I stopped following daily news years ago. The vast majority of news stories are superficial, irrelevant to my life, and filled with negativity. I don’t buy newspapers, don’t watch the news on TV, and most days don’t open a news site either. (I keep up with the big stuff by reading The Economist to make sure I’m not completely ignorant of what is going on in the world.)

My news avoidance has become more pronounced over the past year. Firstly, of course, I have less spare time. But now I also find myself actively avoiding the news, because so much of the headline news is about bad things happening to people.

Some kind of wiring deep in the brain must change when you become a mother. I find it almost impossible to read/see news or books or movies about children being harmed or dying. Getting sick, run over, mugged… The closer the children are in age to Ingrid, the more the stories affect me. I feel tears coming up, and a sense of vicarious grief / panic / distress. I have to turn another page or walk away. If I don’t, I can all to easily imagine what it might feel like to have that happen to my child. And I cannot face that. I stop myself the moment I feel my thoughts going in that direction, because if I continue, I will be overwhelmed.