When Your Child’s Seeking of Reassurance Becomes Excessive – 2 Keys for Parents (2024)

FAQs

What does it mean when a child needs constant reassurance? ›

Anxious children tend to require more and more reassurance over time to get the same soothing effect. It can easily become a compulsive behaviour. But children need to learn that they can comfort themselves without always relying on adult help. And this is a vital skill for healthy emotional development.

A persistent need for reassurance isn't caused by any one factor for every person, but at the heart of the behavior are often feelings of inadequacy and insecurity.

Return to not giving your child attention or reassurance if he or she starts asking you questions again. This strategy quickly teaches your child that reassurance will not be rewarded or answered by you, and that it is more beneficial not to repeatedly ask the same questions.

“Like many other mental health conditions, anxiety has an environmental as well as a genetic component. Studies show that kids whose parents struggle with anxiety are two to seven times more likely to develop an anxiety disorder themselves. But they do better when their parents' symptoms are under control.”

DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for dependent personality disorder

Difficulty making daily decisions without an excessive amount of advice and reassurance from others. Needing others to be responsible for the most important aspects of their life.

What type of person needs constant reassurance? Most people need reassurance once in a while, but people who have obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) tend to seek reassurance excessively. People with anxiety disorders or dependent personality disorder may also engage in excessive reassurance-seeking.

Is needing constant reassurance a red flag? Excessive reassurance-seeking may become a red flag in a relationship, especially when the partner carries emotional baggage from past trauma or has underlying psychological problems. However, professional support and a patient partner can help with such circ*mstances (4).

Kilduff explains that people with ROCD may seek constant reassurance from their partners in a way that may be construed as manipulative. For example, she explains, “They might say, 'I love you,' but what they're really doing is fishing for the 'I love you' back,” rather than directly asking the question.”

Reassurance seeking, a behavior or mental act aimed to clarify or verify something that is typically already known, emerges through an inability to tolerate uncertainty. It is particularly significant in obsessive-compulsive disorder, but it can be found throughout each of the anxiety disorders.

How to deal with an obsessive child? ›

Mom burnout sometimes called depleted mother syndrome, is the feeling of mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion, depersonalization, and lack of fulfillment caused by intense child care demands. Burnout is the result of too much stress and a lack of resources for coping with it.

Children with generalized anxiety disorder are 3.5 times more likely to have a mother with generalized anxiety disorder. Children with social anxiety disorder are almost 3 times more likely to have a father with anxiety disorder.

Repeated exposure to overly harsh and critical parenting may condition children to overreact to their mistakes, thereby increasing risk for anxiety disorders.

When a child is repeatedly given approval, they build up their sense of value. They eventually become confident in their internal sense of validation: they don't need outside approval because they can often validate and approve themselves.

There are many reasons kids seek attention: they're bored, tired, hungry, or in need of quality time with their parents. But the reasons your child acts this way aren't as important as learning how to respond when they do. Keep in mind that such attention-seeking behavior is normal.

Seeking reassurance mentally can look like:

Checking repeatedly in your head and trying to visualize if you turned off the oven or made your bed. Repeating “I am good” over and over in your head or out loud to counteract feeling bad. Reviewing past behaviors in one's mind mentally.

The four mindful steps are 1) Distinguish doubts or distress from true danger, 2) Embrace the feeling of uncertainty, 3) Avoid reassurance, and 4) Float above the feeling while letting time pass. These steps work independently of the content of the thoughts.