But according to psychologist Dr Bijal Chheda of Nos Curare, not feeling particularly motivated can be caused by a range of issues and conditions.
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She said that demotivation is “one of the brain’s early responses to ongoing stress,” explaining, “As stress builds, the brain shifts into energy-saving mode, making focus and initiating tasks feel difficult, which can drain motivation.”
This can be common among those with ADHD, for instance, she added.
While many of us may try to will ourselves out of these periods, the psychologist said this is a mistake.
What should I do if I feel demotivated?
Sometimes, Dr Chheda said, the stress and self-blame you feel about not being productive can, ironically, take a lot of energy. “Overwhelm and perfectionism” are common culprits.
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But believing you’re a failure when you don’t give everything 100% – and thinking you can will yourself back into an A-star performance – is a trap that can sap your motivation, she continued.
“If this sounds familiar, it can help to stop relying on willpower and instead lower the barrier to entry. Start with a messy first version, giving yourself permission to do it badly just to get it moving.”
I’ve seen success with half-assed workouts, which helped to keep me way more consistent than all-or-nothing exercise regimens I inevitably dropped out of. Science says that tiny shifts in our eating, sleep, and exercise routines – we’re talking two minutes more movement and grams more vegetables a day – can help you to live longer, too.
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Actively deciding it’s OK to do a less-than-optimal version of whatever task you’re hoping to achieve “makes it easier to re-engage with the task, without feeling pressure to succeed the first time round,” the expert said.
Speak to an expert if demotivation lasts a long time
As we’ve mentioned before, feeling demotivated for a long time can be related to anhedonia or dysthymia.
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“If you feel this is a consistent pattern, it may be worth exploring whether ADHD could be a factor with a qualified mental health professional,” Dr Chheda added.
The NHS says that low mood, which can include not enjoying things you used to, not being able to concentrate, and feeling helpless, can be signs of depression, for which you should consider speaking to a professional.
It’s common to have fears about being a “bad person”, but for most people, these are fleeting thoughts and not true fears about being immoral.
However, this isn’t the case for people who suffer from a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder known as moral scrupulosity or moral OCD.
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For folks with moral OCD, these “Am I bad?” thoughts can become permanent, leading to guilt, worry and rumination.
According to Joshua Curtiss, an assistant professor in the applied psychology department at Northeastern University in Boston, moral OCD is “a subtype of obsessive-compulsive disorder that’s characterised by really intense, intrusive thoughts of being immoral, bad or unethical in some way”.
This can also come out in someone’s relationship to religion, leading someone to worry that they are acting against their religion or offending God, said Meredith Hettler, the national director of the OCD and anxiety program at Newport Healthcare.
These kinds of thoughts can be debilitating and are very different than a quick worry about being “mean” or “bad.” Here’s what to know.
Moral OCD comes with compulsions
In OCD, compulsions are repetitive thoughts or behaviours that someone does in hopes of relieving anxiety. “And the compulsions are designed to neutralise or undo these types of thoughts or fears about being ‘bad,’” Curtiss said.
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Compulsions look different depending on the type of OCD, but in the case of moral OCD, they could look like someone seeking reassurance from others to prove that they are “good” and not “bad”, according to Curtiss.
Perhaps after an interaction at work that made you feel like a “bad person”, you call your mum, tell her the story and gauge her reaction to determine whether you’re “bad”, Hettler offered as an example.
It could also look like “undoing behaviours,” Curtiss said, which means trying to do something really good to make up for any “bad” or “immoral” thoughts – like volunteering after thinking something mean about a neighbour.
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It could also appear as rumination, so thinking about the same thing over and over again, worrying about it and seeking reassurance, even though the reassurance is “not going to be good enough,” Venker explained.
“It’s kind of like a hamster on the wheel. They’re not going anywhere, but they feel like they can solve the problem, but unfortunately, we can never solve the problem through OCD rumination, it only leads to more questions and more doubts,” Venker added.
OCD is often referred to as the “doubting disorder,” Hettler said. “OCD, no matter what the subtype is, is always looking for 1,000,000% certainty, which we all know we’re never going to get.”
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J Studios via Getty Images
While it’s normal to occasionally wonder if you’re a “bad” person, it can be concerning if those thoughts occupy you continuously.
Moral OCD can lead to guilt and distress
Moral OCD is heavy. It can lead to guilt and “a questioning of one’s own character,” Curtiss said. “It’s almost as if you’re a judge, interrogating your own moral character in a way, as to whether you’re a good or a bad person.”
You almost put yourself on trial and overanalyse every moment, Venker added.
Constant, moral-based intrusive thoughts can be overbearing, overwhelming and distressing, Curtiss said.
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Moral OCD feeds on a fear of being cast out socially
Moral OCD, and OCD as a whole, is embedding the self-protective part of our brains, according to Venker.
“Humans are wired to care about belonging, safety, morality, social acceptance, all of those things,” Venker added. Centuries ago, if you were rejected and kicked out by your group or village, you were put directly in harm’s way.
Moral OCD feeds off this inherent fear and the possibility of “rejection, shame, or even just losing one’s identity as being a good person,” she said.
