Anxiety!
According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (http://www.adaa.org/) there are about 40 million adults in the United States living with anxiety. I am one of those 40 Million and I am pretty sure that my son will be one of those as well. Anxiety can be very mild but it can also be to the point where it consumes your entire being.
I want to preface this post with the fact that my son has never formally been diagnosed with anxiety but he is only 5 years old. That being said we know that I have been diagnosed with sever anxiety, this became fully apparent as I was dealing with my Ulcerative Colitis diagnosis and my ileostomy surgery. Often times I see so much of myself in Jude and his behaviors. The downfall to all of this is that you can see Jude getting anxious in many situations and that just sends my anxiety into a downward spiral as well and I am still learning to handle this.
I was so proud of him this weekend and all of the things that he was able to accomplish despite his anxiety. Jude has been in Tae Kwon Do for quite some time now and has been doing pretty well. Just recently they moved him up to a more advanced class. In this class he is the youngest one in his class, and this has been a struggle for him. Also if you have ever met my son he likes to talk all the time, I know there are many parents who say this, but seriously the child never stops talking.
This weekend he had to complete his first testing in his higher level class. This made me anxious because its a TEST. That word in and of itself causes anxiety. The class went through all the pieces that he was going to be tested on and it was a lot of information. They told us that he had to complete the first 14 moves of a form by himself. This was something I was very concerned that he was not going to be able to complete. He had to know the form as well as piece them together and complete them in sequence . This also was going to be done in front of many other students and parents.
We practiced many times and worked very hard. Despite all the preparation you could see the anxiety building and it all came out on Friday. I had been out on a business trip and when I returned I asked him if he wanted to practice because we had to make sure we were ready and out came the tears. He was so nervous and anxious the only way he could express it was having multiple huge tantrums. I honestly had my doubts and was worried that he wasn't going to move up.
With all of that being said though we woke up Saturday morning and went to his testing. We were one of the first ones there and did a couple of run-throughs and then came the moment that he was out there on the floor and he was in control of how everything went. I was a wreck, I was nervous, and I was horribly anxious. Jude however stepped up to the plate went out there and KILLED IT! He went out with his class and stepped up to the challenge and completed every move. I was so proud of him. I cannot express how excited I was to see him succeed. He worked hard and was able to control his brain as we describe it and succeeded. I hope that this is the first of many successes for him, however I know that all of his successes are going to come with many challenges but we will work through it and I know we will learn from each other. There are many more celebratory Slurpees to come!
Here he is with his new belt and our Slurpee! I am so proud of you Jude!
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