Back-to-School Anxiety: Expert Advice from Austin Therapy for Girls
Turning Jitters into Glitters
We just finished our last Glow Girl camp for all the incoming 6th graders entering middle school for the first time. It brought back a lot of memories of that age for me — picture this: frizzy hair from a perm gone wrong, braces, and the biggest glasses you’ve ever seen (not the cool, chic ones of today — the thick-rimmed kind). My self-esteem was at an all-time low, and all I wanted was to find my people after a bestie breakup the summer before 6th grade.
Today, we all sit on our pink couches and give advice to girls feeling anxious about heading back to school. Just waking up in the morning is a hard transition from summer sleeping in and late-night binge-watching. Lucky for you, we have the best therapists in Austin for helping girls navigate this big transition. We’ve gathered the forces to share our best advice for heading back to school.
From Shayna
I’ll go first, because this is my jam. I’m Shayna, Owner of Austin Therapy for Girls. Transitions to middle school, high school, and especially college are what I spend most of my time on in July, August, and September.
Since most of my clients are transitioning to high school or college, here’s my advice: don’t let what happened last year creep into this year. The past is the past, and the present is — well, as corny as it sounds — present.
One activity we do on my pink couch is pick a word of the year. We also do this on New Year’s Eve, but switching from summer to a new school year is actually a bigger transition than the clock changing. Your word of the year sets the tone for the year ahead. In our Glow Girl camp, a lot of girls pick the word “friendship,” because let’s face it — not having the right friends can be a one-way ticket to Anxietyville. Some choose “courage” or “brave,” and the cool thing is, once you have your word, it can guide what you want to create. Some of my college students pick “change,” because embracing change instead of pushing it away can be a great way to start the year off.
Want to learn more about Shayna?
👉 Meet Shayna Barksdale, LCSW-S
From Michelle
I’ve been an elementary school counselor for over 30 years, currently at Eanes Elementary, and I’m also a mom to two kids who made it through middle school and are now thriving adults. Middle school is one of the trickiest stretches of adolescence — walking into a huge new building, and especially into that cafeteria, can feel like one of the biggest challenges a kid has faced yet. Here are a few pieces of advice that might help as we parent through these years.
- Expect some rockiness — it doesn’t mean something’s wrong. Middle school hits right as her brain is going through a major developmental shift. Self-consciousness spikes, emotions feel bigger, and things that seemed simple before (walking into the cafeteria) can suddenly feel high-stakes. This is normal, not a red flag on its own.
- Friendships will likely shift — let her grieve them. It’s extremely common for elementary friend groups to break apart in 6th grade. Parents often want to fix this fast (“just make new friends!”) but she may need to feel sad about it first. Simply saying “that’s really hard, losing that friendship” goes further than advice does.
- Watch how she talks about herself, not just her grades. This is the age perfectionism and comparison often take root — with schoolwork, with looks, with other girls. A stomachache before a test, or a meltdown over one wrong answer, is often more about self-worth than the actual assignment.
- Low-pressure moments beat sit-down talks. The car, doing dishes, right before bed — sideways conversations (no direct eye contact) tend to get more out of a middle schooler than “can we talk?” ever will.
- Encourage her to take up space. Many girls this age start going quiet — fewer questions in class, deferring to others, shrinking a little. Actively noticing and praising the moments she speaks up, disagrees, or asks for help counters this pattern early.
- Give her small pieces of control. Letting her choose her backpack, organize her own space, pick her first-day outfit — small autonomy over low-stakes things helps her feel steadier heading into a year where a lot else feels out of her control.
- Know the difference between normal moodiness and a flag worth addressing. Some eye-rolling and door-closing is developmentally normal. What’s worth paying closer attention to: withdrawal from things she used to love, real changes in sleep or appetite, or persistent avoidance of school or friends. That’s when it’s worth a closer look, not just “she’s being a preteen.”
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From Betsy
When I think about back-to-school anxiety, I think back to my own experience starting high school. I remember having my first experience with insomnia around that time, but I didn’t make the connection between not being able to sleep and how much anxiety I was feeling about such a big transition. I was entering a new school, meeting new people, navigating new friendships, and stepping into a whole new stage of growing up.
Looking back, I wish I had understood that sometimes anxiety shows up in our bodies before we even recognize it as anxiety. If you’re feeling nervous, having trouble sleeping, or noticing those “butterflies” in your stomach as school approaches, it may simply be your brain and body adjusting to something new. And that’s okay! You can feel nervous and still be ready for what comes next.
Try to focus on what you can control, take things one day at a time, and be kind to yourself as you adjust. Talk to someone you trust if you’re feeling overwhelmed, and remember you don’t have to have everything figured out on the first day. You’ve got this!
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From Molly
As someone who still loves back-to-school shopping (nearly ten years out of grad school, no less), I so appreciate this time of year for all its opportunity for reinvention and change. With that, of course, comes anxiety, trepidation, and the dreaded unknown.
The biggest support we can provide our kiddos is letting them know they don’t have to know what this school year ahead will look like — but that we’re confident they’re going to figure it out. Reassurance during this period can look like reinforcing that it’s both an anxiety- and excitement-filled time, and that although neither of you knows what lies ahead this school year, you know they’re equipped with everything they need to handle whatever comes their way. Resist the urge to hand them the “answers” to the what-ifs, and instead work on modeling the confidence you hope for them to have in themselves.
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From Emily
As I enter my third year as an elementary school counselor, I’ve found that one of the most powerful tools during times of transition — especially the back-to-school season — is vulnerability. When kids think adults are perfect, they view their own anxiety or mistakes as personal failures. Hearing that we also face difficult days or make mistakes changes their perspective entirely. It shifts their mindset from “What is wrong with me?” to “Oh, this is just what being human feels like.”
The key is to also share how you overcame the obstacle, whether that meant having an uncomfortable conversation with a friend or apologizing to a coworker for a missed deadline. Normalizing our mistakes makes us relatable and shows kids that even adults are still learning, growing, and changing every day.
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From Alicia
Look Again.
Being a therapist, former educator, athlete, and coach has taught me one important lesson about behavior:
What we see isn’t always the whole story.
That’s especially important during the back-to-school transition because anxiety doesn’t always look like worry.
Sometimes it looks like irritability. Procrastination. Perfectionism. A stomachache on Sunday night. Suddenly hating school. Picking fights at home. Melting down after holding it together all day. Or the teenager offering the incredibly detailed explanation: “I don’t know.”
This is where I become a bit of a pattern detective.
Instead of focusing only on the behavior, get curious: When does it happen? What changed? What happened right before it? What might your child be trying to manage, communicate, or avoid?
Going back to school can reorganize a child’s entire world. Sleep changes. Social dynamics shift. Academic expectations increase. There’s more stimulation, comparison, performance, transitions, and often less control.
For one child, anxiety may center around uncertainty. For another, it’s performance, belonging, keeping up academically, or simply walking into the cafeteria wondering where to sit.
Same word: anxiety. Very different patterns.
That doesn’t mean every difficult behavior is anxiety or that expectations and boundaries disappear. It means we get curious before we get certain.
When a new behavior appears—or an old one suddenly gets louder—ask yourself:
“Why is this happening now?”
Behavior speaks. Sometimes we just have to look again.
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Every girl deserves a safe place to land.
