As a Gen X, digital immigrant, psychologist and mom, I think a lot about how our current **information-overloaded, Googling obsessed, social-media-mindless scrolling, click-bait, immediate gratification culture** is contributing to the “YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS” but not in the obvious ways that one might think.

➡️The “youth mental health crisis” is also a “PARENT MENTAL HEALTH” crisis. Parental anxiety fueled by easy information access and a wellness/parenting industry boom is contributing to heightened stress and a loss of intuitive parenting practices. High-quality parent influencers like Dr. Lisa Damour and Dr. Becky Kennedy can be tremendous resources for parents who can’t access mental health resources due to time/financial constraints. Parental stress amasses when the lay parent is overwhelmed with all the information and doesn’t know how to discern solid, evidence-based parent guidance resources from quackery.

➡️The Gen X/Millenial Parent Generation is more aware of the long-term negative impact of misinformed/“old-school” parenting approaches. They are choosing to parent in more child/teen-focused/empowering ways. The downside of this heightened movement toward intentional parenting is that it can sometimes result in overcorrection and unintended side effects like helicopter and snow plow parenting.

➡️Easy access to information via the internet is contributing to parents relying less on their innate parental intuition. In general, one of the downsides of technology/AI is its contribution to an atrophy in the parts of our brains responsible for intuition, delayed gratification, sustained attention, social cues/skills, and tolerance for uncertainty/anxiety/stress/negative emotion.

➡️Parental unwillingness to let kids fail, learn from their mistakes, and take calculated risks is contributing to child/teen anxiety and depression. Kids/teens will have lower thresholds for natural negative emotions if they never have the opportunity to feel them.

➡️The anxiety that parents have about “messing their kids up” and/or perfectionism parenting (I’m guilty of this one), is creating heightened anxiety in the home environment that kids/teens are then exposed to and learn from.

As a fellow parent, I struggle with all of the above! Here are some of the ways I cope:

1. Remind myself that kids on the whole are VERY RESILIENT!
2. Reflect on my own childhood and all the challenges and “risks” that I survived and am stronger for as result.
3. Count to 10 and take deep breaths before I rush in to soothe, fix, rationalize my kids’ expressed emotion.
4. Invest time in personal growth, non-parenting activities.
5. Hang with adults who are NOT parents.
6. Refrain from Googling every question that pops up in my brain.
7. Deeply notice and observe my kids behavior so I can make parenting moves that meet the moment and the kid’s personality and unique strengths and limitations.
8. Commit to mindfulness and wellness experiences to help me stay connected to my inner guide.