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Modern cancel culture amplifies this vulnerability in many folks with moral OCD, Venker said, in the form of “public call outs [and] constant exposure to other people’s opinions.”
This is not the same as having a fleeting thought about your morals
A one-time thought about being immoral isn’t the same as having moral OCD.
“Moments of self doubt are very, very normal and very human … everybody has intrusive thoughts,” Venker said.
“The difference is, OCD is a neurological condition … it’s like our brains are almost stuck on a highway loop, and they can’t get off the highway,” Venker said. Someone who does not have moral OCD can find an exit on the highway, so to speak, and rationally understand that one thought doesn’t make them a bad person, she added.
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“People with OCD, they don’t get the all-clear signal, and so they feel like they have to obsessively try to figure out or make the right decisions in order to prove they are a good person or to find certainty that they are a good person,” Venker said.
The other defining factor of moral OCD versus a one-off moment of self-doubt is that OCD is looking for 100% certainty, Hettler said. Even if all of the people in the world tell someone with moral OCD that they’re kind and good, “there’s never going to be a thing that someone can say or do that’s going to fully stop this process forever and always,” Hettler added.
Moral OCD can disrupt a person’s daily life
Folks with moral OCD also experience something called “thought-action fusion,” Curtiss said. “It’s the belief that, in this case, thinking a bad thing is the equivalent of doing it.”
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For example, someone with thought-action fusion believes that thinking about cheating on their partner is the same as doing it. “And it brings the stakes up that much higher,” Curtiss said.
Additionally, a common differentiator between someone having a mental health disorder and not is “both the amount of extreme levels of distress it causes and amount of interference it causes in someone’s life.”
Moral OCD disrupts someone’s life and takes up a lot of time. Someone with moral OCD may go to the grocery store, leave and worry they accidentally didn’t pay for something in their cart, which would make them “bad” and a thief. This could lead them to check the receipt again and again and even go back inside and insist on paying for the item again, Curtiss said. This is very different than a moment of self-doubt followed by reassurance.
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Here’s what to do if you are struggling with these kinds of thoughts
If you think you may have moral OCD, experts told HuffPost the best next step is to reach out to a mental health professional who is trained in OCD treatment.
Not all mental health professionals are trained to treat OCD, so, instead of going to just anyone you find in your neighbourhood, experts recommend looking for a provider via the International OCD Foundation database.
It’s common for moral OCD to get missed and treated improperly. “The treatment for OCD is really, really important, because regular talk therapy can actually make OCD worse,” Hettler said.
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Exposure and response prevention therapy is the gold standard treatment for OCD, said Venker, and, for some, treatment may also include medication.
“Moral OCD is definitely something that is under-appreciated among the general population, but it can be very distressing, very interfering,” Curtiss said.
As you seek treatment, be kind to yourself and know that there are trained professionals who specialise in helping people get past the limiting thoughts that come with moral OCD.
I often think about how tough it must be to be a teenager right now. Between the pressures of school life and the inability to get away from it all thanks to the 24/7 nature of social media, it sounds pretty exhausting.
But what is it actually like? And what’s keeping the nation’s teenagers up at night? A 2025 survey by BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Bitesize shed some light.
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The online poll of 2,000 kids aged 13-18 explored the issues shaping teenagers’ lives – from mental health and safety to the rise of AI.
What is the biggest worry for teens?
Getting kids to open up about what’s worrying them can be like drawing blood from a stone for plenty of parents. But the survey offered some insights into what teens worry about most.
Over two-thirds (69%) of all participants reported feeling anxious at least some of the time, with pressure around exams and grades being the biggest worry.
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Its survey of 1,000 15- to 18-year-olds taking GCSE or A-Levels found 63% said it was hard to cope in the lead-up to, and during, these exams. Of these, 13% had suicidal thoughts and 13% self-harmed. More than half (56%) had trouble sleeping.
Among those struggling, 61% experienced anxiety and 40% worsening mental health, while 30% skipped meals and one in four (26%) had panic attacks.
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The research also found exams were more than twice as likely to have a significant negative impact on mental health than social media.
May – which is when school exam season starts for most – is the peak season for children to call Childline about exam stress. Between 1 April 2025 and 31 March 2026; the free, confidential service for kids delivered 1,679 counselling sessions where exam or revision stress was mentioned.
The majority of concerns about exam stress were from children aged 12-18 years old, however younger students are also impacted, with 11% of contacts coming from children aged 11 and under.
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One young person, aged 16, said: “If I’m not revising for exams, I feel this panic in my chest, but the panic also stops me focusing on the revision when I try and do it.”
Another 16-year-old girl said they have plans for their future, but have completely lost motivation to revise. “I have no idea why, my friends are trying to help get me back on track but I’m so overwhelmed,” they said.
What else did the BBC’s teen survey find?
It found 65% of teens feel overwhelmed at least some of the time and almost three-quarters (74%) of girls feel anxious at least some of the time.
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Another eye-opening finding was just how much time teens are spending on their phones: more than a third (38%) spend five hours or more a day, while one in 20 spend eight hours or more.
