Transcript: Teenage anxiety

Damon Cooper

Welcome to Let's Ask Better Questions, the podcast where we discuss hot school topics for parents. I'm Damon Cooper, Director of Teaching and Learning at Central Coast Grammar School, and around the table today we have Dr. Kylie McIntyre, School Psychologist, Jacki Lynch, Deputy head of the Middle School, responsible for wellbeing, Keith Mills, a Middle School House Coordinator working in wellbeing, and two students, Ruby and Talon, who will share their experiences. 

So teenage anxiety, catch phrase or crisis. What do you think Jacki? Is there an increase in wellbeing issues in the early years of high school or are we just talking about it more?

Jacki Lynch

Certainly, we're seeing that become more of an issue on our table as opposed to more traditional aspects such as social media issues and behavioural issues. We're seeing more issues centred around school avoidance, which is often an indicator for a child who's experiencing anxiety, and certainly working a lot more in that space, not only with children but with their families.

Damon Cooper

Kylie, what is anxiety and what are some of the symptoms that sufferers experience?

Kylie McIntyre

Anxiety is a broad, I guess umbrella term if you like and underneath the term anxiety sits a range of different clinical disorders. As a psychologist we diagnose anxiety in young people and in adults when an excessive amount of worrying has become a problem for that particular person. These worries can manifest in different ways and they can take different types or forms if you like. Typically in my job I tend to see young people experiencing worries either forecasting into the future, so they're predicting something catastrophic in their future, or they're ruminating on something happening in their past, but that's the approach that I see a lot of the times with young people in my office. 

Damon Cooper

What sort of issues are you seeing and how have they changed over the last few years?

Kylie McIntyre

For me as a psychologist, certainly anxiety and depression are the two biggest that I would see and work with. It has in my experience increased over the last 10 years in terms of presentation. It's hard to pull out whether that is an increase in terms of a systemic problem within society or if it's just something that we're becoming more and more familiar with and more able to access and support at a school level as well.

Damon Cooper

What are some of the early signs that parents should be looking out for Jacki?

Jacki Lynch

I think one of the tell-tale signs is school avoidance. That's definitely a precursor to a child who's experiencing a lot of social anxiety. I also think disengagement within the school community, so if children aren't connecting with opportunities that are on offer at the school, that can also be a tell-tale sign that they're experiencing some sort of angst, be it mental health or wellbeing issues.

Kylie McIntyre

I think further to that, parents are in a really amazing position to recognize what their child's normal looks like and when their child's normal changes is when there's possibly some concerns that are underlying for that young person and the parents can reach out for help in a range of different places. They can certainly contact their school and their school is always going to be well versed in being able to put that parent or family in touch with school-based supports or in other cases externally based supports. Parents can also go to their local GP as well for help, if they're worried about those signs, that a child is not quite themselves and as Jacki said nicely, it's a change in their engagement at school, but it might also be a change in perhaps their sleeping patterns at home. Perhaps the way they're eating at home as well. They maybe avoiding food or eating too much.

Also their socialization. So, are they withdrawing from family-based activities as well as school based activities? So, I think parents are a really great position to notice those things for the young people.

Jacki Lynch

I think it's really important that when parents do notice these symptoms that they pick up the phone straight away and say, look, I'm noticing this, I'm feeling this, where are you at and what can we do to work together to unpack this a little bit more and see if we're on the same page? And if we are, if we do have similar concerns, what can we do and what measures can we put in place to start moving that forward?

Keith Mills

Yeah, Jacki, I absolutely agree. I think that we are still living in a society where anything to do with mental health is still stigmatized a little bit and I think a lot of parents commonly think, do you know what? If as soon as I raise this, it becomes a thing and then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. But I think that there's nothing wrong with ever just making a phone call and just saying, hey, I've just started noticing something different. I'd just like to flag it with you.

And it may be nothing and you know half the time maybe it does come to nothing, but it just means that there are extra sets of eyes on your child.

Kylie McIntyre

Most of the time too, Keith, we know that for adults who experienced a mental health diagnosis, for most of those adults, those symptoms started to emerge at around those early adolescent ages. So, at around about age 14 we're seeing symptoms emerge and that's when the parents are in a really good position and certainly the school's in a really good position to get some support structures in place to support mental health.

