Hypochondriac

Okay, my 6 year old with the fear of death? Well, it's now turning into her feeling symptoms of certain sicknesses.

She tells me that her legs are tingling and shaking and she feels like she can't walk.

She tells me that her lungs "feel hot" and she thinks they're going to collapse (a friend from church has been suffering from a reoccuring collasped lung, so I'm sure that's where she heard about this).

She REALLy gets herself worked up over these things, to the point where she's literally shaking with anxiety.

I reassure her that she's fine, I make her close her eyes and take deep breaths until she's calm. So far that's working, but...

I don't know what to do and I have no idea where it's coming from.

What sort of things cause children to react this way? Is this a normal stage?

At first I thought it's because she broke her leg and now she's scared of everything because she remembers the pain.

Could that be it? And whatever it is, how do I deal with this?






A little update on the fear of death...I got her books about heaven and angels in the mail and we read them. She says that she understands A LOT better now that heaven is a good place and it's nothing to fear. So, the books seemed to have worked on the death issue, but now there's this hypochondriac thing...

andry said:

I know it may be traumatic for her......but if you'd step back for a moment, what a wonderful growth stage. She's processing stuff, and with proper parental guidance and wisdom, can be a good thing.

For my 5 yo when he's discovering new stuff, be they positive or negative, I sympathize with him, like in sympathy tears, and go through all the motions, actions, reactions with him.

IOW, with your daughter....go through it with her. Sympathize and go through the motions if you thought you had hot lungs or tingly feelings; what would you do?

So it may mean a trip to your friendly doctor.....so she can get checked out and 'prove' that she's ok and perfectly healthy. I know my GP well enough to take a few minutes of her day (non-billable) to do this.

There is an extreme for obssesive-compulsive disorder that you'd have to be cognizant of, although it doesn't sound like it in your case.

Good luck.

Click to expand...

Actually, Andry, I agree with you and my approach, so far, has been similar to what you suggest. I put myself in her place and try to give her proactive things to do in order to give her a sense of control over her fear and anxiety.

The problem with that is my hubby. He has no patience for it and he feels that we should just tell her to cut it out, she's fine, it's all in her head. Obviously, I know he's right...it IS all in her head, but I totally disagree with his idea of how to handle it.

He feels like I'm only encouraging her to continue in this kind of thinking and behavior. I don't think I am...I feel like it's a really good thing that she's so expressive with me about everything she's feeling and thinking. I don't want her to start keeping her feelings and thoughts inside because I've scolded her for expressing them.

My thinking is that by giving helping her find a way to work through these things on her own (for example, teaching her some breathing techniques in order to calm herself when she's feeling nervous) that she's going to come out of this particular stage (I hope it is a stage) with a sense of empowerment and pride.

Anyway, I find myself torn between submitting to his way of handling this in order to keep the peace OR pushing for what I feel is right.