When they are online, more than half reported having seen sexist and racist content. Two in five (44%) said they have seen extremely violent content.
In real life, 44% worry about knife crime in their local area and almost one third (30%) of teenage girls have experienced sexual harassment in school.
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Artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly popular among the younger generation, with almost half (47%) using it to help with homework or coursework.
This is rising year-on-year – the figure was 36% in 2024 and 29% in 2023.
Despite the challenges teens face today, nearly eight in 10 (79%) are feeling positive about their future.
When we hear about the death of a child or young adult, we are unsettled, unmoored. Such deaths are out of the natural order. And if it could happen to your child, it could happen to mine. Life is never safe once you have children.
When my daughter died of cancer at age 40, some people remained silent, distancing themselves, as if the death of a child might be bad luck, contagious. Other well-intentioned people hesitated, retreated, reaching for a safe landing.
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“There are no words.”
“Your loss is unimaginable.”
“I can’t imagine what you are going through.”
Why is it so easy to find words for joyous occasions – births, graduations, weddings – yet we lose language when seeking words to console and comfort the bereaved? Death humbles us, revealing the empty spaces in language.
I understand. I do. My daughter’s death left me without words. It is incomprehensible to lose a child. Grief isn’t one emotion; it is a tsunami of sadness, anger, shock, pain, helplessness and deep yearning. Perhaps reaching for the shorthand, “There are no words,” is an easier way to say: There will never be words large enough to express this sadness.
After Alex died, I fell into many empty spaces in language, especially the space where I had no name for myself, a parent who has lost her child. Names exist for a child who has lost a parent (orphan), or for a woman who loses her partner (widow), but what do we call an orphaned parent?
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Recently, though, I stumbled upon vilomah – a Sanskrit word that means “against the natural order.” The word vilomah embraces the primal injustice of outliving one’s child, inverting the generational order, an upside-down world. Parents expect to predecease their children, not bury them. To be a vilomah is to become an unwanted messenger from a distant point of human existence.
Bereaved parents – vilomahs – aren’t surprised when we learn the word bereavement has its roots in Old English, meaning to deprive, rob, take away. The future tense has been rearranged: Our children have been deprived of their hopes and dreams – their future – and we, their parents, are robbed of our future with them.
Photo Courtesy Of Nancy Sommers
The author (right) with her daughter Alex at a family party.
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But placeholders such as “there are no words” close off conversations when they most need to begin, forcing a parent who has lost so much to find words to comfort the speaker. Bereaved parents need their friends and families to be safekeepers, using specific words to describe our beautiful children, reminding us that our children live on in their memories.
I needed words of comfort to bring her back – stories about her light and love, her acts of kindness and courage. I needed to hear people say her name – Alex – and surround me with words of love.
Here’s what I want to say to everyone: be brave. There are no perfect words to comfort the bereaved, no comfortable words for something so uncomfortable. You can’t fix my loss, but you can hold in your hearts everything about Alex that made her specific and human – her love for birthdays and balloons, pandas and popsicles, dresses with pockets, Japanese art and fashion design, running marathons and then ultramarathons, making everything look so easy.
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You can reminisce joyfully about photos of Alex at the finish line of her 100-mile runs, beaming with a thumbs-up, or about the ways in which she celebrated life’s small pleasures and brought family along for the celebration. Her beautiful curls and welcoming smile that felt like a hug, or the big-hearted gifts she gave – she was a spectacular gift-giver.
Or her love for s’mores and ice cream cake, sushi and dumplings, for growing dahlias and daisies, for the multitudes she contained. These loving, specific words capture the light Alex carried, the vividness with which she lived her life.
When someone says, “There are no words,” I hear “That’s all there is to say,” and when they say, “Your loss is unimaginable,” I hear “I will not try to imagine your loss.” These expressions allow speakers to retreat, staying emotionally adjacent to the bereaved parent’s loss, leaving us isolated, sealed off, deprived of moments of true connection.
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When friends and family tell an Alex story or ask for one, they open the uncomfortable spaces in language and let my daughter live on in words.
Bereaved parents live with the geography of our grief, becoming familiar with its peaks and valleys, its edges. Our grief doesn’t disappear; its tail is long. No worries if you didn’t bring the casserole or cannoli; there is plenty of time to offer comfort to a bereaved parent and honour a child’s memory.
I am grateful to the many friends who continue to lift up Alex’s name and carry grief with me – like the neighbour who cooked Alex’s favourite dumplings each month for an entire year, leaving them on our front porch with a simple one-word note reading “love”. For the friends who plant dahlias to honour Alex, or wear dresses with pockets remembering her, and the friends who are listening presences, lingering in the backyard to talk about Alex.
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And I am always grateful to the wonderful friends and family who put April 2, Alex’s birthday, and July 15, the day she died, on their calendars, knowing these are both rough days for me and important days to honour Alex’s memory.
A Jewish proverb reminds us of why we need to try to fill the empty spaces in language: “One dies twice – the first time when a body stops breathing; the second time when a name is no longer spoken.”
