Games work as anxiety treatment and anger management, too.

As we discussed last week, when we use play interventions, we focus on three things:

1. Building our relationship

2. Following the rules

3. Practicing self-regulation

Games provide us a great opportunity to help model rule following, to process frustration as it arises, to build self regulation, and to build up our parent/child relationship.

Below, you’ll find 25 of our favorite games to incorporate at home, including a few that we use as child therapists...

You know your child’s not just angry. There’s something going on underneath the surface, too.

And a lot of times, that anger is masking anxiety, stress, and overwhelm.

When kids and teens (and even adults, too!) get anxious, their brains and bodies start to take over. Their fight/flight/freeze response gets activated.

That means for some kids, when they feel scared, they look scared.

The run away (flight) or totally shut down and clam up (freeze).

For many of us, our fight reaction takes over.

And instead of just looking scared on the outside, we look MAD. We look like we’re ready to get into a fight and defend ourselves. We’re ready to yell, or scream, or call you bad names, and we have a very, very hard time calming down.

So how can you integrate games to help your child build up their anxiety and anger management skills?

Tips for call quality, what to cover, and how to get the most out of our time together.

Compassionate Counseling St. Louis always offers teletherapy options, including virtual video sessions and phone check ins, when you’re feeling sick and can’t make it into the office. Below we have a few suggestions to make sure your virtual session is as useful as can be.

Our brains are in charge of everything we do. We take in information, and we send that information where it needs to go.

Every brain has both a relay center, and amygdala, and a pre-frontal cortex. In BrainWise, we say that your emotional response (the fight/flight/freeze response) is driven by your Lizard Brain. Your pre-frontal cortex, which helps you to stop and think, is your Wizard Brain.

The BrainWise curriculum was designed to help kids build social and emotional control and self-regulation skills. When I previously worked in the Saint Louis Counseling School Partnership Program, I received training in this program, and still use components of it in my practice today. To be clear, I’m not TECHNICALLY providing brainwise as I’m not maintaining really strict fidelity with the model. I have a whole walkthrough on the modules in an earlier post. This week, I want to walk you through how I introduce the model in my individual work with angry and anxious kids.

I strongly encourage parents, teachers or therapists to consider buying the BrainWise curriculum if these seem like helpful tools.

Mindfulness should be more than an “every now and then” kind of thing.

If you only practice mindfulness when you’re already upset, you may calm down in the moment - but it’s harder to reach for the skill when you need it. It’s much more effective to set up a daily practice, and really reinforce this skill.

The foundation for all of this? Being in the moment.

So today, let’s practice just sitting.

Internal emotions and external expression:

We all experience emotions internally and express them in slightly different ways from one another. We all have our inside emotional experiences and our outside displays of frustration, anger, and sadness.

When we experience a spike in emotions, it helps us know we may need to take the time to Stop and Think, using our Wizard Brain. Otherwise, our Lizard Brain might take over, leading to an explosive reaction.

Our Lizard Brain wants to react right away (it is in charge of fight, flight, and freeze, of course) – so if you notice yourself feeling heated, your Lizard Brain may tell you that you should explode and yell. However, if you take the time to stop and think “will I get in trouble if I explode?” you can make a wise decision, even when you start feeling upset.

How to help kids clue into their emotions:

Draw an outline of a body. It doesn’t have to be perfect! Try to get a head and arms and legs in there, and call it good.

Don’t judge yourself!

Many people report experiencing panic attacks about panic attacks. Of course it makes sense to wish that you didn’t have to experience them. Or to wish that you were different. But when we judge ourselves, we can make this an unhealthy cycle - the panic, the guilt about the panic, the panic about the guilt about the panic… it’s a panic cycle! So break the cycle, and be kind to yourself. And practice your steps, even before you need them.

I specialize in both anxiety and anger management for a reason.

Anxiety and anger have a lot in common. If you've ever experienced feelings of anxiety before, consider those physical cues - racing heart, shortness of breath, dilated eyes, inability to focus or concentrate, muscles tensed and ready for action. 

Now, think about the last time you were angry. How your face felt hot and your fists tensed up. How your heart started to beat faster because you were ready for a fight. Your brain focused only on the thing that made you feel this way.

For anxious kids, teens, and college students, it can be very difficult to fall asleep at night.

Not falling asleep means being exhausted the next morning. And guess what happens the next morning? You're too tired to adequately respond to all of the stressors during your day. It's a vicious cycle - and it's super, super common. 

One of the ways to relax is to build up a regular relaxation practice.

This means incorporating regular exercise and healthy eating ALONG with relaxation practice, including breathing exercises, muscle relaxation, and visualization.

Everyone has a limit.

We can handle the anxiety, the frustration, the stress that comes up in our everyday life, until we just can't handle it anymore. We reach our tipping point. Our calm and collected bodies and brains give way to big outbursts, yelling, screaming, maybe even cursing out our friends or parents. We're no longer able to tolerate what's going on. We've passed the threshold of our "Window of Tolerance." So the question becomes: What can you handle?

Week 3 and we're halfway there! Today we practice mindful breathing - a fundamental skill so basic you may think you already know it, but trust me - there's room for improvement. Also included in this week's lesson, tips for training your children how to intergrate mindful breathing into their life as well. 

Week 2 of our mindfulness series, and we're exploring how to scan your body for emotions. It's important to be aware of where you hold stress, anxiety, or frustration, as everybody's body is different. And when you're able to identify these trigger points, it's much easier to find 1. where you should focus during your relaxation practice and 2. where you need to check in to make sure your emotions feel controllable.