Did you know one out of every twenty teenagers experience worry, panic attacks, and phobias? Adolescence is already a tumultuous time and chronic anxiety often adds to the chaos. Before we get into coping skills for anxiety, it’s important to understand what anxiety is and how it manifests.

What is Anxiety?

Anxiety is worry, and it can manifest in our thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations. Everyone has anxiety from time to time! It’s normal to get nervous before a big speech or right before you get on a rollercoaster. The way to differentiate normal anxiety that most people get from time to time from chronic anxiety is by the 4 D’s.

Disproportionate: First, chronic anxiety is disproportionate to the situation, meaning it’s normal to feel anxious before walking into a new school for the first time, but does it make sense to feel that same level of anxiety every time you walk into school throughout the year?
Disruptive: Secondly, anxiety is disruptive. We can think of normal anxiety as helping us function effectively in life. With chronic anxiety, however, it may be doing the opposite. Feeling a little bit of anxiety before you meet a new group of friends is normal, but it becomes disruptive when you avoid talking to people and making friends all together for fear of rejection.
Distressing: Anxiety is distressing. Another way to differentiate between normal anxiety and chronic anxiety is how you feel. Are you extremely uncomfortable and distressed when you’re asked to do intimidating things like give an answer in class, demonstrate a drill in practice, or talk to a new person in your class?
Duration: And lastly, it’s important to consider the duration of the anxiety or worry. If you have felt anxiety for a long time, there’s a good chance you’re dealing with chronic anxiety. Even if you feel like your anxiety comes and goes depending on the day, an anxiety rollercoaster can still be chronic.

How Anxiety Works

If we think of anxiety in terms of the Worry Wheel, we have an anxious mind, anxious body, and anxious actions. When it comes to your anxious mind, certain thoughts get your Worry Wheel spinning fast. For example, thinking “I’m going to look stupid in practice today” or “What if the teacher calls on me and I don’t know the answer?” An anxious body often means a fast heart beat, sweating, queasiness or butterflies in your stomach, and shallow breathing.

Finally, anxious actions are when we act as a result of an anxious body or anxious mind. This might look like avoiding practice all together, going to the bathroom during class, or not talking to people we want to be friends with for fear of something bad happening. Anxious actions may feel like you’re dodging a bullet, but ultimately they keep the Worry Wheel spinning faster and faster.

Anxiety’s Impact

Anxiety can impact a lot of different areas of teenagers’ lives. Anxiety can affect everything from a teenager’s experience at school, their friendships and dating relationships, family dynamic, to the sport they play, their sleep, nutrition, and their job. Teenagers experiencing anxiety may have the desire to self-medicate with drugs and/or alcohol and potentially participate in self-harm. Every teen’s experience with anxiety is different, but for many, anxiety affects multiple domains of their life.

5 Coping Skills for Teenagers with Anxiety

Diaphragmatic Breathing (aka: belly breathing)

Picture your belly as a helium balloon with a string that runs up to your nose and mouth. Now, place one hand on your belly (below the rib cage) and one hand on your chest. Inhale through your nose for 3 counts (1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi, 3 Mississippi). Your belly should expand like a helium balloon as you inhale, while your chest remains still. Hold your breath for 3 counts. Then exhale through your mouth through pursed lips for 3 counts. Hold for 3 counts and repeat.

Grounding Exercises

There are many different grounding exercises that can help relieve anxiety. This one is called the 5 Senses Grounding Exercise because it involves using your 5 senses: sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. If you practice this consistently while feeling calm, it’s much easier to remember to use it when you’re anxious.

• Identify 5 things you see (windows, desks, carpet, lightbulb, book, cup, etc.)
• Identify 4 things you can hear (air conditioning, lawn mower, keyboard typing, etc.)
• Identify 3 things you can touch with your hands (your clothes, desk, hair, etc.)
• Identify 2 things you can smell (trees, paint, sweat, food, etc.)
• Identify 1 thing you can taste (drink, saliva, after-taste)

As you go through this exercise, count in your head or out loud as you focus on things around you.

If you want to learn about different grounding techniques, read about the Spiral Technique here.

Visualization

Visualization as a coping skill is exactly what it sounds like. To begin, close your eyes and visualize a calm place in your mind, whether it’s a real place or somewhere you’ve never been, try to visualize as many details about the place as you can. Maybe you hear waves crashing against the shore, birds chirping, or you hear someone you love calling your name. What can you touch nearby? Maybe it’s scratchy green grass, the bark of a tree, or salty water. Take a moment to relax and enjoy this place.

Now, what do you feel in your body? What sensations do you feel? Where do you feel them? Notice your muscles relaxing, your heart rate slowing down, and your breathing calming down.

Positive Self-Talk

Oftentimes, we believe the misconception that an event causes my anxiety. For example, my friend walked by in the hallway without saying hi, and that event made me anxious. In reality, there’s something that happens in between the event and the feeling of anxiety, and it is our self-talk–our thoughts. The A-B-C model helps spell this out. First, there’s the Activating Event (A) then the Belief (B) and finally the Consequence (C).

If we can learn to notice and challenge our automatic beliefs about an event or situation, we can change our resulting feeling about it. For example, if your friend blows you off in the hallway, a thought that would probably make you feel anxious would be “I did something to make her mad” or “She’s decided I’m a loser and not worth talking to.” On the other hand, if we challenge that thought with something like, “I wonder if something happened before school today to make her put her guard up” or “She may not have even seen me.” One set of thoughts will most likely lead to anxiety and avoidance of our friend, and the other may encourage us to check-in with her to see if she’s okay.

Schedule Worry Time

Sometimes, trying to control our anxious thoughts doesn’t work and we need to allow them to race for a minute. For this coping skill, try scheduling 10-20 minutes each day when you can worry. During this window of time, write down as many things you can think of that you’re anxious or worried about, and don’t filter yourself. Once this time is up, leave your anxiety and worry behind. As anxious thoughts come to you throughout the day, reserve them for your worry window and let them know you will listen to them during the allotted worry time.

 What Now?

Coping skills can certainly help relieve anxiety for teenagers, but it’s always a good idea to ask for help and support from other people. As easy as this sounds, there are many reasons you or a teenager you know may not reach out for help with anxiety. Some common reasons include believing the anxiety’s not that bad, not wanting to bother people, feeling embarrassed to admit anything, or thinking there’s no point. Heck, it’s anxiety provoking to think about telling someone you’re anxious!

If you’re a teen and you’re struggling to function because of your anxiety, reach out to an adult you trust. You could start by telling a peer if that feels less intimidating. Let them know you have something important to talk about and you would prefer if it stayed between you two. Then share how anxiety impacts you and that it has become a real problem in your life. You could add that it’s not something you can manage all on your own.

With the help of an adult, you may decide to seek out a therapist for extra support. This is a great step if you’re looking to manage your anxiety more effectively. Click this link to be matched with a therapist today! Learn more about what anxiety treatment goals look like in therapy on our website.