HELP! MY TEEN IS STRUGGLING WITH ANXIETY by David Murray for Core Christianity
A God-Centered Approach
After many months of battling anxiety, Pam had taken an overdose of pain medication and was rushed to hospital. Thankfully it wasn’t a fatal dose, and the next day she was transferred to a mental health unit for teens.
A week or so later, Pam returned home to her still-shocked parents. Pam’s attempted suicide had rocked them to the core and left them in the rubble of confusion, anger, fear, helplessness, and despair. They had attended some seminars for parents at the mental health unit while Pam was there and returned home with lots of leaflets and booklets, but they didn’t really know where to start. They called me and asked if I would meet with them. As they looked at me and then at Pam, their faces said, “We don’t know what to think, we don’t know what to say, and we don’t know what to do.”
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I’ve been in similar situations in different homes and with different parents. Most of them were really good homes and really good parents. Their kids went to really good schools and really good churches. But they were all in really bad situations.
“Friends,” I appealed, “we’ve got to stop looking at ourselves or at one another. We have to look to God. He knows what to think, he knows what to say, and he knows what to do.”
Everyone relaxed a little, I prayed for the Lord’s help, and started to reorient us all in a God-centered approach to recovering from this blow. While grateful for all the interventions and instructions from mental health professionals over the previous week, both Pam and her parents also needed a God-centered approach for long-term recovery. I therefore walked them through three truths that I’ve found helpful to parents and their kids through these times.
