Okay, first of all, I didn’t even know that you could go to rehab for anxiety. Second of all, uh, SIGN ME UP!

Seriously though. Rehab? For anxiety? How is that even a thing? Don’t we all have anxiety? Especially us women? Especially us women who are moms who are trying to do way too much and feeling way too guilty that we aren’t able to be super human and be every place all the time and may, therefore, be failing our children?  

Reality check. Anxiety comes with that little territory known as life. I know plenty of moms who suffer from it.  But you know what? We don’t go into rehab. Know why? We don’t have nannies and housekeepers to take care of our homes and kids and jobs while we’re finger painting and talking about our feelings to a person highly paid to listen.

Not like Chynna Phillips, she of Wilson Phillips fame. She who is married to actor Billy Baldwin. I’m not saying she can’t get stressed out like the rest of us. I’m sure she has her issues. I mean,  it couldn’t have been easy to hear that her dad was carrying on an incestuous relationship with her half sister MacKenzie Phillips for 10 years. Heck, maybe that news brought up all kinds of terrible memories from her own childhood in relation to her dad. In which case, get the help you need Chynna!

Then again, maybe Chynna’s just fed up with the other-focus of motherhood. I mean, when you’ve been a pop star and the center of attention for so long, it’s hard to then realize you’re over forty, your best bikini years behind you, and that you’ve spent the last few years of your life focusing on everyone else but yourself.  Also, she’s 42 so it’s likely that whole perimenopause thing has started rearing it’s ugly head. And there’s nothing like a two week period to make a gal really, really cranky.

The point is that most of us regular moms don’t have the luxury of checking out from our lives for a few weeks to deal with our anxiety.

No, we make due with our limited resources. Instead of finger painting and talking to paid professionals, we set up a table where our kids can fingerpaint while we talk about our feelings to our mommy friends who do listen for FREE. And I don’t know about you, but my girlfriends are some of the best listeners and therapists on the planet. They’ve gotten me through some pretty rough times.

Yep. There’s nothing like a good girlfriend to take the edge off the anxiety. Also, sometimes, margaritas and meds don’t hurt.  And the best part of it all, no deductibles.

Poor Chynna. Maybe she doesn’t have the kind of girlfriends I have.  Which just goes to show you that even people who seem to have everything, don’t always.

My girlfriend Terena gave me this for my B-Day. It says it all.

Available at www.TraylorPapers.com