Jacki Lynch

And I think those key transition phases in a child's life, particularly moving from say a junior school or year six into year seven, we know that that change period is where increases in anxiety and other situations come into play, because it's such a change to their world, and that's where we really need to keep that communication open.

Damon Cooper

Keith, how effective are children that you work with in recognizing warning signs in themselves and in their friends?
I think a lot better than they were say five years ago. I think that the profile of wellbeing, mental health, anxiety, these sort of interconnected issues, has very much been raised in Australia by different organizations and by schools themselves. And I think it is becoming much more okay to talk about it amongst boys and amongst girls. I know that within our school we have those conversations with the kids, and we know that they're having the conversations as well with each other. So, I think kids are, full credit to today's young people, getting better at being able to do that. But they're also able to identify different resources, whether that be inside school or outside of school, particularly digital resources like ReachOut for example, where they can go to get some help.

Jacki Lynch

I mean, as recently as yesterday, the Australian Mission youth survey came out for 2019 and that's where young people recognise that the top issue across Australia was mental health. 

Interestingly enough though too, that survey does point to the fact that most children, 60% of students, actually feel really comfortable and positive about their mental health and comfortable with knowing who they can speak to in situations when they are feeling low and needing extra support. So even though we're talking about anxiety, mental health, wellbeing, the actual statistics that are out there today are saying that our young people are well connected and feel quite positive about their future.

Kylie McIntyre

One of things I really like about Central Coast Grammar School is that the peers are often able to identify concerns with even their friends and because of the support structures within the schooling system, and certainly with our House Coordinators here at Central Coast Grammar School, we’re able to have peers go to adults and say, I'm worried about my friend for these particular reasons. And that happens on a very regular basis at our school and it enables us to put in place support structures fairly quickly for that young person.

Jacki Lynch

I think as parents it's really important to understand that if your child does disclose something to you that is concerning, I always put it to the children that, if it's around safety, we have to tell an adult. We have to tell a trusted adult how we're feeling, what we're seeing, what we've heard. It could be through social media at 11 o'clock at night, it could be on the weekend where teachers aren't accessible. But if it's around safety, then we encourage parents and other educators within our context to tell our students and our kids that it has to be spoken to a trusted adult. And I think that message is getting out there and I think we need to reinforce that at home that there is no discussion there, we need to pass that information on.

Damon Cooper

As it should be, wellbeing is a key focus area in most schools. 

Jacki Lynch

If our kids are happy and safe, they will do well. So, we're doing a lot of good work in this space and there's still a lot of work to do. But certainly, at the end of the day we want to build a future for our kids that is positive and hopeful for the future.

Keith Mills

I think it comes down to equipping kids to be resilient so they can be resilient adults. And I think these are the years where they will learn those formative skills, habits, abilities, to not only be able to look out for themselves, but to be able to look out for other people. I think that's a bit counter-cultural, we're in a bit of a ‘me’ society where it's like, okay, where am I going and what am I doing? And everyone has their head down and thinking, okay, what is my agenda?

But I think when we have conversations like this within schools around wellbeing, it allows people to actually look up and look around for other people. Look at your friends, look at your peers, who is it that is not okay? Who is it that might just need that question, are you okay? Or is there something that you want to talk about? 

Damon Cooper

Jacki, you mentioned earlier the student voice is such an important part in wellbeing. Why is that?

Jacki Lynch

I think because they have a vested interest in it, and I mean it's their wellbeing. It's the systems and the environments that they're working in. So understandably, they would have a very clear and purposeful voice around what works and what doesn't and what's important to them and what's not. And we as adults sometimes make the assumption that we know, but they absolutely know. And I think it's time that we listened to those voices, that we hear what they’re saying. And that we take positive action to show them that their voice is recognised, and it is encouraged, and it is meaningful, and it does have a direct impact on the future generation of children in our society.

Keith Mills

I think that if we are able to help them find their voice, that this will not only increase their resilience, but it will allow them later in life to be able to talk about whatever it is that really is central to their own wellbeing, which I think is one of the most important skills that you could learn within a school environment.

