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Swimming in the Sharknado: Managing Trauma Triggers in the Media

10/14/2016

Media is always a potential source for trauma triggers. This election year means that virtually every medium is a sharknado poised to suck you in to its dangerous depths. You do not have to succumb to it, however. With these three tips, you can stay in the moment, manage your reaction to the trigger and make a plan to avoid triggers in the future.

1. Stay in the Moment
One of the first steps you can take toward managing your triggers is to acknowledge what is happening. You may be tempted to distract yourself or avoid the feeling as much as possible. This can be helpful if you are not in a position to evaluate your surroundings, but there is benefit to be had from staying in the moment. If you can, take the time to consider how you are feeling. What sorts of physical responses do you observe as a result of the trigger? Take note of them, so that you can be better prepared to cope with them next time.

Book Review: Please Understand Me

10/1/2016

In Please Understand Me: Character and Temperament Types, authors David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates discuss the differences people display in their thinking, beliefs, desires, and emotions. However, rather than simply recognizing and accepting these differences in others, we tend to pathologize them: “Seeing others around us differing from us, we conclude that these differences in individual behavior are temporary manifestations of madness, badness, stupidity, or sickness.” Having viewed others this way and experienced this kind of treatment myself, I can relate to the authors’ claim that, “our attempts to change spouse, offspring, or others can result in change, but the result is a scar and not a transformation.”

To help create better acceptance and understanding of oneself and others, the book includes the Keirsey Temperament Sorter, a short questionnaire to help readers determine their personality type. The four-letter result will look familiar to anyone who has taken the Myers-Briggs.

App Review: Tyneside Mind Mood Tracker

9/19/2016

Mood Tracker by Tyneside is another simple tracking app, but it focuses solely on your mood. It has you rate your current mood on a simple 1 to 10 scale as many times a day as you feel like it. You can then add notes about that particular rating in a simple journal entry. The tracking will show your high and low for each day, and you can view a week at a time.

Reasons You Need Social Connections (and How to Make Them Easier)

9/12/2016

It feels like a never-ending cycle. When you hit a roadblock in your health, your social life is usually first to go out the window. Then you have to rebuild it again, which can be stressful at times.

With an understanding of the need for social connection and how you can approach social interaction reasonably, you can reduce feelings of isolation and forge new connections that make you happy.

Emotional Support Animals Provide Comfort and More

9/3/2016

Animals support soldiers and civilians through the Red Cross human-bond program. Photo by The US Army.

Pets give us love, comfort and companionship, but some animals are so much more than pets. Many work as service animals, helping those suffering from a variety of physical, emotional or mental challenges in ways that medications can’t. Emotional support animals, in particular, bring therapeutic benefits that are immeasurable to those who utilize their services.

Emotional service animals, or ESAs, help those with disabilities that may not be obvious to the naked eye, such as

Depression
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
Anxiety and social phobias
Bipolar Disorder
Autism spectrum disorder
And more.

Book Review - Highly Sensitive Person

8/28/2016

In The Highly Sensitive Person, psychologist Elaine Aron, PhD describes what it’s like to be an HSP. Comprising 15-20% of the population, people with this trait have nervous systems that are more sensitive to stimulation than average. According to Aron, this increased sensitivity can mean “that you are more easily overwhelmed when you have been in a highly stimulating environment for too long, bombarded by sights and sounds until you are exhausted in a nervous-system sort of way.”

Many people with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) may also relate to the description above. Individuals with BPD are often very sensitive to environmental factors and other forms of stimulation (or lack thereof). For both HSPs and people diagnosed with BPD, there is often an optimal range of stimulation that is very narrow. In fact, there are many parallels between BPD and being an HSP, and Dr. Aron’s book provides information that can be helpful to both groups.

Mood Tracker App Review: Daylio

8/15/2016

Since finding out if there is a pattern to your moods and symptoms is such an important first step in diagnosing, mood tracker apps could be beneficial in establishing a pattern. Mood tracking is documenting your emotions day to day to see if there is any kind of noticeable pattern. An app is a very convenient way to do this and there are dozens, if not hundreds, of apps available for both Android and Apple systems.

