Separation anxiety
Also called separation anxiety phase, clingy phase
Separation anxiety is when a baby or toddler gets clingy and cries as soon as a parent or other carer leaves, even for a short time. It's common between about 6 months and 3 years, once a baby realizes they're a separate person from you.
How it's said
I mean, I know separation anxiety is normal at this stage, but what can I do to cope and help not to make it worse?
This seems very early to be doing settling visits, especially as 9 to 10 months is a notorious age for developing separation anxiety.
Evenings are getting slightly better now, but separation anxiety is difficult and they just need to grow a bit more before getting through it!
Who says it
Not to be confused with
- Stranger anxiety is distress around unfamiliar people, even with a parent close by. Separation anxiety is about the parent leaving, and stranger anxiety tends to show up first.
- Separation anxiety disorder is a diagnosis for fear of being apart that is excessive and lasts. Said of a baby, separation anxiety means the ordinary stage most children go through.
Where it came from
The term comes from psychology. The British psychiatrist John Bowlby presented a paper called "Separation Anxiety" to the British Psychoanalytical Society in 1959, one of the papers that set out attachment theory. In that theory, distress at being parted from the person a baby is attached to is a normal response.
Mary Ainsworth, who had worked with Bowlby, then watched babies being left briefly with a stranger in her Strange Situation studies. Not every baby in those studies cried when the parent left.
The NHS describes it as a normal part of development, common between about 6 months and 3 years, and a sign that a baby now knows how much they depend on the people who care for them.