Should I be worried?
Coping with health anxiety for your kids
After my first baby was born, I suffered with significant anxiety, primarily about her health. I worried about her breathing, about her feeding, about her development, about everything. Not only did I have my years of medical training to lean on to fuel my concerns, but Google, which was in it’s infancy, was quite happy to serve me with worst case scenarios every time I went searching.
Not only was I highly anxious about my baby’s health, but I was also very anxious that if I sought medical help for a problem I perceived as serious, that I would be dismissed as an anxious first time mum.
Eventually things settled down in my post partum brain, with lots of help and support from my GP and public health nurse. But other parents are not so lucky, and the worry about their child’s health persists, and can become all consuming. This can have serious physical and mental health implications for both the parent and the child.