Different apps approach mood tracking from different angles, and you might want to try a few if you are trying to narrow down a trigger or environmental influence. Daylio is a mood tracker that keeps is simple and versatile. It’s based around a daily micro-diary concept with a simple mood scale and activity tracking.

Social Media and Politics: Put On Your Flameproof Pants and Enjoy

8/9/2016

Politics and social media are like macaroni and cheese–the really spicy kind with habañero peppers. Take one wrong bite, and you get burned. Once politicians realized how much attention they could gather just by doubling their Facebook posts and tweets from the 2012 election, it took off. Now, the election feels like it’s been going for decades, and your Canadian friends are wondering when it will all be over. Despite the heat of the current political season, if you take care, you can still engage with your friends on social media.

1. Select Appropriate Topics and Venues
When you open your Facebook or Twitter accounts, you will likely find a whole host of political discussions, memes, images and rants all over your feed. Probably the best advice for engagement is to realize that you are not obligated to correct every mistake, teach everyone who seems misguided, or argue with anyone who proposes a debate topic. With this idea in mind, you can freely select the various campaign proposals and positions in any particular venue that you like. You might decide to engage people on your own turf by sharing news stories or asking questions, or you may prefer to argue with others in a group that is not directly connected to your personal account.

Massage Envy? The Importance of Healthy Indulgences

8/6/2016

Our society views alternative healing as a luxury, but our ancient civilizations healed themselves with methods people now view as superfluous or indulgent. New scientific research, along with personal testimonials about the efficacy of modalities such as massage, cranial sacral therapy, acupuncture, frequency, sound therapy and yoga, show that such “luxuries” can be an important way to experience complete healing. We, as patients and care providers, now have more tools to manage a thorough whole-body regimen for the improvement of our health and well-being.

As our stress increases in our environment and our daily lives, so do mental health related symptoms such as depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress syndrome. These diagnoses lead patients to seek outside support through psychotherapy, counseling or alternative modalities. From my experience as a massage therapist, my clients come to me for physical and stress relief rehabilitation for their body. Many times the massage session is sufficient, but other times during the session the client begins to release deeper emotions, memories, patterns and thoughts which creates the need for greater support. When additional support is needed, the integration of mental health and alternative healing arts modalities should be considered.

Meditation for Improved Mental Health: Dealing with the Cause of Stress

8/2/2016

Meditation has been an integral part of many spiritual and religious traditions for thousands of years. However, research into the health benefits of meditation has been relatively recent.

Since the 1950s, hundreds of studies have been conducted on the effects of meditation by measuring changes in the brain and body. Overall, these studies have shown that meditation can have a positive effect on health, particularly mental health.

Politics and Healthy Conversations

7/26/2016

Unlike many topics you may discuss with friends and family, politics is much like a game that requires a strategy. You may feel like every move you make has a land mine. With these steps, you will know how to participate in a meaningful political conversation without losing control or burning bridges.

Tips for Politics Without Anxiety

7/23/2016

Politics is always a hot-button issue, turning even the calmest of conversations into a dumpster fire in record time. Throw anxiety into the mix and you have a volatile combination. But you can participate in election-season discussions without worrying that your anxiety will take control.

Tip #1: Practice in a Safe Setting

Preparing to do the near-impossible (e.g. arguing Trump vs. Hillary without losing your cool) calls for practice. Just as people prepare to give a speech by saying it in front of family members and friends, you can prepare to discuss politics by talking about various political topics in a safe zone. Select people who you know will not start acting like a rabid dog when you disagree with them, so that you can practice without feeling like you’re about to get bit. To start, try a few topics where your opinion is either neutral or at least does not make you want to throat-punch people. That way, you can develop some confidence in your ability to talk through minor disagreements without anticipating angry debate or personal attacks.

Suicidal Ideation: A Personal Story

7/12/2016

The red double doors swing open and the nurses patiently wait for me to say goodbye to my mother. Tears stream down both our faces as I stand up from the wheelchair and hug her tightly.

“Mom, I’m scared.” I say, as my voice cracks.

“You’ll be okay,” she whispers, her hands clasped around mine. “You’ll be okay.”

