Anxious Children

When I have nothing else to think about, and that doesn't happen very often, I sometimes wonder why The Dervish and The Girl are as intense as they are.

There isn't much point to this train of thought and while I do like puzzles and I enjoy a good mystery, I usually prefer that they can be solved.

Dervish and The Girl are not only intense, they are anxious. Are they anxious as a part of being intense or are they both intense and anxious? Another thought to ponder.

Dervish is anxious about his place in life. His gauge of self worth and self importance seems to rely on how well life is going at any particular moment in time.

He doesn't get freaked out about the average things. He loves insects, thunder and lightning don't seem to bother him as they do the girl, he rode a 2 wheel bike when he was 3 1/2 - without training wheels (no fear of failure or falling or trying something new) and there's never much fear of trying anything save for a new food or a ride at the amusement park.

However, when things aren't following "the plan" life gets bent out of shape and his perceptions follow closely behind. That's when the downward spiral of anxiety goes into full swing. He becomes convinced that he isn't worthwhile, that his life is awful, that it will from now and forever be awful and worse than awful. It just goes on and on.

The Girl on the other hand doesn't seem to have any concerns about her self worth or the worth of her life. She is anxious in other ways. She has fears, perhaps even phobias. Loud noises, rain, the washing machine... and none of these things are what can be considered 'rational'.

A rational fear would be one that has developed as a result of a life experience or lack of life experience. The girl has never been injured by rain, nor has she ever known anyone who was afraid of rain or storms for that matter, in fact, The Dad and I love thunder storms.

So why are these two children so anxious by nature?

One theory is that perhaps their birth mother was anxious during her pregnancy. This was discussed at this parenting information site. One of the articles states that research suggests that stress during pregnancy can pass stress hormones to the baby causing anxiety.

I haven't read the study, I don't know for sure but I'm presuming that their birth mother was quite likely under a greater than normal amount of stress during her pregnancy - and, if the research is correct, and stress can translate to an anxious child - then perhaps the mystery has been solved after all.

What to do about it though, still remains a mystery.