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strategies for anxious/crying 5 yo - cycling

18 replies

delurking85 · 27/07/2014 12:44

Really hoping some grounded parents can help me parent better. DD is a physically active, well coordinated, happy, able 5.5yo.

however she is tentative and teary about new things. It seems to be a combo of not wanting to get things wrong, a sort of physical terror (often about personal space being invaded like hairdressers/dentists), and being afraid somebody will 'beat' her or say they have been better than her. I'm all for her expressing anxiety (i've seen the impact on adults who were expected to be stoic) but i don't think my current strategies are doing well!

Today I just spent a painful hour this cycling through the park to drop her at the pool to swim with DH. She requested to take her bike - I was going to walk with her there with my bike, then nip back to do chores, but she wanted to join in. All good. It is a max 10min cycle ride, a few small hills.

We haven't cycled as often as we could have, and i am keen that she starts to get better so we can cycle to school together, have fun doing exercise as a family etc (i am quite unfit and don't want to be). She's still on stabilisers. All her schoolfriends cycle really well.

She normally has a little meltdown on leaving the house on her bike cos she's scared of the hill, and I thought I'd cracked that by just riding it out as she usually starts enjoying herself after a while. (I gave her the option of going back and leaving her bike at that point. She refused.)

NOT today. good god she literally screamed with tears rolling down her face about one thing or another the whole way - it's difficult, i'm too hot, i scraped myself, i'm scared about going too fast, scared about other cyclists zipping past. I ended up pushing her on her bike, plus my bike, the whole frigging way. It took 50 mins. I tried being patient, lots of praise, jollying her along, telling her she'd be able to cycle with/like her friends if she kept trying, finding answers to her anxieties (that just bred new ever more outlandish concerns), in the end found myself saying 'ok we'll never go cycling again' and 'shall we just leave your bike here then, but someone will probably steal it' (there was nowhere to leave the bike or i would have!) which finally stopped her but i hate threatening like that… She understands and accepts the concepts of trying and practising.

I'm so sad and frustrated! I'd love us to be out on our bikes together! We're never going to get there without a bit of practice, today is one of the reasons we get so little. I realise that I have helped create this anxious behaviour in her somehow, so no need to tell me this. But Please give me some new strategies to help us both! Helping her feel more robust will help us in so many other areas too...

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boomoohoo · 27/07/2014 15:32

Hi op, I don't have any advice I'm afraid as my (almost) 5yr old dd is just the same, scared of trying anything new, to the point of trembling meltdown.

My latest battle is water; she can't swim and is scared of the water, scared of going out of her depth even with me or her dad holding her and with armbands, scared of the tide coming in at the beach.. I am thinking I might just not pander to her fears anymore and make her go in..! Not with any emotion, just very straightforwardly 'this is what's going to happen'.

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funnyossity · 27/07/2014 15:39

You haven't created her anxious nature, there are aspects of her personality that are innate.

One of mine is fussy like this and although I recognise it as the way I was about new things and learning new skills I still get wound up about it (which as you know doesn't help!) So first off my sympathies.

With regards bike riding we put it on the back burner and got him a mini scooter that he thought was cool. He got into cycling the summer he was 7, cracked it in a week. (A month earlier he'd said he was never going to ride a bike as he didn't need to!) Stabilisers can be hard to ride with anyway.

Maintaining a calm aura seems to be the best thing; I still fail in this regularly.. Also I did start cutting short some of his "Yes but then this could happen.." spiralling concerns as I felt it was a negative spiral of worry iyswim. This was the opposite of my first child who would be satisfied and bolstered with reassurance - lots of reassurance just seems to make my second expand his worry horizon!

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funnyossity · 27/07/2014 15:44

boomoohoo please don't force it.

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OnaPromise · 27/07/2014 15:45

I was also going to suggest leave the cycling for the moment. My dd has only managed cycling this year and is a year older than yours. We tried it last year but it was a no go. Same with swimming. She has friends who have been doing all this for ages, but hey ho, DD is probably more confident about other things than they are.

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BertieBotts · 27/07/2014 15:47

Mine is the same! Sorry no advice - DH is much better than me though as I just get frustrated like your story in the OP. I don't know what it is that DH does but he's enthusiastic, sort of jokey, bouncy, he doesn't get overly involved in DS' worries like I do, he doesn't invest a lot emotionally into it (actually suspect this might be key). But even that isn't enough sometimes. With bike riding DS is still at the stage where he wants someone to run along behind him holding on but we're nowhere near being able to stealth let go because as soon as he notices you're not holding on he has a screaming, sobbing tantrum/strop where he falls off on purpose and then insists that it's "all your fault because I can't do it on my oooooown"

Have you tried removing the pedals? That's what I want to do but can't figure out how to do it on his bike.

Will follow for tips on general encouraging them to do any frigging thing. He's always been the same, he walked accidentally at 10 months but would not even consider doing so on purpose until 16 months. Sixteen months! All other babies had been walking for ages! Potty training was a nightmare as well.

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affafantoosh · 27/07/2014 15:53

DS was like that about cycling at that age. He's 7 now and while he's not the most adept he's got huge confidence.

