"We are Pelham" parent education series Kicks off with presentation on Anxiety

Parents and guardians flocked to Prospect Hill Elementary School last week to participate in the first “We Are Pelham” Parent Education event of the school year. This session, Supporting Your Child Through Anxiety: Tools for Building Resilience, was led by Lindsay Boudreau, MA, CAS, LPC and offered practical, easy-to-use strategies to help children manage anxiety and build confidence, including: 

• Validating children’s feeling
• Taking small steps toward challenging situations
• Celebrating effort and bravery rather than just outcomes.

View video of the presentation

The importance of honoring cultural differences in how children express worry was also discussed, reminding us that every child and family experience anxiety differently.

As a parent herself, the workshop hit on topics that were personal for Bourdreau and relevant for the audience of more than 50 Pelham parents/guardians from across the district. 

“I hate to see my daughter hurting,” Boudreau said. “I often jump to the rescue. I tell her, ‘I’m going to fix it.’ I’m sending messages about how it’s silly to be worried, but also that I can fix it, and she can’t. It’s an automatic response because I love my daughter and I don’t want her to feel any nervous discomfort. It makes the child's and the adult’s anxiety decrease in the short term. But when I always take over, that tells the child that the anxiety is real and that she doesn’t have the skills to go to school herself or to face the fear.”

Boudreau, a certified school psychologist and Licensed Professional Counselor, spoke about her experiences parenting and how it was necessary to break the vicious cycle of anxiety by letting children attempt tasks without support and for adults to help by providing guidance and praise without taking over. The workshop covered strategies like validation, coping ahead and gradual exposure, which can help provide children with assistance and alleviate anxiety without robbing them of the chance to develop skills and self-assurance.

Parents engaged in conversation about the topics presented and asked questions about the realistic application of strategies presented. One parent asked how they could make use of some of the more time-intensive strategies for helping children acclimate to dealing with discomfort when under time constraints.

“One thing to try is ‘coping ahead,’” Boudreau replied. “I would guess that this anxiety isn’t new. If a child regularly experiences anxiety about going to school, then we can sit down with them ahead of time and plan for it to happen. That way, when they start to feel that anxiety, there is already a plan in place for how to react. Maybe that plan is to take a break to color when that anxiety starts to set in, but as part of the planning, you can set a time limit. You don’t have 45 minutes to color in the morning or even 10 minutes, so you plan on five.”

Events like the Pelham Parent Education events provide parents a chance to talk, ask questions about other parents’ experiences and create better outcomes for their children. 

More about the Presenter:

Lindsay Boudreau, MA, CAS, LPC, is the Coordinator of Consultation Services and Continuing Education at Cognitive & Behavioral Consultants. Lindsay brings over a decade of experience supporting students, families and educators. She is intensively trained in DBT and CBT, has led school- and district-wide programs, and regularly provides parent workshops and staff training. Her work centers on helping children and families manage anxiety and strengthen social-emotional well-being.