Blog: Other People's Children™

Now that our children are adults, we have the luxury of enjoying our empty house. Of course, my husband and I always will have projects. We both have jobs, and I (ahem) have a new book coming out in May (available for preorder now!)...

In the crush of taking care of our families during the holidays, we need to take care of ourselves as well. An important part of that is to be prepared if our kids overlook us. The first few times my foster children ignored me in the...

One controversy that surprised me after I married was buying presents for my stepchildren to give to their mother. As a foster parent, I never questioned that I needed to help my children strengthen whatever relationship they had with their...

Those of us parenting a child who started life in another family already know the challenges of navigating the holidays this time of year. Another minefield some of us face is the many different winter holidays for different faiths. If one of...

This time of year, I read and hear lots of questions about how to teach children gratitude. Parenting magazines and websites are filled with suggestions and techniques, all adding yet another thing to our lists of what-we-are-supposed...

In my last post, I discussed some ways to meet the challenges that blended families face during the holidays. If you are a foster parent, you will face the same challenges, only more so. With step-children, they are with at least one of their...

November and December can be stressful times for blended families. The Norman Rockwell holiday ideal surrounds us, and our favorite traditions inevitably clash with someone else’s. What is supposed to be a season of gratitude and...

In this season of COVID and demonstrations, I have been struck by the continual insistence on treating people as victims of “the system.” I first encountered this philosophy when I was in law school, where I learned about Critical Race Theory.

Over the past few months, I have been pondering the power of personal narratives. It is inevitable that people will view events through the prism of their individual experiences. My minority friends read stories of black men killed by police...

Parenting children of divorce or other childhood traumas is daunting, but the good news is that positive experiences can help neutralize bad ones. A recently-published study looked at almost 500 children over 10 years, starting in their...

One of the things that revolutionized my parenting style was discovering the studies of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). The term stems from a groundbreaking study in the late 1990s by the Centers for Disease Control and the...

“Oh, the new marriage is going well,” my friend said. “I adore my husband. The only downside . . . .” She hesitated, looked around carefully, then leaned forward and whispered, “I just don’t like his kids.”

For almost every foster parent or stepparent, there comes a time when a child announces, “I don’t want to be here,” or “I don’t want YOU to be here.” Or the message may not be direct, but a series of subtle slights that add up to the same...

Perhaps because today is World Suicide Prevention Day, I have seen a lot of articles and blog posts this week advising parents how to take care of their children. Having parented depressed and suicidal children, I know how overwhelming...

This is National Suicide Prevention Week, and this year it comes amid reports of increased suicides and depression during the pandemic. If you are parenting a child who is struggling with anxiety and depression, you may hear your...

One struggle we all face, but especially when parenting traumatized children, is where to find the strength to keep going. Sometimes the problems our children face can seem insurmountable. The sheer magnitude of the damage they have...

I am hearing more and more stories from parents about rising anxiety and depression in our children. Most of the reports are anecdotal, but many of us seem to have children struggling with these effects of the coronavirus restrictions.

Coronavirus measures put our children at greater risk of cyberbulllying

Numerous mental health studies suggest that one of the best ways to help children develop resilience and recover...

For those of us who have traumatized children in our care, it is difficult to know how to help them. A recent study from...

One topic that I have been pondering lately is how families manage adversity and teach their children to be resilient...

A pattern that shows up very often in studies of resilience is a high correlation between resilience and self-esteem...

One of the most important, and difficult, ways that we can encourage resilience in children is to allow them...

One of the better trends in the last decade of caring for children is the recognition that children need to develop...

In my last post, I discussed the 20+ years of research on the possible effects of adverse childhood experiences...

One of the most active areas of mental health studies these days is the effect of adverse childhood experience...

A recent analysis of a national survey indicates that families can help children avoid bullying by developing habits of...

Bullying issues get a lot of attention these days, because everyone wants to spare children the trauma of true bullying...

In our zeal to protect children from trauma, we risk creating more anxiety by protecting them too much...

Two recently-published studies claim that mindfulness training can help children cope with stress in school...

An interesting study from the Yale Child Study Center that works with parents instead of their children is being hailed...