No parent wants to sit back and watch their child experience anxiety over any situation, whether it’s going to a new dance school, a football game, trying new food or meeting new kids at school.

And while most parents have the best intentions, many actually come to their child’s rescue during moments of distress – which can be hugely detrimental to their child now and as they grow up, therapists told HuffPost.

The best way to help your child grow through anxiety and learn to manage it isn’t exactly a natural instinct. Here’s what to know:

“I think, in particular with anxiety … the biggest mistake that we make as parents is that when we see anxiety in our kids, we jump straight into that ‘I want to protect this child from this experience.’ So, we go straight to protection mode,” said Cheryl Donaldson, a licensed marriage and family therapist.

Parents don’t want their kids to feel anxiety, of course, but swooping in to take them out of an anxious situation or fix it for them isn’t a way to empower kids, Donaldson noted. It’s actually doing the opposite.

Research suggests that accommodating anxiety makes it worse, said Hannah Scheuer, a licensed clinical social worker with Self Space in Washington state.

“I’m both a child and family therapist and a mom, and I’m just gonna say that watching our child struggle and suffer is one of the hardest things,” Scheuer said. “And if we accommodate and give in, we will make it worse. Accommodation is essentially allowing avoidance, and avoidance feels really, really good in the moment, even to adults.”

For instance, if your teenager is anxious about driving on the highway, avoiding it when teaching them to drive only makes the experience scarier and more stressful when they eventually have to do it.

“It just makes it worse and worse, it leads to long-term negative outcomes,” Scheuer said. “That accommodation, that saying, ‘Oh no, you don’t have to do this thing that you’re upset about or scared of,’ it does temporarily alleviate that child’s distress. Then, what it reinforces is this perception that the thing that they don’t want to do actually warrants their anxiety, and so that gives them more reason to feel the anxiety.”

“Anxiety is our body’s mechanism to tell us that we either need to act in some way … or, in the case of kids, anxiety is telling them, ‘This is a new skill I need. This is a new experience. I need more skills. I need to know how to manage this,’” Donaldson said.

Supporting children through anxious moments takes a three-fold approach, said Laura Buscemi, a licensed professional counsellor at Thriveworks in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

“We have to validate, we have to regulate and we have to mitigate,” she said.

Validation looks like normalising the anxiety and sharing that it’s something we all experience, Buscemi said. Regulation means helping your child learn to manage their anxiety through a variety of solutions, like breathing exercises and movement. Mitigation helps a child understand that temporary discomfort, such as facing the situation that makes them anxious, leads to long-term relief.

“Facing fears ultimately decreases them – and we prove to ourselves that things aren’t as scary as we’ve built up in our mind, or that maybe we’re just braver than it was scary,” Buscemi said.

“The research evidence does also show that what we need to do as parents is to provide support and confidence,” Scheuer noted. “What that looks like is supporting and validating the feelings while also showing confidence in their child’s ability to actually do the thing to cope with the anxiety.”

For example, if your child gets really anxious about going to football practice and has meltdowns in the car on the way to practice, a parent could say, “Wow, I hear you. I know you’re feeling really scared and upset right now, but I also know that you can do really hard things and you’re going to be OK,” Scheuer suggested.

“It’s that mix of validation of the feeling, without accommodating the anxiety and providing confidence that they can do it,” Scheuer explained. This one sentence isn’t going to erase your child’s anxiety and stop the meltdown, but as this encouragement comes up week after week, soccer will feel less and less hard for your child.

“And continuing to inspire that confidence … is going to really make a big impact, and that’s how we build resilient kids,” Scheuer said.

Many parents will be able to manage their kids’ anxiety through different calming and exposure techniques, but some kids (and parents) may require additional support from a mental health professional – and that’s perfectly OK.

There are certain signs that a child’s anxiety requires support from a therapist or other professional.

“If the anxiety is getting in the way of them being able to be in a relationship with other kids, go to a friend’s house … being able to go to practices and do different things, you want to reach out for help,” Donaldson said.

If you notice your child frequently worrying or frequently in distress, those are also red flags.

“Also, with younger kids, they don’t really have the language to talk about anxiety, so sometimes we see it as like more physical symptoms,” Scheuer noted. This includes stomachaches, having trouble sleeping, and general restlessness.

“That is something that I would say, if that’s pretty common, maybe they need some extra support,” Scheuer said.

