Mad? Sad? Glad? Scared? Ashamed? These are some of the words therapists use to help get their clients started on identifying their feelings. You might be using these words, among many others, to identify your own feelings. If so, good for you! However, you might also find yourself to be not so comfortable in talking […]
I often talk to clients who seem to approaching the holiday season with a sense of dread. Their focus is on avoidance. Not spending too much. Not eating too much. Not being too busy. And when I hear about their sense of dread, I just have to ask them where the joy is. So a […]
We live in very uncertain times. No one better understands how to live with uncertainty than someone who has been coping with a chronic condition. Living with all that uncertainty can pack an emotional wallop. Fear. Sadness. Disappointment. Anger. Over time, sitting with these feelings can lead to anxiety, constant worrying: What’s gonna happen to […]
My colleagues in the mental health professions have often lamented the lack of emergency mental health assistance available to individuals experiencing a mental health crisis. We have had to rely on services available through 911 which, while able to respond to an emergency, are not trained mental health professionals and therefore not able to provide […]
We are hearing a lot about unconscious bias these days. Along with many examples of what unconscious bias looks like, how it affects the ways in which we communicate, how it harms those who are the victims of unconscious bias. We hear about it in the media, of course. We see examples of it in […]
We toss the word “advocate” around a lot. I don’t think that’s a bad idea at all. In this complicated world we live in, it is important to advocate for ourselves, and to teach our children to advocate for themselves. And for sure, in the healthcare world, being your own advocate is especially important. With […]
My clients often me that, when they received their diagnosis, they told their doctor to just treat them. Essentially, they didn’t want to be involved in their treatment. This is at its core another form of denial, because by giving your doctor all the power, you are also avoiding becoming educated. Sure, it can be […]
I often speak with clients who are returning from work after a leave of absence, and even wrote an article awhile back addressing this issue. It’s not an easy process to find your way back into the workplace after being on leave, whether for medical or mental health reasons. However, a client recently expressed concern […]
So here we are at the end of 2021 and the beginning of 2022. Yes, it’s that time of year when we’re hit with those “best of the year” and “worst of the year” lists. I wouldn’t be surprised if you were doing your own year-end review, thinking about what happened and what didn’t happen, […]
It’s been a rough road, this COVID-19 pandemic. Right? It’s been rough in many different ways, and I suspect we all share some of the ways in which living during these times has been challenging. As a mental health professional, I’ve been thinking and talking and presenting and writing about mental health impact of COVID. […]