Footer Davis Probably Is Crazy by Susan Vaught: A story addressing mental health, specifically anxiety. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky: Covers mental health issues, trauma, and adolescence. Meh by Deborah Malcolm: Discusses depression Tough Guys (Have Feelings Too) by Keith Negley: Helps young boys understand that they can express emotions. Cory Stories: A Kid’s Book About Living With ADHD by Jeanne Kraus: In short statements and vignettes, Cory describes what it’s like to have ADHD. What to Do When You Worry Too Much: A Kid’s Guide to Overcoming Anxiety by Dawn Huebner: A self-help workbook guides children and parents through the cogni- tive-behavioral techniques most often used in the treatment of anxiety. Finding Perfect by Elly Swartz: 12-year-old Molly Nathan struggles with undiagnosed OCD as she navigates middle school friendships. Don’t Call Me Crazy by Kelly Jensen: An anthology that opens conversation on mental health. Anger Is a Gift by Mark Oshiro: Covers anxi- ety and panic attacks.
A way to use social media for learning good emotional and social communication is FaceTime. She says a lot of research around FaceTime shows it being an effective tool for social emotional learning when kids interact with a loved one. They can see their actions, their reactions, and they can hear words. While they can get that from mom and dad, they can also get through the app. WAYS TO HELP Teaching language, modeling behavior, and understanding why a child is acting the way they are is a great way to start helping boys learn to express their emotions. Re- sponding to a feeling without endorsing the behavior is also a way to help grow language. “I can see you’re really upset. I’m not going to let you hit me, and I want to understand what happened.” To help a child learn language, especially emotional language, Dr. Lucker says it’s important to have parents mirror things such as talking about feelings or working through feelings. “It’s okay for a parent to cry in front of their child,” Dr. Lucker emphasizes. “If their child sees that their parent is crying, this creates an opportunity to talk about it.”
Dr. Lucker. It is okay to model feelings and emotions. She explains that you can model strength and vulnerability at the same time, and they can coexist together. If a boy is older, say elementary, middle, and high school, and a parent is still noticing patterns of irritability, disrupted relationships at home, at school, they can’t hold a friend, they’re withdrawn—that’s when Dr. Lucker says it might be time to consider going to see a therapist. A lot of times, irritability, lashing out, and anxiety can be driven by underlying mental health diagnoses. “Especially ADHD oftentimes really comes out in middle school because in elementary school, they’re the class clown, they’re hyper, but they can kind of get through it. In middle school, when the academics are more de- manding, that’s when really specific learning disorders are becoming more apparent. That’s when we’re figuring out maybe this is the underlying factor of what’s driving that avoidance, that anxiety, or that irritability,” says Dr. Lucker. 10 BOOKS TO START THE CONVERSATION Superpowered: Transform Anxiety into Courage, Confidence, and Resilience by Dr. Renee Jain & Dr. Shefali Tsabary: A non-fiction guide for dealing with anxiety.
Boys need to see adults handling sadness and disappointment without shame, says
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