When my son had a stroke and seizures as a newborn, every moment felt uncertain. Once things stabilized, that deep anxiety finally eased until the first time he got sick again. I remember walking into his room and feeling that old fear rush back.

If you’ve ever felt your heart race when your child spikes a fever or starts coughing, you’re not alone. Even if your child’s never been seriously ill, that drop in your stomach is real. Health anxiety is something many parents carry, especially after the pandemic reminded us how fragile health can feel.

In this episode, I share what helped me work through that anxiety—both as a pediatrician and as a mom who’s lived it. I talk about the mindset shifts that changed everything:

• Accepting that I can’t control every outcome for my child

• Trusting that I’m doing my best with the resources I have

• Remembering that back-to-back viruses mean my child’s immune system is learning

• Focusing on what’s in my control, not the scary “what-ifs”

• Finding hope, even when it’s hard

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00;00;00;01 – 00;00;17;02

Dr. Mona

Welcome back to the PedsDocTalk podcast. It’s me, Doctor Mona, and you are listening to our weekly the follow up episode. Where we revisit an old favorite episode in less time than it takes for you to spiral because your child is sick. Again. I chose this episode because, let’s be honest.

 

00;00;17;02 – 00;00;18;20

Dr. Mona

Everybody is sick with something right.

 

00;00;18;20 – 00;00;42;19

Dr. Mona

Now. Back to school means back to back illnesses, schedule crashes, and that creeping anxiety parents feel every time the thermometer beeps or your child starts to cough. For me, health anxiety really started with my son Ryaan, when he had his stroke and seizures as a newborn. Every moment felt uncertain and when we finally realized things were stable and he was improving, that heavy anxiety lifted until he got sick with viruses.

 

00;00;42;22 – 00;01;07;25

Dr. Mona

I’ll never forget the first time he spiked a fever and he was sick. I walked into his room and had a flashback of walking into the neonatal ICU. Those memories can creep in, and even if your child has never been hospitalized or seriously ill, it’s real to feel your stomach drop when they’re sick. So in this follow up, we’re revisiting why this happens, how to manage it, and of course, you can go back to the full episode Managing Health Anxiety.

 

00;01;08;00 – 00;01;24;18

Dr. Mona

If you want all the detailed tips I share. If this resonates, don’t forget to download the episode, subscribe, leave a review and share it with a friend. I know that sounds like a lot to ask, but that’s how the show continues to grow and tag at the PedsDocTalk podcast and at PedsDocTalk, so I know it landed with you.

 

00;01;24;21 – 00;01;31;24

Dr. Mona

Let’s get into it.

 

00;01;31;26 – 00;01;51;29

Dr. Mona

Our brain is wanting to protect us and our family. Now, this health anxiety is common for many. Regardless if your child was in the NICU, the hospital or not, it doesn’t matter, you know, or if they had any major medical issues. Remember, when we talk about anxiety, this is a feeling of fear, dread, worry, or uneasiness. It’s a feeling.

 

00;01;51;29 – 00;02;13;04

Dr. Mona

It’s not who you are. And sometimes I think we let anxiety define us. Anxiety is protective. I think also we feel like it’s this bad thing, but anxiety is something that protects us, you know? So if you’re outside playing on the street with your child and all of a sudden you hear a car speeding, even if it’s not coming near you, you’re going to look around, you’re going to make sure that there’s no threat to your immediate safety.

 

00;02;13;09 – 00;02;34;00

Dr. Mona

This anxiety is telling you to get your kid out of the street. So anxiety exist to protect us from threats in our environment, threats to our health and our safety and health. Illness anxiety is somewhat part of this. You know, many worry about the health of their child because this is their safety. Health and safety are the basics of what we want to provide our children.

 

00;02;34;02 – 00;02;56;05

Dr. Mona

Yes, people may say, you know, I want them to thrive developmentally, this and that. But at the core, we want our children to have safety and health. This is the essentials, I think every parent wants for their child, and everything else is a bonus. Number one, I can’t control every outcome in my life and my son’s life. I mean, this is obvious, but I think we try so hard to control control outcomes.

 

00;02;56;05 – 00;03;20;20

Dr. Mona

Control held control our child’s trajectory. And similar to Ryaan’s delivery with his stroke and seizures, I had a healthy pregnancy and I did everything quote unquote, right. But unfortunately, we had a traumatic delivery. And as I started to realize, you know, I know that we did our best and that we cannot control everything. Ryaan’s delivery awakened something in me that says, I am doing my best, and my best is good enough.

 

00;03;20;20 – 00;03;48;26

Dr. Mona

And sometimes there’s going to be hard times. Sometimes I’m going to get sick, sometimes is going to happen, but I am going to do everything I can that’s in my control. Letting go of this control again doesn’t cause you to get permissive. It allows you to remember that you are human and you cannot control every aspect of your outcome or your child’s outcome, but you make choices that are sustainable and that make sense to you with the information and resources that you have.

