While the holiday season brings joy and makes festive family time, it can also become stressful, as one in five parents are experiencing high holiday stress to the point of negatively affecting their children, according to The C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health. The extra shopping and holiday tasks accounted for most of the stresses for parents (31 percent), followed by keeping family healthy amid the COVID-19 case uptick (30 percent) and balancing household finances (29 percent). Holiday preparations including planning for family gatherings (23 percent), making special holiday meals (22 percent), and getting criticism from family members when negotiating holiday plans (14 percent) also produce stress. “Excessive parental stress can add tension and diminish the joy children associate with the season,” Sarah Clark, co-director of Mott Poll and research scientist in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Michigan, told Neuroscience News. One in five …