Introduction Imagine the driver of a school bus and his dilemma when a student refuses to get off at his stop. The first-grader sits in her seat crying because, as usual, she can't see her mother from the bus window. The mother is as always in the courtyard waiting for her child, but she sees that the bus is moving away. Frustrated driver takes child back to school. An irate principal meets with parent about child-shaming incident as she throws her hands in the air and says, "I have kindergartners who walk home alone!" The distraught parent intervenes with the principal's inappropriate statements, but leaves having to acknowledge the reality of a new manifestation of an ongoing problem. She was diagnosed with separation anxiety disorder at the age of seven. Separation anxiety is said to have a childhood onset before the average age of any specific phobia. Are children with separation anxiety related to adult anxiety disorders? Studies are linking childhood separation anxiety and increased risk of later disorders in adulthood. There is an estimated 33% to 40% chance that a child diagnosed with Separation Anxiety Disorder (SAD) will develop another psychiatric disorder between the ages of nineteen and thirty. Continuing studies will help clinicians understand and develop preventive treatment for children with SAD in adulthood (Lewinsohn, Holm-Denoma, & Joiner, 2008). A Review of the Literature Childhood Separation Anxiety DisorderSeparation anxiety disorder (SAD) is prevalent in 4.1% of children aged 7 to 11 years and 3.9% in children aged 12 to 14 years in the United States (“Related Separation Anxiety Disorder,” n.d.). The onset of SAD is most common between the ages of seven and t... half of article ......Separation anxiety in patients with adult separation anxiety disorder. Journal of Personality Disorders, 25(1), 128-133. doi:10.1521/pedi.2011.25.1.128Silove, D. M., Marnane, C. L., Wagner, R., Manicavasagar, V. L., & Rees, S. (2010). The prevalence and correlates of adult separation anxiety disorder in an anxiety clinic. BMC Psychiatry, 10(21). http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-244X-10-21 Understanding anxiety disorders. (n.d.). Retrieved April 26, 2014, from the University of Texas Harris County Psychiatric Center website: http://www.uth.tmc.edu/uth_orgs/hcpc/understanding_anxiety_disorders.htm#ad_sep Walkup, J.T. (January 26, 2012). The best medications for children with anxiety The best medications for children with anxiety. Retrieved April 27, 2014, from http://www.childmind.org/en/posts/articles/2012-1-26-best-medications-kids-anxiety