At 5.5 he couldn't go down big slides at the park. The other day he dragged me down a log flume, with me just about in tears of panic while he whooped all the way Grin

Make sure she gets plenty of sleep. Praise effort, not achievement. Talk about it at times when there's no pressure - tell her how proud you are of her achievements, however small, and point out that she achieved them with persistence and practice. Bedtime is a good time to leave her with thoughts like this. "Remember when you couldn't do x, and now you are so good at it and you enjoy it so much, isn't it wonderful that you worked so hard and now it's easy and fun".

Have you thought about binning the stabilisers in favour of a balance bike? She'd probably become more confident more quickly because stabilisers make it much more difficult to balance and they make the bike heavy and cumbersome.

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OutragedFromLeeds · 27/07/2014 16:00

I would get her a balance bike. They're much easier to ride than a bike with stabilisers. Make bike riding an activity in itself, only go when you have the time and patience to do it properly. Cycling when you actually need to get somewhere is too stressful and probably adding to any anxiety she has.

In general I would stop making an issue of things. If it's something she insists on doing, like with the bike, then she needs to get on with it. A bit of fear is ok, but the constant whining and crying and screaming is ridiculous. Don't pander to it. If it's something you've asked/told her to do, unless it's essential, just leave it. If she doesn't want to go to the hairdressers leave it for a while, at some point she'll grow out of it. Save the fight for things that really matter.

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BertieBotts · 27/07/2014 17:23

You can't get a balance bike for a 5yo, they don't make them that big, but taking the pedals off achieves exactly the same aim.

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BertieBotts · 27/07/2014 17:26

True Outraged, but if she is anything like my DS it gets to a point where it is ridiculous and just needs doing. We had to bribe DS quite heavily to agree to a 5-point-programme to cope with having his hair washed because he was so terrified that we just barely ever did it. He's fine now because it wasn't that he wasn't developmentally ready, he was just scared, and the fear was becoming this big overwhelming issue which was far outweighing what was actually likely to happen.

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affafantoosh · 27/07/2014 20:27

You can get bigger balance bikes, LikeaBike and GoGlider do them that I know of. As you say, removing the pedals is just the same but many of these kids are learning to ride on huge heavy Apollo monstrosities which make it really difficult. So in some cases a lighter balance bike might be better.

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Theyaremysunshine · 27/07/2014 20:56

I very much doubt she's doing it on purpose, she perhaps just can't cope with her anxieties. DS is a worrier too. He's much better when we back off and with swimming, he is actually fine with an instructor but anxious with us.

Is it worth trying a few books together about worrying, such as this or this?

TBH i do think pushing when a child is honestly frightened (even if logically they shouldn't be) could cause all sorts of long term issues. I'm not a fan of forcing through. DH tried that with DS and swimming and we're still undoing the damage.

Pedals off/balance bike are good ideas. DS has just gone direct from balance bike to pedal with no stabilisers. Took him 2 attempts which is no doubt due to the balance bike.

It's an expensive option but would you consider a tagalong to improve her confidence?

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affafantoosh · 27/07/2014 21:24
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GoogleyEyes · 27/07/2014 21:32

Dd1 can be like this. Knowing the plan helps, as does staying calm and trying not to talk too much. I find this hard!

In the end, I find she does do stuff, but it's after some of her friends manage it. And I've come to the conclusion that I shouldn't worry so much about it, as she does get there. It just takes a few more goes for her to be confident enough to try, and it's more about managing my frustration than it is about her.

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OutragedFromLeeds · 27/07/2014 23:35

Bertie I'm just suggesting that the OP differentiate between things that need doing (e.g. having a bath or going to the dentist) and things that don't (e.g. the hairdresser or going down a big slide). Save the five point plan and bribery for the things that really matter.

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BertieBotts · 28/07/2014 09:26

Oh yes, I know, I totally get that. And if it's truly non essential then no problem. But I would say that going to the hairdresser is essential eventually.

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delurking85 · 28/07/2014 15:29

Wow, thank you to everybody for your kind comments and advice which has come in since I last checked the thread.

i'm going to check out the links/books, and I think the idea of not cycling when we need to get somewhere is a very good one. It has really helped just hearing that others are in the same situation and they do eventually get through it. I'll have a think about a balance bike altho tbh not sure we can afford one, so may have to revert to a bigger scooter and just retry cycling another time. Your comments have also made me think that maybe I rush into things too much too soon for DD (eg, thinking about the goal or cycling to school and that putting too much pressure on something she's still tentative about…) and that might be a pattern that is exacerbating her anxieties.

She is anxious. And I just have to live with that and stop wishing she wasn't! I guess I wish so much she could be more robust than I felt as a child and still feel; when you see kids that brush things off with sublime confidence and motor through things, it's hard not to want that for your child but for sure the way i am going about things now is not going to make that happen…

Thanks all.

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BertieBotts · 28/07/2014 16:18

Delurking, you can turn the bike you have into a balance bike for no cost at all by removing the pedals. You may also have to lower the seat - for a balance bike their feet need to be flat on the floor. Then put them back on when she wants them on.

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OldBeanbagz · 28/07/2014 16:52

How about going out a few times with her on a Trail Gator. That way she'll get a bit more confident being on the bike without worrying about how to steer or even pedal?

My DH took DS out on one from being 4 years old and he's a lot more confident in traffic (now that he's on his own bike) than his sister who started cycling later.

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