Is It College Stress or Something More? A Parent's Guide to Supporting Your Teen's Wellbeing Senior Year
College prep is stressful for your teenager and you. Applications, essays, test scores, tuition, leaving home: the year before college strains even the most grounded kids. But how can you tell what’s normal stress and what’s something more? Learn how to spot the difference.
The Stress of College Prep
College prep is one of the most common triggers for stress in teenagers, because it's full of big, important choices that will shape their next four years, if not beyond. It's also often the first time teens are faced with making choices that really matter.
It's normal to worry about deadlines, standardized test scores, and one of the biggest decisions they have faced so far. But when that worry becomes constant, overwhelming, or begins to interfere with daily life, it may be a sign that your teen is experiencing an anxiety disorder or would benefit from additional support.
Normal Stress vs. Anxiety
Stress is situation-specific and is an appropriate response to a challenging problem or experience. Stress typically decreases or resolves once the situation has passed.
Anxiety can be related to a specific situation or be free-floating, which means the anxious feelings are not attached to one particular thing. Anxiety may persist even after the stressor has passed, especially if it has developed into an anxiety disorder. So if the SATs are over and their applications are finished but your teen is still feeling overwhelmed and worried, it could be more than just stress.
Many of the symptoms of anxiety are the same as those of stress — the difference is duration and whether there's still an external trigger.
If your teen is consistently and persistently experiencing any of the following signs or symptoms, they might have anxiety:
- Feeling panicked or a sense of impending doom
- Feeling nervous, tense, or restless
- Increased heart rate and/or hyperventilation
- Difficulty concentrating on anything other than what they're worried about
- Difficulty controlling their worry
- Difficulty sleeping
- Sweating and/or trembling
- Feeling tired or weak
- Stomach upset
- Actively avoiding things that trigger their worry
This is not a comprehensive list or a diagnostic tool. If your teen's symptoms are persistent, cause significant distress, or interfere with their ability to function at school, at home, or in relationships, consider seeking support from a mental health professional.
What You Can Do to Help
If you see your teen getting overwhelmed with anxiety, you might feel helpless. But there are some simple things you can do to lighten their load.
Talk to them
We all know that teenagers aren't the best communicators. But if you make a safe space for them to share their feelings, they'll be more likely to confide in you.
Start by asking questions. And not just, “How was your day?” Be curious about the stressors in their lives. But at the same time, you don't want to come off as nagging. Focus on their experiences rather than tasks.
Ask open-ended questions — those are questions that can't be answered with just “yes” or “no.” Specific questions also let them know that you're paying attention and care about what they're doing and how they're feeling.
Make it clear that you won't judge them for answering honestly. You're not checking up on their progress, you're checking in on their mental health.
You could say:
- “What's been the hardest thing about writing that essay?”
- “Which part of this process has been stressing you out the most?”
- “What's something I can do to help take some of the weight off your shoulders?”
Giving your teen the chance to talk about their worries reminds them that they don't have to face them alone.
Offer your help
While you can't complete the admissions process for them, there are certainly tasks that you can take on to help your teenager as they manage their anxiety around college prep.
If you know they are trying to get in under the wire for an application, tell them they don't have to do their regular chores until they finish. This gives them some breathing room and lets them know that you recognize how hard they're working.
If your teen is stressed about keeping track of deadlines, help them set up a calendar system that alerts them when a deadline is approaching. This way, they have more headspace to devote to the things they need to accomplish rather than obsessing about due dates.
Set up a designated check-in time. Once a week, have a sit-down conversation with your teen where you celebrate what they've accomplished, ask about what they're struggling with, and come up with an actionable plan to tackle what they've got to do next.
Design a schedule
Helping your teen stay organized is a great way to manage anxiety. This changes the perspective: instead of having every single thing they have to get done floating over their head at all times, nailing down tasks and determining a specific time to get those tasks finished creates a visible timeline and sets attainable goals.
“Having a timeline with somewhat flexible deadlines keeps everyone on the same page with less parental nagging and keeps the procrastination at bay,” explains Anita Doddi, a counselor with Collegewise, a college admissions counseling service. “It's hard to write well and edit when the essay is due in less than a day or in less than an hour! Having a thoughtful, intentional, and realistic process will help everyone be happy in the end. Parents and students will know they did their best and didn't miss any key milestones or parts of the process.”
When You and Your Teen Need Professional Support
If you've noticed that your teen is worried all the time, having panic attacks, or having trouble functioning in school or at home — including falling behind on schoolwork, withdrawing from friends and family, and feeling “stuck” in the face of everything they need to do — it might be time to talk to a mental health professional.
A therapist can provide realistic, practical support for a teen experiencing anxiety around college prep. Your teenager's therapist can work with them to identify the negative thoughts that may be contributing to or maintaining their anxiety, come up with healthy responses to those thoughts, and develop a plan to change the way your teen reacts to the thoughts.
For example: If your teen is caught in a trap of recurring thoughts about failure (“I'm never going to finish all these applications,” “I won't get in anywhere”), a therapist can help your teen:
- Understand the flaw in their thinking — in this case, identifying their black-and-white, “all-or-nothing” approach when the situation is actually much more nuanced.
- Build their confidence — pointing out the things in their life they've already accomplished that are similar to what they need to do now.
- Come up with a different response — consciously recognizing your teen's thoughts of failure and purposefully redirecting them with a mantra like “I have done things like this before so I know I can do them now.”
- Change their behavior based on their new response — instead of giving up, your teen identifies one small part of one task that they can achieve next, thereby breaking the work into manageable pieces and challenging the debilitating anxiety response.
Collegewise has college prep experts who can take the wind out of your teenager's anxiety sails. Working with a therapist and an admissions counselor can help anxious teens manage their feelings, persevere through challenges, and solve the problems that are plaguing them as they — and you — maneuver the college admissions process.