Just like that she let go and I’m wheeled into the psychiatric unit. The doors make a loud buzzing noise as they clamp shut. I hear them lock behind me simultaneously as a lump of irrational abandonment settles in my stomach. I find myself immediately on the verge of throwing up and I feel my whole body shivering. Why do hospitals always have to be so damn cold?

Dissociation: An Adaptive Defense

7/11/2016

I stare at the TV without seeing what’s on the screen. My mind switches between replaying an upsetting conversation with a loved one from earlier in the week, to an image of myself laying on the couch in the dark, as if I’m watching it all from a distance. I tell myself to get up, to move, or to at least pay attention to the movie, but I remain still, feeling blank, numb, and exhausted. Suddenly, the movie on TV has ended, and I realize I’m unable to recall anything about the plot or the characters.

What I experienced was a form of dissociation, “an adaptive defense in response to high stress or trauma characterized by memory loss and a sense of disconnection from oneself or one's surroundings.”

Dissociation varies in severity, existing as a spectrum from mild dissociative symptoms to dissociative disorders including dissociative amnesia, depersonalization/derealization disorder, and dissociative identity disorder (previously called multiple personality disorder).

Making It Personal: How We Grieve Orlando

6/28/2016

Remember what we were doing after learning about the June 12th massacre at The Pulse?

Remember? We became a nation of somnambulists. In shock, we watched the news for clues. We called family and friends to find out if one of ours was among the dead. Why them and not us? The fear and helplessness engulfed us. Numb, we demanded blame and blood: Who can we shame? Some of us turned to the 'Just-World Hypothesis', targeting groups and making lines between “us” and “them.” Our collective anger served as a crumbling bulwark against the chaos.

3 Therapeutic Benefits of Being a Pet Parent

6/23/2016

Watching your pet enjoy the simple things in life helps you relax and be more mindful overall. Photo by AAS Pups.

You fall in love with a puppy or pick out the perfect aquarium fish and bring it home to be part of your life. Even though you discover being a pet parent has its challenges, you love caring for your pets and find it enriching and rewarding. But did you know it can also be therapeutic?

There’s much evidence, both anecdotal and through various studies, that show pet ownership brings a variety of health advantages that those without pets don’t experience. Read on to discover three therapeutic benefits to being a pet parent.

How Come I'm Not Getting Better?

6/20/2016

Sometimes things treatment-wise don't always go as expected and that can be frustrating for all involved. But there are some common reasons that results are often less than expected.

For example, we professionals miss the diagnosis. We get it wrong. Take the symptom "mood swing." This symptom might be seen in several different diagnoses, such as bipolar disorder, PTSD, substance abuse, domestic violence, or other brain injury. We can misattribute the root source of a symptom and therefore treatment doesn't match or work.

Eyes: Windows to the Soul and Key to Unlocking Negative Emotions

6/14/2016

How many of you - just for the heck of it - randomly dart your eyes around, back and forth, up and down or diagonally? Most of us don’t, unless we’re dreaming and having REM sleep.

Research has found that this rapid eye movement, that occurs in our sleep, plays a significant role in processing and storing information. Rapid eye movement can also help in the healing of trauma, good news for those dealing with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

Expressive Writing Groups Create Compassion

6/3/2016

We sit in a close knit circle, the lights dim yet bright enough to read by. We listen to a version of the fool's journey and it is hard to believe that we are nearing the end of our own journey as a collective. Tonight we will feast on words we've written, reading from a book of potery that we've created individually and as a group.

“Poetry is not merely a luxury for the middle classes – it offers a tough language for those with hard lives.” Jeanette Winterson

It is the final evening of Self Discovery Through Poetry Writing facilitated by Krista Clement at Real Caring. Less than two months have passed since we began this group exploration yet all of us feel we've known each other much longer; word crafting weaves such magic.

One Day Art DBT Intensive: Emotion Regulation

5/30/2016

Learn new skills in a safe, supportive environment, be facilitated in art making and embodied awareness as part of emotional regulation skill building. No prior art experience needed.

Emotion Regulation is the module in which we learn to understand how our emotions work, and the skills we need to manage our emotions instead of being managed by them, to reduce how vulnerable we are to negative emotions, and to build positive emotional experiences.