Stressed Out Parents Make Kids Sick

Interesting research is out that found that children who had anxious or depressed parents were more likely to get sick. The study was led by Dr. Mary Caserta from the University of Rochester.

Caserta teamed up with Peter Wyman, associate professor of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester, who designed surveys aimed at evaluating levels of stress in the parents. After six months, the parents were asked to take the test to measure their amount of anxiety and depression. What they found was that the children who were sick more often were those of parents with the highest levels of stress.

Here’s a possible explanation. Maybe the parents were more stressed because their kids were sick?

Seriously, what is a parent to do with this information?? Stop getting stressed, it’s making your kids sick.? Oh, OK, I’ll just turn the stress off.? I mean, we all know stress is bad in so many ways.? But it’s not exactly something that’s easy to control or turn off.? Especially, like in this case, when the source of the stress (kids), is also the recipient of the consequences.