With a month or less of summer left, it’s time to start thinking about school again. So here’s a question worth asking: how can you set your child up for a better year than last time? A lot of what came up last year can actually be addressed now, before it starts again. I look at ways to make learning easier, treat ADD/ADHD, anxiety, and depression naturally without jumping straight to medication, and build a plan to boost immune health so your child misses fewer days to colds and flu this season.
Signs Your Child or Teen Is Under Stress
According to the American Psychological Association, stress in kids doesn’t always look like stress — often, they can’t recognize or say what’s going on. Watch for irritability or moodiness, pulling away from activities they used to enjoy, repeated worrying, more complaints about school than usual, crying, surprising fearful reactions, clinginess with a parent or teacher, sleeping too much or too little, or eating too much or too little.
With teens, it’s normal to lean more on friends and less on you — that’s part of growing up. But significantly avoiding you, dropping long-time friends for a completely new group, or showing excessive hostility toward family can signal real stress underneath. Not every behavior change means something’s wrong, but a real shift in behavior almost always means something is.
Signs of ADD/ADHD
ADHD involves attention difficulties plus hyperactivity; ADD involves attention difficulties plus inattentiveness. Both are common in kids, and both can carry into adulthood.
Kids with ADD/ADHD often struggle behaviorally and academically, while teens and adults may be forgetful and disorganized. What’s driving it varies a lot — it could be inflammation from infections, food or environmental allergies, cranial bone misalignment, or neurotransmitter imbalances. Blood and urine testing can help pinpoint what’s actually going on, which makes building an effective treatment plan much more precise.
Common ADD/ADHD symptoms:
- Switching tasks frequently
- Difficulty focusing on one task
- Trouble concentrating
- Impatience
- Excess energy, inability to sit still
- Trouble following instructions
- Impulsive behavior
Signs of Anxiety
Everyone feels anxious sometimes, but for some kids, it goes well beyond occasional nervousness. In younger children, anxiety often shows up as resistance to separation, excessive worry, nightmares, restricted activity, or meltdowns.
The first step toward real treatment is figuring out what’s actually causing it. Urine testing for neurotransmitter levels can reveal a lot about how the nervous system is functioning and interacting with the rest of the body, and we can evaluate the immune system too, to check for inflammation or other underlying triggers. Once we know what’s driving the anxiety, we can build a treatment plan around your child specifically.
Anxiety symptoms in teens:
- Worry and/or fear
- Racing heart
- Feelings of panic
- Trouble sleeping
- Obsessive thoughts
- Avoiding social situations
Anxiety symptoms in children:
- Resistance to separation
- Excessive worry
- Frequent nightmares
- Obsessive thoughts
- Self-restricted activity
Signs of Depression
Many people with depression end up on antidepressant medication, which works by changing brain signaling through neurotransmitters. Testing neurotransmitter levels can help determine whether medication is actually necessary, guide which class would work best, and track how well it’s working if your child is already on one.
As with anxiety, we look at the nervous system’s function and interaction with the rest of the body, along with the immune system, to find the real root causes of depression. Once we understand the biochemistry behind it, we can build a plan tailored to your child.
Depression symptoms in teens:
- Apathy
- Complaints of pain — headaches, stomachaches, low back pain, fatigue
- Difficulty concentrating or making decisions
- Excessive or inappropriate guilt
- Irresponsible behavior — forgetting obligations, being late, skipping school
- Loss of interest in food, or compulsive overeating, leading to rapid weight change
- Memory problems
- Preoccupation with death and dying
- Rebellious behavior
- Sadness, anxiety, or hopelessness
- Staying up at night and sleeping during the day
- A sudden drop in grades
- Alcohol or drug use, or promiscuous sexual activity
- Withdrawal from friends
Depression symptoms in children:
- Persistent sadness or irritability
- Low self-esteem — statements like “I’m bad,” “I’m stupid,” or “No one likes me”
- Loss of interest in activities they used to enjoy
- Appetite changes, either direction
- Sleep changes, either direction
- Difficulty concentrating
- Anger and rage
- Headaches, stomachaches, or other pains with no clear cause
- Becoming noticeably more lethargic or more hyperactive
- Recurring thoughts of death or suicide
If your child is expressing thoughts of death or suicide, please treat this as urgent — reach out to their doctor right away, or contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (call or text 988) for immediate support.
Let’s Figure Out What’s Really Going On
If you suspect your child or teen is dealing with any of these issues, please reach out. Contact me today to schedule an appointment — we’ll test for the specific underlying causes and build a natural plan that supports both their physical and mental health. There are many natural options to try before turning to medication, and as a naturopathic doctor, I’m also trained to recognize when pharmaceutical support is genuinely needed, in which case I’ll connect you with a qualified psychiatrist.
— Dr. Faith Christensen