We all have some. Anxiety is the low-level, background tension that interrupts sleep at the smell of smoke or the sound of a baby crying. It’s the almost-unnoticed pressure that sparks a yelp! when something startles you.

Everyone has anxiety. It’s the pressure that fills the balloon. It’s the tension that keeps us alert and reactive, aware and engaged. But like the air that fills that balloon, anxiety can become too much, the pressure too high, to the point that all it takes is a pin-prick to explode. Here are three rules to help let the air out of the balloon.

I’d be glad to fill your head with silver-lining ideas about how a virus spreading across the globe is killing hundreds of thousands, destroying economies, forcing incalculable debt upon our children and their children, fueling racism, and locking down borders is a good opportunity for family time. But let’s not talk about those things. Let’s talk about your kids.

Dr. Garber recently discussed the topic of depression, as October is “National Depression Education Month” in an article in the Nashua Telegraph. Dr. Garber explains people with depression might not be merely sad, but can feel irritable, distracted, anxious or exhausted…

Parenting is about rhythm. Sure, it helps if you can sing and dance. But parenting is about the rhythms of eating and sleeping and toileting.[…] Our job as healthy parents is to slowly and gradually help our children fit in to these rhythms

I’m told that one Chinese character communicates both “crisis” and “opportunity.” Its meaning—like so much in this life—is what you make of it, and what you make of it will trickle down to your kids.

Sometimes it takes dramatic extremes to wake us up. By definition, republicans and democrats serve as foils to one another. Early in any campaign, candidates try to distinguish themselves by taking polarized positions. Pro-this and anti-that.