First-Person Stories & Parent-Led Solutions

By Rhitu Chatterjee, NPR, July 24, 2022 Shortly after Elizabeth George started her freshman year in high school last fall, her parents tested positive for COVID-19. And Elizabeth stepped up to take care of them. "I was running the house, sort of," says the soft-spoken 15-year-old. "I was giving them medicine, seeing if everyone is OK." Elizabeth's mother recovered, but her father was hospitalized. He died in September of last year. His death turned Elizabeth's world upside down. In the weeks...

NeuroClastic provides articles by autistic writers and professionals. Articles range from topics related to autism to those about justice, culture and identity, and health. NeuroClastic also provides resources for specialists diagnosing autism in adults, people who are neurodivergent, parents, educators, physicians and therapists, and employers. NeuroClastic's mission statement helps educate about the importance of their work: We are a collective of Autistic people responsive to the evolving...

This Mental Health Awareness Month, on May 5, ZERO TO THREE is launching a new podcast focused on mental health and well-being in the earliest years of life. Join to hear from early childhood experts on what’s working, what’s not, and where we go from here. We’ve all seen the news headlines, and many of us are experiencing the impact firsthand of the unprecedented mental health crisis among people of all ages and walks of life. During Mental Health Awareness Month, we invite you to a safe...

By Paula Span, Photographs by Todd Heisler, The New York Times, April 12, 2022 This is not what Ida Adams thought life would be like at 62. She had planned to continue working as a housekeeper at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore until she turned 65. After retiring, she and her husband, Andre, also 62, thought they might travel a little — “get up and go whenever we felt like it.” She didn’t expect to be hustling a seventh-grader off to school each weekday. But in January 2021, Ms. Adams’s...

By Jericka Duncan, Image: Screenshot from article, CBS News, March 3, 2022 When 35-year-old Maureen Gardner was pregnant, she was on the brink of homelessness — until a new pilot program created a financial bridge to help her stay out of poverty. For years, Gardner worked as a director of a nonprofit after-school program. Right before the pandemic hit, she left the job and went through her savings. Gardner soon found herself expecting her now 5-month-old son Garrett with no job. But then, a...

Ryan Reynolds seems like one of the most confident people in Hollywood. He's constantly ribbing on famous friends like Hugh Jackman, playing brash characters like Deadpool and married to another A-lister, Blake Lively . But that public persona is very different from the anxious person he is on the inside , Reynolds says. The 45-year-old actor has dealt with intense anxiety since he was a child, Reynolds said on CBS Sunday Mornings . "I've had anxiety my whole life really. And you know, I...

By Claudia M. Gold, MD, February 22, 2022 For the past several weeks I’ve had the privilege of leading a course in Community-Based Early Relational Health. My students come from a broad variety of disciplines- physical therapists, occupational therapists, social workers, home visitors, program director, among others. They are at different stages of their professional lives. One home visitor works with young adults who have recently aged out of the foster care system and are now parents of...

By Maxwell Adler, Photo: Bryan Banducci/Bloomberg, Bloomberg City Lab, February 10, 2022 A man in a Superman costume and a child on a tricked-out tricycle, affectionately nicknamed “trek-ceratops,” stood out among the pack of cyclists riding right down the middle of JFK Drive in San Francisco on their way to school. Two parents sped ahead to the intersection at the corner of 11th and Mission to block off traffic. No police escort was present. And music blasted from the speakers on...

By Annie Gowen, Photo: Maddie McGarvey/The Washington Post, The Washington Post, February 9, 2022 Dozens of suburban moms from around the country dialed into an Ohio-based Zoom training session last month with the same goal — to learn how to combat the increasingly vitriolic rhetoric from parents whose protests over mask mandates and diversity education have turned school board meeting rooms into battlegrounds. The lessons: Show up at meetings with fact-based speeches ready and create text...

By Caitlin Gibson, Photo: iStock, The Washington Post, January 29, 2022 Andria Hayes-Birchler had barely begun to comprehend her new reality as a single parent before the pandemic hit. In March 2020, she had an 8-month-old infant and a 4-year-old, and her soon-to-be-ex-husband had recently moved from their home in Washington, D.C., to California. What followed was a year and a half of unrelenting crisis as she struggled to balance her career as a research consultant with caring for her two...

Please read below to learn more about this change from Raising the Future: We are so excited to unveil our new brand: Raising the Future ! Friends, colleagues, parents, and youth, For over 50 years, Parents Anonymous has strengthened families through our evidence-based programs, services, and advocacy work. Our new name, Raising the Future, represents our core belief that the future depends on parents. Supporting parents has never been more urgent, as the last two years of this pandemic have...

When Grace Berbig was 7 years old, her mom was diagnosed with leukemia, a cancer of the body’s blood-forming tissues. Being so young, Grace didn’t know what cancer was or why her mother was suddenly living in the hospital. But she did know this: that while her mom was in the hospital, she would always be assured that her family was thinking of her, supporting her and loving her every step of her journey. Nearly every day, Grace and her two younger sisters would hand-make cards and fill them...