To a bereaved parent, silence feels like forgetting. Whenever someone speaks the name of my beloved child and asks about her, her life story is kept alive.
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If you know a bereaved parent, reach out with loving words and gestures, show up and help carry their grief – and do it again. And again. Become safekeepers of memory – tell a story; ask for a story. Help a bereaved parent find the spaces where their beloved child continues to live.
Mind, open Monday to Friday, 9am-6pm on 0300 123 3393.
Samaritans offers a listening service which is open 24 hours a day, on 116 123 (UK and ROI – this number is FREE to call and will not appear on your phone bill).
CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably) offer a helpline open 5pm-midnight, 365 days a year, on 0800 58 58 58, and a webchat service.
The Mix is a free support service for people under 25. Call 0808 808 4994 or email help@themix.org.uk
Rethink Mental Illness offers practical help through its advice line which can be reached on 0808 801 0525 (Monday to Friday 10am-4pm). More info can be found on rethink.org.
“Is there anyone we can call?” the EMT asks, standing over me as I raise a shaky hand to my left collarbone and feel the bulge that shouldn’t be there. I am sitting on the pavement, my Madewell jeans now covered by a long black streak down the left leg, still wearing my motorcycle helmet. My elbow is shattered into three pieces, and the pain radiates down my arm to my pinky and ring finger, where my wedding band always used to be.
“No, there’s no one. I have no one!”
I panic about who will take my elderly, rescued basset hound for her bedtime walk if I go to the emergency room. I look over at my Vespa — an impractical divorce gift to myself — laying on her side with huge dents and scuffs ruining her beautiful mint green body. My phone and rainbow pride keychain are trapped in the storage compartment under the tan leather seat.
Just a few months before, after undergoing ketamine treatments as a last-ditch effort to ameliorate my relentless existential depression, I told my husband that I couldn’t be married to him anymore because I was meant to be with a woman. Now I am desperately alone in the back of an ambulance experiencing a cataclysmic life event. And yet a feeling of “It’s supposed to be this way” reassures me that just like ending my marriage and coming out as a lesbian, this accident is part of my life path.
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A year earlier, when I started the IV ketamine treatments that ultimately led to my sexual awakening, no one warned me that I might experience an ego death. “If this is what death feels like, I’m totally OK with it,” I thought as I sank deeper into the blissful emptiness. I remembered all the times I wanted to end my own life over the years. Suddenly, without the fear of the unknown keeping me from acting, the thought of returning to my “waking life” terrified me. Death seemed like a better option than perpetual self-hatred.
I broke down in tears as the nurse removed the IV from my arm.
“I don’t want to live like this anymore!” I wailed.
My sweet husband came in to hold my hand as I steadied my breathing.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with her,” the nurse told him quietly, as if I wasn’t in the room. “I’ve never seen anyone react this way.”
I thought back to our wedding all those years ago, and how I mistook the deep pit in my stomach for typical wedding day jitters. On the outside, I was smiling, but an unfamiliar voice within was screaming at me to run.
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I hated myself for not being able to give my husband the love and intimacy he deserved. The infrequent times we did have sex, I was drunk and closed my eyes tightly and left my body until it was over. I felt broken and ashamed.
Throughout the years, we continued to grow and move forward in our lives, progressing in our careers and relocating to different cities and buying bigger houses, but the feeling that something was off persisted. As the depression worsened, my problematic binge drinking escalated.
I avoided the basement of our starter home because I imagined myself hanging from our cast-iron pipes. When we moved to Texas, I regularly drove home in my tiny convertible in a blackout drunk state, completely disregarding how much it hurt my dear husband, because I honestly didn’t care if I made it back to him or not.
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One night, after downing two bottles of red wine, Googling local gay bars and failing another “Am I gay?” quiz online, I shut myself inside our closet, curled into the fetal position, and cried till I passed out.
I emerged from my office one evening and quietly admitted to him, “I think I’m bi. What does that mean?”
I knew the word I wanted to say was “gay,” but I wasn’t ready to utter it yet. I was still hoping we could somehow stay together, that maybe I wasn’t ruining our lives. And how could I possibly know that I’m gay without ever kissing a woman? He took a deep breath and eventually said, “I always knew this was coming.”
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I looked down at my hands — half of my fingers were bandaged from picking at my cuticles until they bled. I remembered that wild animals chew off their own feet if caught in a trap as an attempt to save themselves from capture.
“I kept quiet as long as I could. It feels like I don’t have a choice anymore.”
I signed a lease for a small apartment in the city where the stores hang rainbow flags in their windows. With a houseplant in one arm and my basset hound’s leash in the other, I walked into the sun-filled space and felt the words “this is where you heal” rise inside me. I placed the plant on the counter and crumpled to the floor in a heap of tears and wrapped my arms around my dog.
“We’re gonna be OK,” I reassured both of us.
My upbringing hardwired my brain to believe that same-sex attraction was dirty, shameful, and something to be kept secret — locked away and buried so that I could fit into what people wanted for me. It’s like cutting out part of your soul so that you can be loved.
