Sometimes you might feel just a little anxious, other times you might feel very anxious, and other times, you may not be anxious at all!
It can be hard to describe how much anxiety we are feeling.
Because of this, it is helpful to have a tool that we can use to tell how anxious or worried we are. The tool we like to use is the anxiety scale!
When you are not feeling anxious at all, your rating on the anxiety scale would be 0.
If you are feeling really anxious, it would be 10.
If you are feeling anxious, but it isn’t high or intense enough to be a 10, you would choose a number somewhere in between!
Keep scrolling to see some examples from our friend Neil below!
Neil is afraid of the dark. However, his anxiety level is different depending on the situation. He is not always afraid of the dark. When he is with his mom or has several night lights in his room, his anxiety level changes.
Let’s look at the ratings below:
When Neil is alone in his room during the day with lights on, his anxiety scale is at 3.
When Neil is going into a dark room by himself during the day, his anxiety scale is at 6.
When Neil is going into a dark room by himself at night, his anxiety scale is at 8.
When Neil is falling asleep alone in his room at night, his anxiety scale is at 10.
Now, work with your parent to think of three situations that make you feel anxious and write them down on this worksheet: Using the Anxiety Scale. Then mark your anxiety scale rating for each situation. alternatively, you can use this prompt:
For some kids, the 0 to 10 numbers do not work as well. If you are having trouble figuring out your ratings, you can also check either “a little bit anxious,” “anxious,” or “very anxious.”
Now that you’ve had some practice, you are on your way to becoming an anxiety scale expert, which is an important skill for a safe and successful trip to space!
The anxiety scale helps us understand our own anxiety and show other people (like parents) how you are feeling, too! The anxiety scale is also helpful because it can show us that just because something is really scary right now, it doesn’t mean that it is going to be really scary forever!
You are going to use the anxiety scale throughout LUNA, so start practicing using the anxiety scale to see how strong your anxiety and fear are in different situations.