Upper-middle-class kids are now considered high risk due to 'toxic achievement culture'
Kids in families who make around $130K a year are two to six times more likely to suffer from anxiety, depression and substance abuse disorders.
Upper middle class kids are now considered high-risk.
When people think about kids who are at-risk, the image of an upper-middle-class child doesn't typically come to mind. In fact, even writing that upper middle-class children as a group are considered at-risk feels awkward. There are children who are food insecure, or are at risk of losing housing or have little to no stability at all, but the risk facing children in upper-middle-class kids, specifically, is different.
Kids in families that make around $130K or more are at high risk for "toxic achievement culture," which can lead to increased instances of mental health conditions.
"So these kids are at-risk, meaning they are two to six times more likely than the average American teen to suffer from clinical levels of anxiety, depression and substance abuse disorder," Jennifer Breheny Wallace, author of "Never Enough," told CBS Mornings.
Surprisingly, the likelihood increases further among upper-middle-class children of color when compared to their inner-city minority kids with fewer privileges.
Wallace explains that minority children have the excess pressure to achieve with the added layer of discrimination, which leads to their higher likelihood of having those mental illnesses. It seems backward since most parents work really hard to be able to afford their children a better lifestyle than what they themselves may have grown up with. But it seems once you're in a certain tax bracket, the pressure is on and it's crushing children in its wake.
Parents don't have to sit by and cross their fingers, though. Wallace mentions several things parents can do to keep their children from falling into this toxic achievement trap. The first thing experts interviewed for her book told her was that parents need to have an adjustable bar when it comes to what their expectations are of their children.
"Teach them good, healthy work habits. Teach them how to build a life of play and downtime and family time, that they don't need substances to escape from," Wallace says. "That's really the job of a parent."
One of the things most helpful for children who were "healthy achieving," is that they felt like they mattered in their home for who they are at their core. So it turns out, there isn't a super secret magic formula that's difficult to replicate—it seems to be showing your kids that they themselves are valuable outside of how well they do in school, sports or other extra-curricular activities.
The entire interview can be viewed below:
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A Generation Jones teenager poses in her room.Image via Wikmedia Commons
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An angry man eating spaghetti.via 
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Woman gives toddler a bath Canva
An Irish woman went to the doctor for a routine eye exam. She left with bright neon green eyes.
It's not easy seeing green.
Did she get superpowers?
Going to the eye doctor can be a hassle and a pain. It's not just the routine issues and inconveniences that come along when making a doctor appointment, but sometimes the various devices being used to check your eyes' health feel invasive and uncomfortable. But at least at the end of the appointment, most of us don't look like we're turning into The Incredible Hulk. That wasn't the case for one Irish woman.
Photographer Margerita B. Wargola was just going in for a routine eye exam at the hospital but ended up leaving with her eyes a shocking, bright neon green.
At the doctor's office, the nurse practitioner was prepping Wargola for a test with a machine that Wargola had experienced before. Before the test started, Wargola presumed the nurse had dropped some saline into her eyes, as they were feeling dry. After she blinked, everything went yellow.
Wargola and the nurse initially panicked. Neither knew what was going on as Wargola suddenly had yellow vision and radioactive-looking green eyes. After the initial shock, both realized the issue: the nurse forgot to ask Wargola to remove her contact lenses before putting contrast drops in her eyes for the exam. Wargola and the nurse quickly removed the lenses from her eyes and washed them thoroughly with saline. Fortunately, Wargola's eyes were unharmed. Unfortunately, her contacts were permanently stained and she didn't bring a spare pair.
- YouTube youtube.com
Since she has poor vision, Wargola was forced to drive herself home after the eye exam wearing the neon-green contact lenses that make her look like a member of the Green Lantern Corps. She couldn't help but laugh at her predicament and recorded a video explaining it all on social media. Since then, her video has sparked a couple Reddit threads and collected a bunch of comments on Instagram:
“But the REAL question is: do you now have X-Ray vision?”
“You can just say you're a superhero.”
“I would make a few stops on the way home just to freak some people out!”
“I would have lived it up! Grab a coffee, do grocery shopping, walk around a shopping center.”
“This one would pair well with that girl who ate something with turmeric with her invisalign on and walked around Paris smiling at people with seemingly BRIGHT YELLOW TEETH.”
“I would save those for fancy special occasions! WOW!”
“Every time I'd stop I'd turn slowly and stare at the person in the car next to me.”
“Keep them. Tell people what to do. They’ll do your bidding.”
In a follow-up Instagram video, Wargola showed her followers that she was safe at home with normal eyes, showing that the damaged contact lenses were so stained that they turned the saline solution in her contacts case into a bright Gatorade yellow. She wasn't mad at the nurse and, in fact, plans on keeping the lenses to wear on St. Patrick's Day or some other special occasion.
While no harm was done and a good laugh was had, it's still best for doctors, nurses, and patients alike to double-check and ask or tell if contact lenses are being worn before each eye test. If not, there might be more than ultra-green eyes to worry about.