Parental stress is an urgent public health crisis, according to a 2024 U.S. Surgeon General report that found nearly half of parents and caregivers face daily pressures that they feel are “completely overwhelming.”
A panel of experts convened recently at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health to discuss how parents can care for themselves while raising healthy children and what communities and governments can do to help.
Karestan Koenen, a professor of psychiatric epidemiology at the Chan School, kicked off the discussion by acknowledging the unique strains on parents today.
“The first thing I want to say is that there isn’t anything wrong with the parents themselves,” she said. “I think when we’re stressed as parents, we often blame ourselves, but parents are facing so many systemic challenges. Challenges coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, challenges with lower incomes, higher childcare costs, community supports being eroded, the barrage of information from social media and global events.”
“I think when we’re stressed as parents, we often blame ourselves, but parents are facing so many systemic challenges.”Karestan Koenen
