Deliberately harming yourself or having an impulse to is a sign of emotional distress. It is not uncommon, especially in adolescents, to self-harm. On the surface, it may appear to occur only when you have difficulty managing emotions and don’t have proper coping skills. This is too commonly used [...]
Co-parenting is a special case within the broader category of parenting and family therapy. Two situations are most common to co-parenting difficulties: (1) where separated parents get help maintaining coordination and consistency in their parenting strategies without being in romantic [...]
Workplace appreciation is the most important motivation for employees. Timely recognition of your value, work quality, and effort put forth are directly related to job satisfaction. This dedication to the employer greatly increases employee retention. Motivated employees are more likely to maintain [...]
Difficulty paying off debt and living within your means can show up in other areas of your life, causing an emotional toll. The fear of your inability to provide for yourself can manifest in many ways for an extended period of time. Poor decisions with money can lead to a poor credit rating, which [...]
Grief is one of those universal life experiences from which a person never really recovers but learns to cope with and grow through. When we lose people we love, the world is permanently changed. This is the price we pay as humans for the richness that our loved ones bring to our lives. Although[...]
Gender identity is a spectrum that describes to which degree a person perceives and recognizes their inner knowledge and outer expression of gender. Generally, this is the consistency between anatomical sex and the person’s internal maleness or femaleness or combination or neutrality. There are [...]
It’s my responsibility as a mental health professional to remember the history of the American Psychiatric Association’s diagnostic manual. Sexual orientation and identities were considered diagnoses that came with stigma and suffering. Homosexuality was considered a diagnosis until 1973, and [...]
Social expectations of being the perfect parent can be overwhelming. It’s common to feel useless over the thought of not being able to cope with your new responsibilities, or hopeless when the natural motherly feelings you expected aren’t present. Women and men across all socio-economic [...]
Life is a process of constant change. Sometimes, major life transitions can throw us out of balance to the point where we lose access to some important aspects of our experience, we lose our sense of grounding and routines, or we disrupt our connections to others. Very brief, highly targeted [...]
Humans experience stress as a natural reaction to meet a demand or challenge. This “fight or flight” survival mechanism slows normal bodily functions like immunity and digestion to focus on breath, alertness, blood circulation, and muscle movement. The degree to which we react can be [...]