How to Help an Anxious Child: A Conversation with Dr Debra Kissen

If you’re looking for guidance on how to help an anxious child, this episode of Don’t Get a Therapist Yet is for you. Host Wendy Castelino sits down with Dr Debra Kissen, clinical psychologist, anxiety specialist, author, and founder of Light On Anxiety Treatment Centers, for a practical, honest conversation about supporting children and teenagers through anxiety, panic attacks, school refusal, and social fear.

About the Guest

Dr Debra Kissen is the CEO and founder of Light On Anxiety Treatment Centers, which she built from a one-person practice into a network of over ten locations with more than 100 clinicians, offering therapy, medication management, and testing services. She has co-authored several books on anxiety, including titles on panic disorder, parental anxiety, intrusive thoughts and OCD, and rewiring the anxious teen brain — as well as a recent book aimed at helping younger children play their way past anxiety.

What This Episode Covers

This conversation is aimed at parents, carers, and educators who want to understand how to help an anxious child without accidentally making things harder. Topics include:

• Telling the difference between normal childhood stress and an anxiety disorder
• Recognising anxiety when it shows up as irritability, anger, or shutting down rather than obvious fear
• School refusal, and why Dr Kissen treats it as a mental health emergency rather than bad behaviour
• What to say, and what to avoid saying, to a child in the middle of an anxious moment
• Panic attacks in children and teens, and how understanding the biology behind them reduces their power
• Social anxiety and the fear of judgement, and how gradual exposure helps teens build real confidence
• Why constant reassurance can backfire, and when it actually helps
• Managing parental guilt around a child’s anxiety
• Practical strategies for anxiety and worry at bedtime

Why It’s Worth Listening To

Parents searching for how to help an anxious child are often met with generic advice. This episode goes further, offering specific, clinically grounded guidance for the situations parents actually face — the school-refusal morning, the slammed door, the 2am panic attack — from someone who has spent over a decade specialising in exactly this.

Listen or Watch

Don’t Get a Therapist Yet, hosted by Wendy Castelino.
Guest: Dr Debra Kissen, Light On Anxiety Treatment Centers — lightonanxiety.com

Episode timestamps:
00:00 Intro & Meet Dr Debra Kissen
01:25 Anxiety Treatment & Support
02:08 Books for Parents & Teens
04:35 Anxiety or Normal Behaviour?
09:14 Stress vs Anxiety Disorder
13:03 School Refusal Explained
17:40 Helping an Anxious Child
22:16 Anxiety, Anger & Emotions
28:30 Panic Attacks in Children
34:07 Why Reassurance Backfires
38:12 Social Anxiety in Teens
46:13 When Children Stop Talking
48:49 Parent Guilt & Anxiety
52:29 Night Anxiety & Sleep Tips
56:27 Final Advice for Parents

Connect with Dr Debra Kissen

Want to go deeper on how to help an anxious child? Dr Debra Kissen’s books, worksheets, and treatment centre information are all available below:

• 🌐 Light On Anxiety — lightonanxiety.com/about-us/meet-dr-debra-kissen
• 📘 The Anxiety Busting Workbook for Kids — Fun CBT activities to squash fears and worries
• 📘 Overcoming Parental Anxiety — Rewire your brain to worry less and enjoy parenting more
• 📘 Rewire Your Anxious Brain for Teens — See all of Dr Kissen’s books

Related Resources on This Site

Looking for more support on how to help an anxious child, or with your own stress and anxiety as a parent?

• 📥 The Calming Effect — Wendy’s free guide for worry, panic attacks, and phobias
• 📥 Exam Stress — top tips for teens and adults managing exam-related anxiety
• 📥 12 Easy Steps to Overcome Stress, Anxiety & Overwhelm — Wendy’s eBook for parents juggling it all
• 🎙️ More episodes of Don’t Get a Therapist Yet
• 📝 Read more on the blog