Damon Cooper

Jacki, you mentioned before peer support and mentoring. Why is that such a powerful tool? 

Jacki Lynch

Kids are sometimes the best educators of other kids. I think they have experienced it first-hand, they've experienced it in the current world, and they have talked a lot with their peers around that. And what I've experienced from the programs that we've run at our school is that they absolutely want to give back. And they want to pass on their wisdom, and they want to pass on their experiences and share their thoughts and share their ideas and strategies with younger children. Because they're passionate about making their world better. And I think that's a really beautiful thing that's happening, when you've got kids passionately wanting to give back to other kids and make their world better.

Jacki Lynch

Talon and Ruby recently participated in a group mentoring session between Year 9 and Year 7, but we also had some Year 11 students provide their voice to our Year 9 students. Can you tell us what your experience was with that process that we went through? 

Ruby

I feel like the biggest positive was I felt closer to the girls in my group. A lot of them I had only, I guess, really said hi to in the playground. I wasn't really close to a lot of them, but I definitely, after this program, I felt more comfortable with them. I felt like I could say, "Hi, how's your day going?" And yeah, we really did come together as a group. 

Talon

I thought, particularly in my group, we found out that our issues aren't just the ones that we individually suffer from. Everyone collectively, we kind of realised we're not alone with these issues. Everyone has them. And so having those conversations about mental health will kind of normalize the issues and allow people that are truly suffering from them to recognise help that is available at school and at other platforms as well.

Keith Mills

And you used some of this knowledge, guys, and did some work with Year 7, girls obviously working with the girls, the older boys working with the younger boys. Talon, do you want to tell me a little bit about what you were doing with them and what you hope to achieve by working with the Year 7 students?

Talon

Working with the Year 7 students was really helpful, not only for them, but for me as well because I could pass on my knowledge on the stuff I went through in Year 7, and they can kind of recognize that and relate to it a bit more. And I really wish when I was in Year 7, I had the same platform because it would've helped me a lot with even just dealing with assessments or dealing with different friendship changes. Especially in Year 7, you're the youngest people in the school, so you are struggling with it and you don't know who to connect with. But knowing that other people went through the same challenges and came out bigger and better is really helpful, I guess.

Yeah. I think for the boys we kind of have our own struggles that we go through. So, as you go through puberty, you start getting more masculine and then you always want to prove yourself. So, if that's through banter and then that can go too far, or you try and be too tough. 

Ruby

Yeah, and I also think social media plays a big part because that's really when a lot of the year group and a lot of your friends start to really get into social media. And so that new introduction of internet sharing and social networking sites really does impact the way that you see yourself in school, as well as at home, behind a screen, and the interactions that you have with people definitely differ from at school and on the internet.

Jacki Lynch

So, if you were to give some advice to parents and other people within our community about how to assist young people with their mental health and wellbeing, what might that be?

Ruby

I think the first step to that is definitely try and look into a lot of maybe the cultural things and the social things that your child is surrounded with and what they're going through, because obviously there's a big generational gap with, especially technology. We, me and Talon, being in Year 9 we've grown up with technology and modern technology, and that has really influenced the way that we live our lives and how we view a lot of things. I know when my parents say, "Oh, we were once your age," yes, you may experience the same issues, but whether those issues translate the same way is questionable, because obviously you're living in a different time and there are so many different factors today that weren't around back then that really change how there's certain issues that are present in our age group.

Talon

Yeah. For especially students our age, we are starting to get jobs, we have building up of assignments, our assignments are becoming more valued sort of thing as we get closer to the HSC. And on top of that we also have external pressures from social media and friends and changing friendship groups. And then parental pressures, as well, as we start becoming more and more moody from stuff. Our parents are going to dislike us more, I guess, and I think that's more of the time to be more understanding of what the child's going through and how they are coping with it because every child copes with it differently.

Jacki Lynch

Do you know who to ask for help, if you were needing help?

Ruby

Definitely, my first go-to is my friends. I'm very lucky to have a very close-knit friend group that we're able to comfortably and confidently share our problems with. Obviously if there is a bigger scale problem, I do feel quite comfortable talking to any of the teachers at school. I guess, in a sense it is harder to talk to your parents sometimes because you've been with them your whole life. They were the first people that you've ever seen, and sometimes it can get a little hard to talk to them and confront them about some of the issues that you may be facing, and it's a lot easier to talk to friends or teachers who you don't really have that deeply personal connection with.

