What a Journey

When Wyatt began dealing with Anxiety in 4th grade, his school counselor asked for a list of his coping skills. Naturally, I provided a 30 page Power Point presentation. I wanted to create something that would actually be useful to Wyatt in the moment of Anxiety so he could evaluate how he was feeling and how to recognize it was actually anxiety happening and escalating. To make it easier, I broke it down into a scale from 1-10, and then provided some coping skill suggestions for the specific stage. If he was super escalated, some deep breathing might not be enough to de-escalate. However, if he could catch the start of a stomach ache, some mindfulness could keep the anxiety manageable.

His school counselor asked for a version without Wyatt's name that he could use with other students. I excitedly shared my creation with some friends, and one of them mentioned wishing it were a children's book to share with foster kids. It took some time, but I did turn it into verse with the goal of creating an illustrated children's book. It was time for Beta readers before diving into the artwork.

One of my beta readers said they wished it was in graphic novel format for her middle school Guardian Ad Litem kids so she could shove it in their backpack and they'd always have the resource with them. I knew she was right.

So, here I am. Turning what was going to be a list of coping skills into a full on middle-grade graphic-novel-in-verse, and hoping my own anxiety and imposter syndrome doesn't get it the way.