was a brunch where the host says, "arrive any time after 10am and we'll gather through the afternoon." I'm not going to skip my morning exercise class so that we can leave at 9am for the half hour drive "in case there's traffic." But that was DD's wish and she felt so anxious and upset when we were arriving around 10:15, never mind that we were the first people to arrive by quite a while!

It gets in the way of things like carpools because she'll want to leave a huge buffer that more than 90% of the time would have them arriving at the soccer field 40 minutes early. No one else wants to do that.

Anonymous wrote:The SPACE program is complete garbage. It’s marketed to “anxious” kids, with zero basis in how to best medically treat clinically diagnosed anxiety /GAD pediatric patients. Its insistence on denial of accommodations is also contrary to law. I wish someone would shut it down, or at least strip its terms.

Do you disagree with the clinical case studies and research articles showing the efficacy of SPACE for certain conditions?
https://www.spacetreatment.net/manual-and-books

I think you are misunderstanding "accommodations" in the context of SPACE. It's not about 504 or IEP accommodations. Rather it's examining if parents are making accommodations for their child's anxiety that are not serving them well and then changing the parents' behavior.

Can PPs speak more about SPACE and the debate over accommodations?

The SPACE program is complete garbage. It’s marketed to “anxious” kids, with zero basis in how to best medically treat clinically diagnosed anxiety /GAD pediatric patients. Its insistence on denial of accommodations is also contrary to law. I wish someone would shut it down, or at least strip its terms.

The best thing for my DD’s anxiety has NOT given in and adjusting to her, it’s been pushing her past her comfort zone. Whenever we accommodated, things got worse.

Not fighting with DD about food; allowing her to order from door dash, do take out, sushi when she wants it- sigh

Anonymous wrote:Leaving for things really early.

"Early is on-time. On time is late." -DD

This is really true. It's not anxiety. It responsible. Her punctuality may make you anxious; but, this is not something that a bad trait. She will be an asset to the workforce and gain the trust of those around her for being dependable. Support this for sure.

Anonymous wrote:Leaving for things really early.

"Early is on-time. On time is late." -DD

Your DD is me.

For us, it’s spending $200/week out of pocket for therapy. It’s painful but dd is doing so much better.

Leaving for things really early.

"Early is on-time. On time is late." -DD

I signed my anxious son up for a sports camp for his age group at the local high school that was theoretically run by adult coaches. Turns out it was mostly run by some pretty obnoxious and foul-mouthed teenagers who let the “alpha” kids bully the other kids. My kid was a wreck after the first day and I didn’t make him go back. Now we have agreed that if he hates a camp the first day, he had to go for at least half the day the second day and then he can quit. It’s made him way more willing to sign up for camps (and he loved every other camp he was in).

My kid has a lot of social anxiety . I am fine with her skipping things like the all day field trip to Hersheypark or picking her up early from a friend’s house or a school dance.