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I flourished in my newfound freedom over the next few months. People said they’ve never seen me so happy. I took time to date myself, going to concerts alone, getting dressed up and making dinner reservations for one. I never imagined a fun night out would end with a life-changing accident.
The physical recovery was excruciating. I spent eight weeks lying in my living room waiting for my surgical incisions and bones to heal, and another three months doing physical therapy to regain full range of motion in my elbow and shoulder.
My collection of thrifted travel books stared back at me from their shelf and reminded me of the life I always wanted. Amid overwhelming despair and pain, I realised that I am so lucky to be alive. I thought back to my ego death and remembered being surrounded by divine love and protection, and feeling like something was guiding me toward the life I was meant for. I thought about all the experiences I still hoped to have, and started dreaming of ways to make them happen.
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“I think you’ll be really happy with the settlement amount,” my personal injury lawyer said, as I muted the phone so I could burst into tears of joy without judgment. “Just sign the paperwork, come get your check, and you’ll be all set.”
My ex-husband moved home, and met someone to build a new life with. I know he now has the loving marriage he deserves — the one that I could never give him, despite how much I wanted to. Me speaking up — and him letting me go — allowed us both to find happiness.
The travel guides are finally being used, and I’ve discovered the joy of solo trips abroad. I found healing in Mexico, and gratitude in Italy. I recently went to Paris alone, but never felt lonely.
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I continue to go on dates, and apart from a casual romance, am yet to find a first girlfriend. I remind myself that I needed this time alone to build community, to make precious friends, to heal physically and emotionally, and to undo a lifetime of hiding.
I am still looking for the love I knew I had to make myself available for when I realised I could no longer be married. I am confident I will feel it in my now-healed bones when I find her. I trust that she is out there, on her way to me, and that we will both know it when the time is right.
That night in the ambulance I had the thought, None of this would be happening if I were still married. Had I not been confronted with an ultimatum from the Universe during that ego death, directing me to speak up or never be happy, I would still be pretending. I would have the comfort and security of a marriage to my best friend, but I would not love myself. Even in that moment of desperation and pain, I knew I had made the right choice by speaking my truth. I felt reassured that this was the divine path that was meant for me all along.
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When we are confronted with life-altering choices — “Do I say something? Do I ruin our lives?” — we can make our decision from a place of fear or love. Staying quiet and staying with my ex-husband would have been the path guided by fear. In the face of absolute uncertainty, I chose love by honouring my inner voice.
I know now that I am meant to be here, despite years of wishing that I wasn’t. Though I haven’t yet found my person, I feel more joy than I ever thought possible, and I am so freaking grateful for that.
Erika Hearthstone is a pseudonym of an author who lives in Texas and writes about identity and healing. Her work centres on queerness, spirituality, and courageous self-acceptance, and is working on a collection of personal essays.
A child psychiatrist has opened up about a pattern she sees routinely where a neurodivergent child will struggle at school, and the adults around them mistake their symptoms for poor behaviour or a bad attitude.
Dr Anya Ciobanca, consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist at The ADHD Centre, says children who appear disengaged, inconsistent or emotionally volatile at school may be experiencing something far more complex than just a bad attitude.
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“Behaviour is never the whole story,” she says. “When we approach a child with curiosity rather than judgement, everything changes.”
Conditions such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) can go undiagnosed for years because there are often misunderstandings over symptoms. For example, people might think kids who have it are just hyperactive, but there are also more subtle signs that can show up, like day-dreaming or emotional dysregulation.
Experts previously told HuffPost UK this happens largely because there’s a gender divide in how ADHD symptoms are expressed (girls tend to demonstrate more inattentive symptoms), and social expectations on girls can lead to them keeping quiet, carrying on, and developing sophisticated masking strategies (sometimes at detriment to their mental health).
“There is a version of ADHD that looks, from the outside, like daydreaming or simply not caring,” says Dr Ciobanca. “But internally, that child may be working extraordinarily hard just to keep up. The effort of masking is immense, and it has a cost.”
In classrooms, children are often doing the best they can with a nervous system that’s working against them, but there are certain signs they might be fighting a hidden battle and need more support.
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5 signs a child may be struggling with ADHD at school
Avoidance of school or specific lessons – this might look like persistent reluctance or distress around certain subjects or transitions.
Difficulty starting or completing work – this is often mistaken for laziness, says Dr Ciobanca, but rooted in overwhelm or difficulties with executive function.
Emotional outbursts or withdrawal – this can look like frustration, tears or shutting down, particularly after school (also known as after-school restraint collapse).
Chronic tiredness or physical complaints of headaches, which can be linked to anxiety or sensory overload.
Low self-esteem, negative self-talk, and appearing to cope at school (masking) while falling apart at home.
One child Dr Chiobanca worked with had been labelled by her school as inconsistent and difficult to motivate. But in reality, she was overwhelmed and had developed a profound sense of shame around her difficulties.
Girls with undiagnosed ADHD are “more likely to blame themselves, turning their anger and pain inward”, according to the Child Mind Institute, which noted they’re also more likely to experience depression, anxiety and eating disorders than those without ADHD.
