Grounding for Teens

Teenagers experience the same overwhelm and anxiety adults do, often with less say over their environment and less patience for anything that sounds like a worksheet. Grounding techniques tend to land better with teens when they are quick, private, and do not require explaining to anyone else in the room.

The core approach is the same one used in the general grounding techniques on this site: shifting attention to the senses to interrupt an anxious or overwhelmed state. Grounding is a standard part of trauma-informed clinical practice, recommended in national behavioural health guidelines as a way to help someone overwhelmed by anxiety reconnect with their immediate surroundings, and it works just as well adapted to a teenager’s day, a classroom, a phone, a friend group, as it does in a boardroom or a parking lot.

It is fine if a teenager wants to do this alone rather than being talked through it. Handing over a technique they can use privately is often more useful than any amount of well-meant checking in in the moment. The 5-4-3-2-1 technique and box breathing are the two easiest places to start.