Melissa Garvey, LCSW. Over 18 years treating anxious teenage girls.
Most anxiety books only work for half of teenage girls.
There are two kinds of teenage anxiety, what I call Tourist anxiety and Roommate anxiety. Almost every book is written for one of them. If she has the other, nothing you have tried was ever going to work. It takes four minutes to find out which one she has.
English and Spanish. Printed in the United States.
Common scenarios parents tell me about
- She is fine at dinner, and by ten o’clock she is not.
- The homework has been finished for an hour and she is still sitting at the desk.
- She has stopped going to the thing she used to like, and she cannot tell you why.
- You ask her what is wrong and she says nothing, and she means it, because she does not know either.
- You have started reading her face at bedtime to work out what kind of night this is going to be.
None of that means you have missed something, and none of it means she is not trying. It means she has the kind of anxiety that does not answer to being told to calm down, and there is a reason for that.
The Tourist and the Roommate
I use one framework with every teenager I see: anxiety either passes through like a tourist, or it moves in like a roommate who will not leave.
The Tourist
It comes for a reason, and then it goes.
It turns up before the test, and it leaves once the test is over. It is uncomfortable, but it is doing its job.
Responds to: breathing, grounding, the 5-4-3-2-1 method.
The Roommate
It moves in, and it does not leave.
It is there on an ordinary day when nothing has gone wrong, and loudest once the house goes quiet. If you have told her to take a deep breath and watched nothing change, this is why.
Does not respond to: breathing, grounding, the 5-4-3-2-1 method. Responds to: thought defusion, cognitive restructuring, values-based action.
Three questions that will tell you which one she has
You can do this over dinner tonight without turning it into a conversation about anxiety. They are the same three questions I ask in a first appointment.
When does it show up?
Is something coming that she is dreading, or does it arrive on days when nothing is happening?
When does it stop?
Does it lift once the test is over, or is it still there on Saturday morning?
What happens at night?
This is the one that tells me the most. The Tourist usually lets her sleep. The Roommate gets louder once the house has gone quiet.
If she lands on the second option most of the time, it is the Roommate, and everything she has already tried was built for the other kind. What she needs is the set of tools built for that kind, which is exactly how the book is arranged.
What "Finding Your Calm" will teach you
Part 1. The Tourist
She will be able to bring a spike down while it is happening, before the test or the party, instead of figuring it out afterward.
Part 2. The Roommate
She will stop waiting for the anxiety to leave before she does anything, and start going to the things she wants while it is still there.
Part 3. The Sleep Showdown
She will be able to get herself back to sleep in the middle of the night, without needing you awake in the room with her.
Part 4. Living with It
She will have something to follow on the worst nights, and a plan in her own words that keeps working long after she has finished the book.
The workbook teaches her the skills. The planner makes her use them.
What early readers tell me
The first thing is almost never that she feels calmer. It is that she picked it up on her own, without being asked.
I really liked the weekly quotes and the technique of the month. They encouraged me and at the same time reminded me that I am building skills.
The check boxes and quick prompts make it easy to track my progress and set daily goals.
I walked in on my teen teaching her younger brother the 54321 grounding exercise one day. I am truly thankful for this resource.
Questions parents ask me
What if she will not use it?
She does not start at page one. She answers three questions, finds out which kind she is dealing with, and goes straight to the chapter that matches. There is no deadline on that. Some girls pick it up right away, and some need more time before they are ready. It will be there waiting when she is.
Is it too young for a fifteen-year-old?
It is written for girls between 13 and 18, and the reading level assumes high school rather than middle school. If you would rather judge the tone yourself, read the free sample.
How involved should I be?
Both ways work. Some girls want you reading it alongside them, and most would rather work through it alone and talk about parts of it later. The book names both options so that she picks one instead of quietly avoiding it.
Is this a substitute for therapy?
No, and I would not want you to treat it as one. These are the tools I teach in session, written down for the six months you might be waiting for an appointment.
When will it arrive, and what does shipping cost?
Both are printed in the United States and shipped by USPS with full tracking, and you will get email updates as it moves. The planner ships in 1 to 2 business days. The workbook is printed to order and ships in 3 to 4 business days. Order both together and they ship as one parcel on the workbook's schedule. Delivery takes another 3 to 5 business days.
Do I need both, or is the workbook enough?
The workbook is the whole method, so if the budget is tight, buy that on its own. The planner is the daily structure that keeps her using it past the second week, which is where most people quit.
Not ready to buy yet?
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