I know exactly when my severe math anxiety began: with my third-grade teacher, Miss S. (I am afraid to write her full name because even if she is no longer among the living, her ghost will most certainly come roaring back and thrust more work sheets at me).

Long story short: In elementary school, I tested out of second grade on the strength of my reading and writing skills; my math skills were appropriately grade level. (I had that finger-counting thing down cold.) But when Miss S. realized the new student had never been taught three-digit computation, she pressed her lips together, rolled her eyes, and, during math lessons, made me drag a chair past the new, older kids, and sit out in the hall. For weeks.

Things went downhill from there. And as my math grades went into free-fall, my math-adept father did not exactly keep his disappointment to himself.

As an adult, I am a walking cliché of math anxiety.

I so much wanted my girls to be confident, math-strong achievers. I was going to model upbeat, positive, math ’tude. I made dozens of flashcards, preparing to drill them so they could chant math facts in their sleep. (I wouldn’t know a logarithm from logorrhea, but I can figure out change in my head because I was taught rote memorization.)