 

00;03;48;28 – 00;04;10;00

Dr. Mona

Number two, I’m doing my best with the resources I have. For example, I had to send my son to child care and we still continue to send him. And I was working full time. My husband was working full time. We needed the help. And so, so many of us could say, okay, well, if I kept my child home, if I was a stay at home mom, or if we had a nanny at home, then he wouldn’t be in school.

 

00;04;10;00 – 00;04;27;01

Dr. Mona

He wouldn’t be getting sick all the time. But we know that when children are around other children, illnesses happen. So you have to look at the resources that you have and accept that and say, well, I need to do what I need to do. I’m doing my best. I have to send my child to child care. It’s important for us because we need to work and someone needs to watch.

 

00;04;27;01 – 00;04;47;21

Dr. Mona

My son that’s responsible and that is okay. Now. Yes. With that it could mean illnesses. And I’ll get into how to reframe and remember this, but it’s important to know that your resources are individual to you. You can look at your friend down the street that has two nannies for each of their children, and is able to keep their kids home until they’re five, but that is their life, that is their resources.

 

00;04;47;21 – 00;05;07;14

Dr. Mona

That doesn’t mean that what you’re doing, your child getting sick back to back, is a negative. This is their immune system working. Which brings me to number three. I hate these illnesses. I did okay, like the back to back illnesses, especially that first year of childcare was really, really hard. I remember being in tears so many times because I was missing work.

 

00;05;07;18 – 00;05;32;17

Dr. Mona

My son was sick. I just felt like nothing was going right. It felt very overwhelming. And you’re just worried about your child. You’re worried about your job, you’re worried about everything. But with every illness, we would remind ourselves his immune system is learning this reframe was actually very helpful when it was going back to back, and it doesn’t take away from the fact again, that those back to backs were really hard, that we were missing work, that he was sick, the fever, the worry.

 

00;05;32;20 – 00;05;54;23

Dr. Mona

But it really helps to kind of know that, okay, this is normal. I’m going to look out for what I need to look out for. I’m going to make sure that I’m not missing anything, but it’s really important to remember that this is actually very, very common for children when they start group childcare. And we did see an increase in viral transmission once the pandemic kind of lockdown kind of ended and everyone’s kind of coming together again.

 

00;05;54;28 – 00;06;12;04

Dr. Mona

We saw a lot of these childhood viruses transmit more. You know, we just felt like it was happening more because, yes, kids were getting together for the first time in a year. And so then you’re going to see sickness. But the reframe can be very helpful for that can really help when you’re trying to, you know, think about reframing and getting to these illnesses.

 

00;06;12;07 – 00;06;29;24

Dr. Mona

I know what to look out for in this illness. This is what I’m trying to do with Doc talk to educate all of you on when to be concerned. I know that it’s such a nuanced discussion. I know that your feelings and comfort may be different from someone else’s, but it’s important to know that if your child has a fever, croup, bronchiolitis, whatever it is.

 

00;06;29;26 – 00;06;47;09

Dr. Mona

When do I need to see a physician? When do I need to go to the hospital? And this is what I hope to continue to do. Now as a pediatrician, I will say that yes, having this knowledge when Ryaan is sick is helpful. But what was not helpful is knowing all the rarities, right? The children who don’t do so well with the illnesses.

 

00;06;47;09 – 00;07;07;16

Dr. Mona

My husband sees the worst scenarios in the E.R., but we had to really remember and lean in on the positive stories. The fact that children do recover from illnesses, the fact that we did our best to reduce risk. But illness happens. We can’t control every virus that comes into our life, but we can control what we’re looking out for, what we’re doing in the moment with our child.

 

00;07;07;18 – 00;07;27;13

Dr. Mona

And number five, if he does get sick. I’m a physician and my husband is a physician, and we know that modern medicine can do so much right now, and we will get him the help he needs if he needs that formal medical help. This is huge to me. And I bring this up not to again say, okay, your kid gets sick.

 

00;07;27;13 – 00;07;42;12

Dr. Mona

Don’t worry, we have a hospital. That’s not what this means. This means that I don’t want any child in a hospital if I can avoid it. I hated Ryaan being in the NICU. I love the NICU people. Don’t get me wrong. I love the staff, but I do not like being in a hospital. Even though I’m a physician.

 

00;07;42;19 – 00;08;03;26

Dr. Mona

I don’t like it. It’s not fun for anybody. It’s not an easy experience. But I also know that sometimes it’s the best place we need to be to heal. And although it may seem daunting and I want you to go home as soon as possible, modern medicine can really help us compared to centuries ago. So when you find that your child is sick, what I want you to focus on is my child is sick.

 

00;08;03;26 – 00;08;25;19

Dr. Mona

What do they need now? What am I going to help them with? What do I need to know in terms of when my child needs to get seen, when they need to go to an ER or the doctor’s again, and also leaning in and understanding that if I need formal help, it’s there. You are not alone. I feel like so much of health, anxiety and anxiety in general comes from the fact that we feel isolated in this experience.

