Anxiety at School

Question: We are noticing increasing physical behaviors at school (throwing things, climbing, and pushing). These behaviors are incredibly rare at home. We are up to date on all specialist visits and have not noticed signs of pain or discomfort. We suspect our child may be experiencing anxiety at school. We have seen indications of anxiety at home and have our child working with a play-based psychologist outside of school and are on a waitlist to get a neuropsych eval. We also have recently received a secondary diagnosis of central auditory processing disorder and know that his processing challenges are not yet being fully supported at school. We are wondering if it is worthwhile to look into anxiety medicines at this stage or if we should wait till we can get the neuropsych eval. Is 8 too young for anxiety medicines? And are there any particular medications you would recommend for a child that work well with mild CdLS (missense NIPBL mutation)? Thanks so much!

Answer: For a young child with developmental disability such as CdLS, anxiety medications are prone to be less effective and cause more side effects. The evaluation as well possibly looking into behavior therapy for anxiety would be important first steps. If an SSRI is used, would consider low dose Celexa (liquid form). Finally, If the anxiety is mostly or only at school, would consider that a behavioral issue and not as responsive to medication.

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