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“Once we understood the underlying picture – the interaction between her ADHD, her anxiety and her environment – we could make meaningful changes,” says the psychiatrist. “She no longer had to spend every day just fighting to survive it. That freed up an enormous amount of energy for actually learning.”
With one in 20 children thought to have ADHD, Dr Ciobanca wants to see earlier intervention, more flexible teaching, and emotional wellbeing placed at the centre of education rather than its margins.
“Too much support comes too late. We cannot expect children to learn well when they do not feel safe,” she adds.
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Advice for parents
If you think your child might be neurodivergent (research suggests around 15-20% of people are), it’s worth exploring this subtly with your child. Dr Chiobanca advises parents to ask their children: “What’s the hardest part of your day?” as this can reveal more than questions about effort or behaviour.
It’s also worth speaking to your child’s school – specifically their class teacher or SENCO (a special educational needs coordinator) – if you notice a pattern of distress or avoidance. Months of avoidance or emotional dysregulation are a signal worth acting on, she notes.
The psychiatrist also urges parents to separate the behaviour from the child, as “struggling children often already feel like failures; they need to know you’re on their side”.
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While NHS waiting times for diagnosis can stretch for months, it might also be worth considering a professional assessment. “ADHD and anxiety remain significantly underdiagnosed, particularly in girls,” says Dr Ciobanca.
Yet when children feel safe and understood, “they are far more able to learn and grow,” she adds. “That is the kind of education system worth working towards.”
No parent wants to sit back and watch their child experience anxiety over any situation, whether it’s going to a new dance school, a football game, trying new food or meeting new kids at school.
And while most parents have the best intentions, many actually come to their child’s rescue during moments of distress – which can be hugely detrimental to their child now and as they grow up, therapists told HuffPost.
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The best way to help your child grow through anxiety and learn to manage it isn’t exactly a natural instinct. Here’s what to know:
The number one way parents fuel anxiety, according to therapists
“I think, in particular with anxiety … the biggest mistake that we make as parents is that when we see anxiety in our kids, we jump straight into that ‘I want to protect this child from this experience.’ So, we go straight to protection mode,” said Cheryl Donaldson, a licensed marriage and family therapist.
Parents don’t want their kids to feel anxiety, of course, but swooping in to take them out of an anxious situation or fix it for them isn’t a way to empower kids, Donaldson noted. It’s actually doing the opposite.
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Research suggests that accommodating anxiety makes it worse, said Hannah Scheuer, a licensed clinical social worker with Self Space in Washington state.
“I’m both a child and family therapist and a mom, and I’m just gonna say that watching our child struggle and suffer is one of the hardest things,” Scheuer said. “And if we accommodate and give in, we will make it worse. Accommodation is essentially allowing avoidance, and avoidance feels really, really good in the moment, even to adults.”
For instance, if your teenager is anxious about driving on the highway, avoiding it when teaching them to drive only makes the experience scarier and more stressful when they eventually have to do it.
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“It just makes it worse and worse, it leads to long-term negative outcomes,” Scheuer said. “That accommodation, that saying, ‘Oh no, you don’t have to do this thing that you’re upset about or scared of,’ it does temporarily alleviate that child’s distress. Then, what it reinforces is this perception that the thing that they don’t want to do actually warrants their anxiety, and so that gives them more reason to feel the anxiety.”
“Anxiety is our body’s mechanism to tell us that we either need to act in some way … or, in the case of kids, anxiety is telling them, ‘This is a new skill I need. This is a new experience. I need more skills. I need to know how to manage this,’” Donaldson said.
It’s important to validate your child’s emotions while supporting them through anxiety
“We have to validate, we have to regulate and we have to mitigate,” she said.
Validation looks like normalising the anxiety and sharing that it’s something we all experience, Buscemi said. Regulation means helping your child learn to manage their anxiety through a variety of solutions, like breathing exercises and movement. Mitigation helps a child understand that temporary discomfort, such as facing the situation that makes them anxious, leads to long-term relief.
“Facing fears ultimately decreases them – and we prove to ourselves that things aren’t as scary as we’ve built up in our mind, or that maybe we’re just braver than it was scary,” Buscemi said.
“The research evidence does also show that what we need to do as parents is to provide support and confidence,” Scheuer noted. “What that looks like is supporting and validating the feelings while also showing confidence in their child’s ability to actually do the thing to cope with the anxiety.”
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For example, if your child gets really anxious about going to football practice and has meltdowns in the car on the way to practice, a parent could say, “Wow, I hear you. I know you’re feeling really scared and upset right now, but I also know that you can do really hard things and you’re going to be OK,” Scheuer suggested.
“It’s that mix of validation of the feeling, without accommodating the anxiety and providing confidence that they can do it,” Scheuer explained. This one sentence isn’t going to erase your child’s anxiety and stop the meltdown, but as this encouragement comes up week after week, soccer will feel less and less hard for your child.
“And continuing to inspire that confidence … is going to really make a big impact, and that’s how we build resilient kids,” Scheuer said.