If therapy or counselling isn’t accessible, your child’s school should have a social worker or school counsellor who can provide support, Scheuer said. Talking to your paediatrician could also be a good idea.

Managing anxiety in kids often involves the parents, especially if the kids are younger.

“So, it’s not just saying, ‘Oh, fix the kid’s symptoms.’ It’s also … what strategies can we give to the parents to help really make sure that everybody has the tools to help this kid navigate these symptoms?” Scheuer said.

It’s also on the parents to consider how they react to anxious moments in their lives. Think about it: if mum or dad doesn’t know how to manage their own anxiety, they likely won’t be able to help their child, either.

Ask yourself what you feel when your child gets anxious. Does it make you anxious, too? If so, what do you do to calm down?

“Leading with your own leadership” is an important way to go about this, according to Donaldson. If you know deep breathing helps you feel less anxious, gently guide your child toward that. Or, if you know that getting out for a walk reduces your anxiety, gently encourage your child to try it.

“You want them to know that you’re partnering, that you have answers that are going to be really helpful for them,” Donaldson said.

If other techniques and interventions don’t work, “sometimes the kids need to go on medication,” Donaldson noted.

Watching your child experience anxiety isn’t a pleasant experience for anyone, but it helps build life skills and confidence that are tough to grow later in life. The ability to live with discomfort and manage anxiety is important throughout the lifespan, as someone takes a big test, gets their first job, experiences their first break-up, faces job rejection and more.

“I really like to emphasise with my clients that we’re trying to push through temporary discomfort to achieve long-term relief,” Buscemi said.

An Easter staple, hot cross buns are believed to date back to 1361.

Some say their precursor, called Alban buns, was invented by a monk called Brother Thomas Rocliffe at St Alban’s Abbey. He is said to have given them to the poor on Good Friday.

They’re slightly different to the ones we know and love today – the cross on top was cut into the bun, rather than placed on top with a flour mixture – but they still contained spices, fruit, and yeasted dough.

Given their possible religious past, then, perhaps it’s not surprising that some think hot cross buns allude to more of the events of Easter than just the obvious cross.

The cross on top of the buns may have been placed on buns like Brother Roclliffe’s to allude to Jesus’ crucifix (Good Friday being “the day of the cross”).

But according to historian of food Dr Eleanor Barnett, hot cross buns weren’t really eaten as we know them now until the 18th century.

She also says not everyone agrees that they came from Brother Rocliffe: some think the origins date back to Ancient Greek crossed bread, while others think it has to do with Passover.

Nonetheless, Dr Barnett writes, the traditional ingredients are still “laden” with religious symbolism: “The bread is a nod to the Communion wafer, the spices represent the spices Christ was wrapped in in his tomb, and the cross is of course a reference to his crucifixion”.

Whatever their origin, they’ve proven somewhat divisive in the past. For instance, Queen Elizabeth I tried to tightly control the sale of buns because they looked a little too “Catholic” and “superstitious” for her taste.

“Perhaps they were associated with the blessed and crossed buns distributed by some Catholic churches on Good Friday, which were made from the same dough as the holy Eucharistic bread,” English Heritage shared.

Later, some believed that crumbling hot cross buns into water could cure them from illness. Victorian people would swap hot cross buns on Good Friday, saying, “Half for you and half for me, between us two good luck shall be”.

Others thought it could calm their stomachs, protect them from evil, keep pests away from grains, and never go mouldy.

Writing for The Conversation, historian Darius von Guttner Sporzynski said: “Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Poles, Romans, Saxons, medieval monks and 18th-century street sellers all had their versions of spiced, crossed bread. Each group gave the buns its own meaning, from honouring gods to celebrating Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection.”

We often hear the phrase: you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. It’s a useful way to think about therapy.

Therapy has enormous value. I believe in it both personally and professionally. It can offer insight, structure, and a safe space to explore difficult feelings, their origins, and what might be possible in the future. I say that as someone who has spent years training and working as a psychotherapist, and as someone who has also sat in the therapy room myself.

But something has been bothering me for some time now.

Therapy asks a great deal of the person in front of us. It asks them to take what is explored in a 50-minute session and carry it into the complexity of everyday life.

To notice thoughts in real time, reflect on feelings, and apply strategies when emotions are already running high. This relies on metacognition – the ability to think about one’s own thinking, to pause, reflect, and respond rather than react.