Talon

I feel like, for me, personally, I have a couple of friends that we openly talk about and you know you're not going to be bullied about it or made jokes upon it. And I feel like there's a lot of the teachers, especially the teachers that ran the wellbeing sessions, that students look up to and feel extremely comfortable to go up and talk to about personal issues. And even in those wellbeing groups when we had our own personal reflections, for me, I felt really comfortable talking about my problems and how together we can all come together and help each other out. I think that's really helpful. 

Keith Mills

I think it's really positive that the statistics indicate that a lot of people are healthy, a lot of people are talking, that young people are identifying how important wellbeing is to them. What do you guys think communities can do to support this journey towards better wellbeing?

Talon

Especially at our school, we have those opportunities with production, or we have sport or with other extracurricular activities. There are always those options to connect with your friends outside social media or in the playground and I think those activities are what really boost your self-worth and your friendship groups for example. Especially at camp, even though guys were separated as groups, you form connections with those people that kind of bond you together much more, rather than just talking online or just talking in the playground. I think those little activities are what boost you a bit more.

Jacki Lynch

Thank you Talon and thank you Ruby. I think you're a testament to the fine young people that are going to be our future generation. We really appreciate your openness, your honesty, and the passion that you have for making the next generation of young people as positive as it can be. Thank you.

Damon Cooper

At Central Coast Grammar School, we’ve been doing a lot of work on our wellbeing strategy. Can you tell us a little bit about our journey?

Jacki Lynch

So, over the last few years we've had a real focus on our wellbeing approach at our particular school and we've collaborated with a fabulous team of wellbeing staff who are passionate about improving the wellbeing of children and young people. Part of our journey has been around developing a framework that talks to a consistent language of what wellbeing is, our future direction, where we want to head in terms of the wellbeing space, so that we're all working from the same page. And I think that was really important.

From that, we have developed a scope and sequences to look at how wellbeing is implemented from Kindergarten right through to Year 12 and how that is sequential in nature and builds social, emotional learning. It's protective and preventative in its approach. I think also we're now moving into a phase where we're looking at how do we action wellbeing more practically day to day in the school context. And one of the big key finds for us was that we wanted our wellbeing approach to not just be about student wellbeing, that it was about families, it was about community, it was about staff, and it was about students. So, we're really on this journey of trying to look out for the wellbeing of all our stakeholders and that's something that we're very passionate about.

Damon Cooper

For our listeners who are starting to think about wellbeing, what are some of the things they can do?

Kylie McIntyre

We know that suicide currently is the leading cause of death amongst young people, so it is a real concern. That said, it's only a small number of people that are at that pointy end. So, if you're worried about your child or your young person, there are lots of places that you can go for help. We've mentioned some fabulous online resources that parents can also access, places such as Reachout.com, Black Dog Institute, Youth Beyond Blue are all really fabulous websites that you can just have a look at.  

Jacki Lynch

We're in a partnership here. We're all here because we care about your child. So, communicate with the school, ask for help. We may not be able to give you all the answers on the spot, but certainly we have the resources to direct you and your child in the right place. Everyone, in my opinion, is a teacher of wellbeing, so it's not isolated to particular people within a school context. Every staff member is a teacher of wellbeing. So, whoever you feel most comfortable talking to, I would suggest you pick up the phone and have a conversation.

There might be a whole other list of things going on for your child and by putting two people together from two different contexts, we put the puzzle together. Once we see that puzzle come together, we can actually do some positive work around moving that forward in terms of their wellbeing. So, communicate with your school, communicate with your child’s teachers, talk to them openly and honestly about how you're feeling.

Damon Cooper

Thanks very much for your time today, Kylie, Jacki, Keith, and our fabulous students, Ruby and Talon. Thank you for listening to this episode of Let's Ask Better Questions. You can find links to some of the resources mentioned today on our website and never miss an episode by subscribing or by heading to our website at ccgs.nsw.edu.au.

 

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