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Justin Paget via Getty Images
Never making kids face the thing that makes them anxious will only impede their confidence.
Some kids (and parents) require professional support for anxiety management
Many parents will be able to manage their kids’ anxiety through different calming and exposure techniques, but some kids (and parents) may require additional support from a mental health professional – and that’s perfectly OK.
There are certain signs that a child’s anxiety requires support from a therapist or other professional.
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“If the anxiety is getting in the way of them being able to be in a relationship with other kids, go to a friend’s house … being able to go to practices and do different things, you want to reach out for help,” Donaldson said.
If you notice your child frequently worrying or frequently in distress, those are also red flags.
“Also, with younger kids, they don’t really have the language to talk about anxiety, so sometimes we see it as like more physical symptoms,” Scheuer noted. This includes stomachaches, having trouble sleeping, and general restlessness.
“That is something that I would say, if that’s pretty common, maybe they need some extra support,” Scheuer said.
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If therapy or counselling isn’t accessible, your child’s school should have a social worker or school counsellor who can provide support, Scheuer said. Talking to your paediatrician could also be a good idea.
Managing anxiety in kids often involves the parents, especially if the kids are younger.
“So, it’s not just saying, ‘Oh, fix the kid’s symptoms.’ It’s also … what strategies can we give to the parents to help really make sure that everybody has the tools to help this kid navigate these symptoms?” Scheuer said.
It’s also on the parents to consider how they react to anxious moments in their lives. Think about it: if mum or dad doesn’t know how to manage their own anxiety, they likely won’t be able to help their child, either.
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Ask yourself what you feel when your child gets anxious. Does it make you anxious, too? If so, what do you do to calm down?
“Leading with your own leadership” is an important way to go about this, according to Donaldson. If you know deep breathing helps you feel less anxious, gently guide your child toward that. Or, if you know that getting out for a walk reduces your anxiety, gently encourage your child to try it.
“You want them to know that you’re partnering, that you have answers that are going to be really helpful for them,” Donaldson said.
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If other techniques and interventions don’t work, “sometimes the kids need to go on medication,” Donaldson noted.
Watching your child experience anxiety isn’t a pleasant experience for anyone, but it helps build life skills and confidence that are tough to grow later in life. The ability to live with discomfort and manage anxiety is important throughout the lifespan, as someone takes a big test, gets their first job, experiences their first break-up, faces job rejection and more.
“I really like to emphasise with my clients that we’re trying to push through temporary discomfort to achieve long-term relief,” Buscemi said.
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Help and support:
Mind, open Monday to Friday, 9am-6pm on 0300 123 3393.
Samaritans offers a listening service which is open 24 hours a day, on 116 123 (UK and ROI – this number is FREE to call and will not appear on your phone bill).
CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably) offer a helpline open 5pm-midnight, 365 days a year, on 0800 58 58 58, and a webchat service.
The Mix is a free support service for people under 25. Call 0808 808 4994 or email help@themix.org.uk
Rethink Mental Illness offers practical help through its advice line which can be reached on 0808 801 0525 (Monday to Friday 10am-4pm). More info can be found on rethink.org.
According to the World Health Organisation, about 16% of people worldwide are facing social isolation and loneliness. In 2024, 22% of UK adults said they felt lonely at least some of the time.
And new data from the Belonging Forum’s 2026 Belonging Barometer has found that “people reporting poor mental health are five times more likely to feel lonely” than those with good mental health.
What did the research find?
The survey, conducted with Opinium, involved 10,000 UK adults.
It’s part of the Belonging Barometer, which the Belonging Forum says is designed to look at “how connected people feel to others, their communities, and their sense of purpose”.
Roughly one in five people with poor mental (21%) or physical health (20%) say they have no close friends,
Only 27% of those with poor mental health say the things they do in life are worthwhile, compared to 85% in good mental health,
Only 33% of people with poor mental health said they feel a strong sense of belonging to their neighbourhood, compared to 65% in good mental health,
Nearly two-thirds (64%) of people with poor mental health reported high anxiety yesterday, vs 29% of those in good mental health,
Though 76% of those with good mental health say they are satisfied with their friendships, this falls to 52% among those reporting poor mental health,
Two in five people with poor mental health report feeling lonely often or always, compared to 3% of people in good mental health.
That means about 2.9 million people in the UK with poor mental health say they feel lonely often or always – “roughly the population of Greater Manchester”.
“Health and belonging are closely connected”
Kim Samuel, founder and chief architect of the Belonging Forum, said: “Health and belonging are closely connected. When people struggle with their physical or mental health, they are much more likely to experience loneliness, weaker friendships, and higher levels of anxiety.”
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She added, “These findings show that belonging is not only about community or identity. It is also about wellbeing. When people are unwell or facing barriers in their daily lives, it becomes harder to build and maintain the relationships that help us be connected and supported.
“A society where people cannot participate fully in social life is a society where belonging becomes harder to sustain.”
It goes without saying that we are living through incredibly hard times. We are facing innumerable environmental crises, there is an alarming rise in far-right ideologies and we’re still feeling the social hits of the Covid-19 pandemic.
