What if the answer to an increasingly connected, anxious childhood is to go backwards?

Vanessa Feltz and child therapist Saskia Joss explore the growing “90s summer” trend, where parents are swapping packed schedules, constant screen time and endless online stimulation for bikes, books, boredom, playing outside and a little more freedom.

But can you really take the phones away without making summer feel like a punishment?

Vanessa and Saskia discuss what children may have lost as childhood has become more connected, why real life can struggle to compete with the intensity of screens, and how parents can recreate the best parts of their own childhood without pretending the 1990s were perfect.

Plus, they answer a listener whose eight-year-old daughter's friend has started her period. How early should parents talk to children about puberty, periods and their changing bodies?

Help! My Child's Anxious is hosted by broadcaster Vanessa Feltz and her daughter, child therapist Saskia Joss, offering practical advice for parents navigating childhood anxiety, emotions and everyday family life.

Watch this episode on Youtube:

https://youtu.be/LyXkogjdxT8

In this episode of Help! My Child’s Anxious, hosts Vanessa Feltz and Saskia Joss are joined by child, family, and adult psychotherapist Zara Kadir (from The Therapy Shed) to explore how anxiety and neurodiversity intersect in children.

Zara shares insights from both her professional practice and her personal journey parenting a son with ADHD. The conversation dives into the common ways anxiety manifests—from school avoidance and separation anxiety to phobias and rejection sensitivity dysphoria (RSD)—and offers practical strategies for parents.

Topics covered include:

• Understanding Accommodation vs. Support: Why removing every anxiety trigger can accidentally make fears bigger, and how parents can "outsource confidence" and stay grounded instead.
• Scaffolding for Neurodivergent Kids: Practical tips for building routines, using executive-function tools (like dementia alarm clocks), and setting up intentional morning systems.
• Managing Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (RSD): How to reduce shame, believe your child’s lived experience, and sit with their big emotions without rushing to fix them.
• The Impact on Siblings: Addressing the "tyranny of the weak" dynamics, balancing attention, and ensuring siblings of neurodivergent children aren't forgotten or forced into premature responsibility.
• Practical Co-Parenting: Simple team strategies for partners, including burn-out code words and avoiding post-bedtime debrief fatigue.

A seven-minute walk was taking Shakira Akabusi three and a half hours. From the outside, nobody had a clue.

In this episode of Help! My Child is Anxious, Vanessa Feltz and child therapist Saskia Joss sit down with women's health expert and StrongLikeMum founder Shakira Akabusi to talk about body anxiety, OCD, and what happened when pregnancy pulled the floor out from under her.

Shakira grew up in a sporting family with an Olympian father, and still ended up with obsessive-compulsive disorder so severe it cancelled a family holiday at the airport check-in desk. She talks openly about the compulsions, the isolation of new motherhood, and how she recovered through hypnotherapy, talk therapy and movement, without medication.

Then the conversation turns practical. Saskia explains why compulsions are really an attempt to control something uncontrollable, and why pregnancy so often brings buried fears to the surface. Shakira shares what actually works for families: the after-dinner walk, the indoor obstacle course, the kitchen dance, and why the word "workout" puts most parents off before they start.

If you are the parent holding everything together and quietly running on empty, this one is for you. Anxiety does not only live in the head. It lives in the body too, and that is often the easier door to open.

Watch this episode on Youtube:

https://youtu.be/dJKxakAG5F0