Asking some hard questions... about parenting anxiety

I've been pondering this week about the ways anxiety and PTSD have affected my family. In many ways, I actually don't know. We can see, to some extent, how it is impacting on my daughter who has the anxiety. But how has it affected my other children? and me?

There are nine years between my oldest and youngest child and it occurred to me, as I pondered, that she probably isn't even aware her older sister has anxiety. And even if she has heard that word, she would have an extremely limited understanding of what that means. I'm not sure she's seen her sister have a panic attack. She's probably unaware that some days, when her sister stays home from school, it's because she can't get out of bed. And she wouldn't understand why her sister struggles to deal with her when she's left in charge, and her other older sister has to take over caring for her. I guess at some point we'll have those conversations with her, but when? I really don't know.

And then there's my middle daughter. She has a terrific relationship with her older sister and is very aware of the part anxiety is playing in her life. She looks up to her sister. She is invited into her sister's world through mutual friendships at their youth group, often hanging out together, going on lunch dates, to the movies, and to evening church services. But then, when my middle daughter's teachers tell me she has had incidents at school that look like panic attacks, it begs the question - is she experiencing her own struggles with mental health (after all, it often runs in families, and even more so follows same-gender siblings) or is she just learning to cope with the world around her in the same way her older sister does? I really don't know.

And then there's me. How has having a daughter with anxiety affected me? It is difficult to say. How much of the changes that have happened in my life have been a result of this greater level of need to love and support her, which takes time and effort and resources, and how much has it been because I'm so much busier now. I feel like I don't have time and energy to care for people outside my own family like I used to. I can't remember the last time I cooked another meal for a family in need. I can barely remember the last time we had people over for dinner. Some days I feel like I can barely keep up with the medical appointments and the need to have my children at home so they can recover from their days, let alone work and study and writing and cooking and shopping and laundry and and and... And yet God calls us to love and care for others. I used to do that - does God remember?

Perhaps I need to remember that is just for a season. It could be a few years. It could be ten. And actually, it doesn't matter.