That is demanding for many adults. And even more so for children. Sometimes extremely hard.

In recent years, therapy – or long waiting lists for therapy – has become a default response to children experiencing anxiety, ADHD, ASD (autism), and emotional regulation difficulties. Yet many families reach the same point after weeks or months of sessions: why is nothing changing?

The answer is rarely that therapy “works” or “doesn’t work”. It is that there is often a mismatch between what therapy requires and what children are developmentally able to do.

Children are still learning how to identify and express emotions. They are developing the ability to link cause and effect, to reflect on behaviour, and to pause before reacting. They live in the moment, whereas therapy often asks them to step out of the moment, reflect on it, and apply that understanding later.

This is not resistance. It is development.

Even approaches such as cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which can be highly effective, rely on a child being able to notice, question, and shift their own thinking patterns. These are not simple skills – they are still under construction for many young people, and continue developing well into adolescence and early adulthood.

Short-term interventions can add another layer of difficulty. A child may be introduced to helpful ideas or strategies, but then expected to carry and apply them independently in real-life moments. For many children – particularly those with ADHD and autism – that is where the process breaks down.

And so we are left with an important question: are we sometimes placing too much emphasis on the therapy room itself?

When a child is struggling, it is easy for the narrative to centre on what is “wrong” within them. But in many cases, the difficulty sits in the interaction between the child and their environment. A busy classroom. A rushed morning routine. Sensory overload. Expectations that do not match how a child processes the world.

These are not background details, they are that person’s world.

So, rather than asking how to fix the child, we might begin to ask how to better support the environment around them – and how therapeutic ideas might be applied not just in sessions, but in everyday life.

This is where caregivers become central. And it can feel like an uncomfortable shift. Many parents are already stretched beyond capacity, and the idea that they hold so much influence can feel like added pressure. But it is also where the greatest opportunity lies.

Caregivers are present in the moments that matter most: the school run, the transition home, the moments of overwhelm, the recovery after distress. The ordinary, repeated experiences where emotional patterns are shaped and reshaped.

No 50-minute session can replicate that. What children often need is not just insight. They need practice. And not occasional practice, but supported, repeated, calm practice.

One way to understand this is through a “seed planting” approach.

In therapy, a child may be introduced to a strategy – perhaps breathing techniques, emotional labelling, or identifying what is within their control. But understanding a strategy is only the beginning.

For it to become useful, it must be revisited and practised in calm, safe moments. This is when the brain is most able to encode and store new learning. Over time, repetition builds pathways that make those strategies more accessible when stress rises.

Without this, expecting a child to use a strategy in the middle of distress is often unrealistic.

A simple analogy may help. Imagine standing in a large field and being asked to find your way to a specific point. The grass is long, the path unclear, and obstacles are hidden. It feels overwhelming.

Now imagine that same field, but this time a path has been cut through the grass. There are signposts along the way. A map has been drawn. Hazards have been identified and managed.

The destination is the same, but the experience is entirely different. Preparation changes what is possible.

Children need that preparation – not once, not in crisis, but over time, through repetition and relationship. These pathways are not built in a single session. They are built in daily life.

This is where the conversation around therapy becomes more nuanced.

It is not that therapy does not work (for areas such as attachment and relational trauma, it can be profoundly important, and I have seen this firsthand in my work in school settings), it is that therapy alone is often not enough.

For many children, particularly those who are neurodivergent, meaningful change happens when therapeutic ideas are woven into everyday life – when they are supported consistently, adapted to developmental stage, and held by the adults who are present day in, day out.

In that sense, the most effective support often happens outside the therapy room.

The challenge is not to abandon therapy, but to reimagine its role. To see it as one part of a wider system of support. And to recognise that the people best placed to bring that system to life are already there: caregivers.

For families navigating neurodiversity, anxiety, and emotional regulation difficulties, this shift can be powerful. It moves the focus away from whether a child is “failing” to engage with therapy, and towards how we can better support them to learn in a way that fits their development, their environment, and their needs.

This is why my practice has changed. I rarely see children directly in clinic now. Instead, I work with parents – equipping them with therapeutic tools that can be planted, practised, and nurtured over time. Tools that help them provide daily scaffolding in both calm and challenging moments.

Because children are not failing to use the tools they are given. More often, they are still learning how.

Psychotherapist Gee Eltringham is the founder of the parental care platform for ADHD families, twigged.