Ep 70 When Worry Doesn't Go Away: Helping Kids Understand Their Emotions with Dr. Louise Mansell

In this episode of Conversations with Kristi, Kristi sits down with clinical psychologist Dr. Louise Mansell to explore a powerful question:

Why are we waiting so long to teach children how to understand and manage their emotions?

Dr. Louise shares how her early experiences supporting her own mother through anxiety shaped her career, and how years of working with children-particularly those experiencing trauma-revealed a major gap in how we support emotional development.

Rather than accepting that gap, she created a solution.

Introducing Tedology - an innovative, therapeutic teddy bear designed to help children understand, regulate, and process their emotions in a safe and accessible way.

Together, Kristi and Dr. Louise unpack why children aren’t meant to “get rid” of emotions like worry, how emotional suppression impacts long-term wellbeing, and why early emotional education has the potential to change entire generations.

This conversation is warm, honest, and deeply practical. It challenges common parenting approaches and offers a new way of thinking about how children can be supported-long before issues become overwhelming.

Content Covered in This Episode

Why emotional education needs to start earlier

The difference between regulating emotions vs. avoiding them

Why children can’t (and shouldn’t) “get rid” of worry

How unprocessed emotions impact mental and physical health