Ollie turned six last week.

If I’m honest, I don’t have many memories from the past six years outside of the blur of him transforming quickly from a wriggling little worm into the bright, moody weirdo he is today. Somewhere in there he learned to crawl and then to walk and then to talk, his brother Nolan was born, we moved from Los Angeles to Portland, he started preschool and learned to read and write and do math. He became obsessed with bowling, then calendars and clocks, then “trick shots”. I spent too much time trying to make it through the day. I spent too much time working. I was there with him, I witnessed it, but it happened so fast and I was always also somewhere else—worried about money and my business and my health and our future.

I’m an anxious person. It started when I was a teenager and got worse through college. Those days, it was mostly limited to the stress of school, making money, trying to figure out what to do with my life.

Things took a pretty sharp turn on September 11, 2001, when I spent that morning across the street from the World Trade Center. Suddenly, I found myself afraid to fly, ride the subway, hang out in crowded areas. Work stress gave me more anxiety than ever. Relationship issues magnified. I had several panic attacks. Travel was difficult, sleeping was difficult, everything was difficult.