Are you a concerned parent? Is your child struggling at school? Have you considered that it may in fact be anxiety that they are struggling with?
Anxiety is a major problem within society and whilst it remains a relatively new or unresolved topic for most of us in South Africa the statistics coming out of the US are staggering. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the US, impacting an estimated one in eight children.
Left untreated, childhood anxiety can result in poor school performance, poor social functioning, and even substance abuse. None of this is unique to the US, all you have to do is speak to teachers in our communities to understand that the very same problems are being faced here in South Africa.
There are a number of symptoms consistent with anxiety disorders that can interfere with ones learning. Studies have found that anxious individuals find it difficult to avoid distractions and require more time to turn their attention from one task to the next.In fact, anxious children and adolescents are often considered “inattentive” because they appear off-task within the classroom setting. A worried brain is a distracted brain.
Keep an eye out for these symptoms of anxiety that can negatively affect your child’s ability to learn:
- Difficulty focusing or mind going blank
- Fatigue from sleep disturbance
- Feeling restless or on edge
- Irritability (sometimes referred to as “acting out”)
- Fear of talking in front of a group
- Fear of scrutiny or judgment
- Difficulty separating from care givers
- Avoidance behaviors
- Tantrums or meltdowns
- Panic attacks
- Excessive worry.
In many cases anxiety disorders are generally treated with psychotherapy, medication (such as Ritalin), or a combination of the two, many people opt to forgo these standard approaches and self-treat with products like CBD oil.
We’re not telling you that this is a miracle cure, even if we believed that whole-heartedly we wouldn’t be allowed to so instead we want you to know a little more about how it works so that you can make that decision yourself.
How does CBD work and why is OK for kids? What CBD does do is that it feeds your cannabinoid system. Your cannabinoid system is responsible for many things such as regulating your mood – things such as anxiety, depression, regulating your sleeping patterns, regulating pain sensations, balancing out your metabolism and enhancing your immune system and the piece that is alwasy worth repeating about CBD is that it is poly-pharmacological which means that it effects all of these pathways at the same time.
We recently read a survey published in 2018, which showed that almost 62 percent of cannabidiol users reported that they used CBD to treat a medical condition, with the top three conditions being pain, anxiety, and depression which is great news for parents whose children suffer from these increasingly common symptoms.
As with most “holistic” remedies, much of the research is still being done around exactly why this is the case. Research suggests that in addition to impacting the endocannabinoid system, cannabidiol may influence receptors involved in the modulation of serotonin (a chemical messenger thought to play a role in anxiety regulation).
We for one, are completely sold on the benefits from taking CBD oil daily but its up to you to decide if it works for you!