When My Worries Get Too Big!: A Relaxation Book for Children Who Live With Anxiety Paperback – May 1, 2006

I use this book and worksheets I created to go with it to help students with self-awareness and self-regulation - not just students with autism spectrum disorder! Any elementary student can benefit! The author also has a manual with worksheets on a disk for printing. I now have 2 copies of When My Worries Get Too Big because I've used it so much with individual students, small groups, and even whole classrooms from preschool through 4th grade. It's so easy to integrate into your current classroom management system and helps students understand their own anxieties and to know that other people experience the same feelings. We use the book to help discuss positive and constructive ways to deal with feelings.

One of my daughters struggles with managing her emotions. When her father and I started the process of divorcing, I picked this book up and added to my twins' bookshelf. When I received this book, I was initially disappointed by its simplicity. My daughters were in kindergarten, but reading at a 3rd grade level; I thought that the presentation of the book would be too simple to hold the interest of the one with anxiety challenges. Boy, was I wrong.At age 5, she read through the book from cover to cover. She didn't end up doing any of the drawing activities in the book, but she couldn't stop talking about the levels of emotion the book presented. She came up with a long list of situations in which she felt a "1" (was happy and calm), a '3' (was agitated and starting to lose control) and a '5' (felt like she had no control at all over her feelings or her body).We still deal with her feelings of anger, frustrated perfectionism, and feeling misunderstood. This book has helped, though. The other day, she picked some wildflowers (weed blossoms) and placed them in a cup on the windowsill. No fewer than 3 times, our cat pulled the flowers out the cup, and strewed them across the floor. My daughter because extremely frustrated with the cat. She lectured her to no avail and then, without prompting, retrieved this book from the bookshelf, read it all the way through, and then picked up a blanket and retired to her room with another book. No tears. No yelling.NOTE: Neither of my children are on the autism spectrum. They are also academically precocious, socially competent, and generally happy and outgoing. One of them gets into what I call "worry spirals" where a small concern balloons into full panic.

THis book was a big help to my 7 year old who has Anxiety. His therapist uses the same techniques as the book so it really goes hand in hand with what she is working on with him and she reviewed the book as well and thought it was very well written and useful and will be recommending it to some of her other patients. This is easy for a younger child to help identify triggers and what to do to help themselves through their anxiety and fears. My son really enjoyed the parts that he could draw in his own pictures and answer the questions. Very interactive and helpful I would recommend this book to anyone whos child is going through anxiety or fears.

My son has a lot of anxiety. This book is an easy to use format that helps us work through his worries together. When I see him starting to have a lot of anxiety, we pull this out and read it. It helps calm him down and helps him make sense of the world.

I bought this for my 5-year-old son, and I thought he would throw it across the room, because he often rejects my attempts at "talking through" his anger. But he was fascinated and seemed quite relieved to have been given a strategy to help himself. He often speaks in terms of feeling like a "5" or a "3". It is, for me, a helpful context for understanding his moods. That night, after we first worked through the book, he wrote me a picture and a card saying, "Thank you, Mama. I love the book." I am now about to check out some of the other books by this author. Although these books are published by the "autism- asberger" society, or some such organization, I think it is invaluable for any child who struggles with feelings that feel too big...

Bought to help 5-year daughter with more than usual general fears. Has some good tips (see below*) but seems to mostly be geared toward anxiety that is expressed with aggression. VERY simple, quick read, though most of book meant for kids to do themselves. So there may be an issue depending on the education level of your child and their emotional maturity. Also, we didn't want to show it our daughter because we worried that some of the pictures and descriptions would make her feel worse about herself and/or think something is REALLY wrong with her. We aren't at that degree of anxiety. So be aware that this is for kids with very high levels of anxiety and aggression. *So to sum up what we got from it: Teach your child to calm themselves when feeling anxious and/or afraid. They can do this by thinking of fun and peaceful things they love (ex. events from a recent vacation they enjoyed, being with their favorite pet, happy moments with parents, etc). Take 3 deep breaths, counting to 10 with each inhale and slowly exhaling. They sit, eyes closed while they rub their laps with their hands. And for us, the 3 of us openly praying to God with her (she REALLY like that). Each time she feels brave when her anxiety starts up, she makes a shooting sound. She shot the devil. In fact, I think those of us adults who have heightened anxieties and fears should do the same things to help us. Though as adults you might want to keep the shooting sounds to yourself when in public. Who knows what type of attention that'll bring to you. ;-)