 

00;08;25;22 – 00;08;48;04

Dr. Mona

We are all going through very similar experiences and know that you have a support team, whether it’s your pediatrician, whether it’s a hospital, whether it’s your friend, you have that support. When we have health anxiety, we often go down the rabbit hole. Worst case scenarios Google searches, reading stories of sad outcomes I remember when my son got his stroke and seizure diagnosis.

 

00;08;48;07 – 00;09;10;18

Dr. Mona

I chose to surround myself with positive stories. Stories of survival stories of hope, stories of healing, stories of children who went on to lead a very normal life. This doesn’t mean that I lived it with my head in the clouds, where I knew that the other stories didn’t exist. I’m a pediatrician. I know that they do. I know that there are not so great outcomes with certain diagnoses.

 

00;09;10;20 – 00;09;40;16

Dr. Mona

I know outcomes aren’t always roses and butterflies. In my career, I’ve seen the most dire of situations freak accidents, negative outcomes from conditions, etc. but I have also seen miraculous recoveries. I’ve seen hope. I’ve seen kids overcome some horrible illnesses or accidents and walk out of hospitals like nothing ever happened. So I chose to focus on hope. So I ask myself, why are parents so much more anxious about health anxiety than years past?

 

00;09;40;23 – 00;09;56;24

Dr. Mona

What is going on? You know, I feel that there’s more tension, fear and anxiety and I am on social media, so I hear a lot of concerns, but I also feel that it’s happening in my office. I feel like there’s just more tension in parenting and the health of our children, and I do think we have the pandemic to thank for this.

 

00;09;56;28 – 00;10;15;13

Dr. Mona

For two years we have been programed to avoid a threat to Covid okay, avoid Covid, handwash mask, vaccinate, vaccinate. Covid is bad. Covid is bad. If people got Covid, especially early on, right, we thought that they weren’t doing enough, but they weren’t social distancing. There was this hierarchy of oh, you are not doing this right. I’m better. You’re worse.

 

00;10;15;15 – 00;10;41;07

Dr. Mona

Our brains have been told to fear, fear, fear, fear, Covid. And the media is also to blame. Okay? But to some degree this was important so that we made choices to reduce risk. But remember it’s reducing risk. You cannot eliminate all risk when it comes to a viral illness or illness in general. But if it becomes all consuming, right this fear and affecting life now, the anxiety has now tipped over to becoming an unsustainable and unhelpful.

 

00;10;41;09 – 00;10;59;02

Dr. Mona

We cannot completely avoid risk when it comes to respiratory virus. When I say completely avoid the only way you can completely avoid getting sick is that if you stay home and never see another human. Anybody in your family? I’ve said this before, it’s the only way. But we’re human beings, we’re social creatures. We have to see other people at some point.

 

00;10;59;04 – 00;11;17;23

Dr. Mona

And so with that comes the risk of human spread, of contact, of illness, you know, and it’s a reality. We can reduce risk. However, you know, we can do the hand hygiene, we can take the precautions, but we have to accept that we cannot completely reduce it. This is important so that you do what’s in our control and let go of what’s not.

 

00;11;17;26 – 00;11;34;15

Dr. Mona

And it’s also important to remove guilt because if you think that you do x, y and z and you will not get sick, or your children will not get sick, and then you do you feel like a failure? As you navigate these difficult moments, focus on what you can control. No, we cannot control every aspect of our life or our child’s life.

 

00;11;34;17 – 00;11;55;10

Dr. Mona

Accepting the limits of control and taking the actions that can be pursued is a very important concept. So although we might not be able to control everything, we can recognize the importance of taking steps to minimize risk. So in setting of health and safety, doing our best to reduce risk with seatbelts, car seats, vaccinations and the education we do have.

 

00;11;55;12 – 00;12;15;01

Dr. Mona

And tell yourself this when you feel that guilt or that doubt creeps in. I’m a great parent. My life is abundant and my child’s life is abundant. I am doing my best and my child is doing their best. And the last portion is being hopeful. This is hard for many people and it’s trying to find hope even harder.

 

00;12;15;01 – 00;12;41;25

Dr. Mona

Finding hope in dire situations. Hope doesn’t automatically mean things will work out, but it sure is better than feeling like there’s going to be dread and things are not going to work out for you. Hope makes you more mindful so that you can do what is needed for yourself or your child while you all are healing, whether that’s healing at home from a virus or healing in a hospital.

 

00;12;41;28 – 00;13;03;08

Dr. Mona

And that’s your follow up. Just a small dose of the real, relatable and eye opening conversations we love to have here. If you smiled, nodded, or had an moment, go ahead and download, follow and share this episode with a friend. Let’s grow this village together for more everyday parenting wins and real talk. Hang out with us on Instagram at the PedsDocTalk podcast.

 

00;13;03;15 – 00;13;18;27

Dr. Mona

Want more? Dive into the full episode and more at PedsDocTalk.com. Because parenting is better with support. And remember, consistency is key. Humor is medicine and follow ups are everything. I’m Doctor Mona. See you next time for your next dose.