Who among us didn’t grow up with Big Bird, Elmo and the whole gang teaching us how to navigate our emotions and the wider world? “Sesame Street” has been instrumental in my own children’s lives. When we were potty-training, there was an episode for that. When it was time to give up the pacifier, there was a jingle for that (“Bye Bye, Binky”).

“Sesame Street” taught our children kindness and sharing. But lately the show has been tackling ever-more mature topics — with dubious results.

In 2017, “Sesame Street” added a Muppet with autism to teach children about neurological differences. The character, Julia, was very well-received. In August, however, the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network, the group that helped create the Julia character, cut ties with the show because of its affiliation with a different, more controversial, organization, Autism Speaks. Autism Speaks had previously argued that autism can be cured.

But while the execution of this storyline may have stumbled, at least the Julia character made sense. Kids should learn that there are all different kinds of people in the world, with different kinds of needs. Teaching children how to deal with those needs is exactly what “Sesame Street” is about.

But the addition of a recent character, a bright green Muppet named Karli, is far less compatible with the show’s target audience and core message.

Karli is a foster child, and in a recent episode, it was revealed that she is in foster care because her mother is seeking treatment for opioid addiction. Karli will meet 10-year-old Salia, a real girl whose parents have also struggled with addiction. Viewers are introduced to Salia’s family, and she tells us, “They were gone for 60 days. But it felt like 60 years.” Crushing stuff.

It’s terrible that any child has to learn about addiction at a young age. A child is in foster care or stays with relatives, like Salia did, because her mother is in rehab — it breaks our collective hearts.

It’s a devastating story, one that often has no happy ending. It’s hard for adults to hear — why subject children to it?

I’m extremely sensitive to the opioid epidemic. As I wrote in these pages in February, I have had close friends die of overdoses. And I confessed that I want to scare my own children out of ever using drugs: “It’s poison. You will die. I don’t want to go to your ­funeral and sit in the front row, shaking and shell-shocked like my friend’s mother. I want you to live.”

But I meant that for when they grow older and learn to understand our fallen world’s darknesses. I talk to my 9-year-old about drugs. I told my 6-year-old about the loss of my friend. I’m not imploring my 3-year-old, who has already aged out of watching “Sesame Street,” to lay off drugs. Teens and tweens, meanwhile, don’t watch “Sesame Street,” a show meant for preschoolers.

All a small child will hear is that a character’s mother is gone. That’s pushing fear on kids without the necessary context: Will my mother have to go, too? Will I be left with people I don’t know?

We keep hanging these serious issues on ever-younger kids, and it’s causing them lasting damage.

Last year, The Washington Post reported that in the “National Survey of Children’s Health for ages 6 to 17, researchers found a 20 percent increase in diagnoses of anxiety between 2007 and 2012.”

When we fail to protect our children from all the scary things they will face in the adult world, it’s no surprise that they experience a spike in adult ailments like anxiety.

Lying awake at night worrying about the things that can go wrong — in your family, in your life, in the world — should be the province of grown-ups, not toddlers. “Sesame Street” has a lot to teach children about how to be good people. It shouldn’t teach them to be grown-ups until they have to be.

Twitter: @Karol