So, how do we cope? Why can we get up, make a cup of coffee, go to work and tune into our everyday life while knowing that we are surrounded by The Horrors? Are we monsters?
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Well, no. But we are feeling emotionally detached and this is something our brains do to protect us. Unfortunately, it can also make us numb to what’s happening around us and less likely to take action.
How emotional detachment keeps us moving
VeryWellMind explains: “Emotional detachment refers to being disconnected or disengaged from other people’s feelings. It can involve an inability or unwillingness to get involved in other people’s emotional lives.
“While this detachment may protect people from stress, hurt, and anxiety, it can also interfere with a person’s psychological, social, and emotional well-being.”
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It is completely understandable that we don’t know how to cope and so instead mentally detach without even knowing that we’re doing it. In fact, sometimes it’s necessary. Think of dealing with death admin following the loss of a loved one. Sometimes you just have to keep going.
This can lead us to something called ‘compassionate fatigue’
Psychology Today explains that while this phrase is most often applied to emergency and healthcare workers, “A secondary definition of compassion fatigue refers to the experience of any empathetic individual who is acutely conscious of societal needs but feels helpless to solve them.”
Sounds very familiar.
The psychology experts explain that it can be treated, though: “You can counteract such fatigue through regular exercise and healthy eating, a commitment to adequate rest and regular time off, and time in therapy. It also helps to set emotional boundaries without barricading yourself from the world.”
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Reducing screen time is also incredibly beneficial.
Primate expertise provided by Dr Luke Duncan, a postdoctoral research fellow, primatologist, and part of the University of Warwick’s ApeTank. Therapy comment by relationship therapist and author at Passionerad, Sofie Roos.
If you’re 1) on social media and 2) have something resembling a heart, chances are it’s been broken by the Japanese macaque, Punch, from Ichikawa City Zoo in Japan.
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The adorable monkey, whose mother abandoned him, has gone viral for clutching an IKEA orangutan plush to help manage his feelings of abandonment (the burnt orange stuffed toy has since sold out in multiple stores).
But why do animals, including humans, so often turn to stuffed toys in our times of need, or as a more everyday source of comfort?
Here, we spoke to primate expert Dr Luke Duncan and therapist Sofie Roos about the “cuddle therapy” a variety of species can get from stuffed toys.
Emotional support plushes are pretty common among adults, and could be helpful for distressed animals
Punch’s toy orangutan was given to him to help him handle the loss of his parent. According to Dr Duncan, that move makes sense.
“Young primates are biologically programmed to cling to their mother ― it’s a normal and essential part of emotional and psychological development,” he told us.
“Harry Harlow’s foundational research in the 1950s and 1960s showed that infant rhesus monkeys overwhelmingly preferred a soft cloth surrogate over a wire one that provided milk, demonstrating that tactile comfort is a powerful driver of attachment behaviour in infants.”
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So, while the goal should always be to provide a “safe, living social partner of the same species,” in a pinch, “A soft surrogate, in the form of a plush toy, can… provide meaningful comfort for an orphaned infant primate.
“While a plush toy cannot replace a real mother, it may help alleviate distress in the short term.”
And Roos said that while humans – and almost certainly other animals – know our toys aren’t really alive, they can “work as a ‘transition object’, which… stands as a symbol for safety when an important person is no longer with us”.
Among adults, she added, stuffed toy use offers a kind of “cuddle therapy”, which provides a combination of physical touch and pressure that a lot of animals find soothing.
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“Physical touch, [even] from an object, can make our body calm and feel safe.”
Then, there’s the fact that, generally, toys don’t leave us.
“For people who lose someone important, and have wounds connected to abandonment and an insecure attachment, the cuddly toy can give a feeling of not being completely alone, which for some becomes a saviour,” the therapist said.
“We’re born with a… need to… belong, and this need stays with us until the day we die. A stuffed animal doesn’t get any less good at giving us this just because we grow older.”
Perhaps that’s why 44% of adults hold on to their childhood toys.
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The therapist doesn’t think it’s that different to using meditation apps
Lots of animals, including humans, “are born social, and seek closeness, warmth and touch. A cuddle toy can work as a complement to give that safety, care and attachment we so strongly seek, especially if we feel lonely,” said Roos.
This is not unlike what may be happening with Punch: Dr Duncan shared, “Physical contact with a soft object can help regulate [primate] stress responses and provide a sense of security during a vulnerable period”.
Roos continued, “Many also connect the cuddle toy with childhood, a time most look back at as easier and more protected, where the stuffed animal can stand as a symbol for that time when we felt cared for, comforted and soothed in another way.”
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In fact, the therapist doesn’t think relying on a stuffed toy for “cuddle therapy” is all that different to other forms of self-soothing.
“When looking at what the cuddle toy does for you, it’s not far away from what using mindfulness apps, yoga, stress balls or weighted blankets do – the stuffed animal is just less socially accepted, even though in my [opinion], it works better than many other more accepted methods of dealing with stress, loneliness, overthinking and anxiety.”
