Blogs
If you're anything like me, family might be a touchy subject for you or possibly even an addiction trigger depending on your family's level of dysfunction. Childhood trauma, emotional gaslighting, and psychological abuse are all possible factors when determining a family's dysfunctional nature. For some individuals who endure these experiences as an adolescent, it can possibly lead to a life of addiction, mental health concerns, or for some a life of crime and incarceration. In my experience, the difficulties I have faced with my dysfunctional family certainly impacted the probability of my addiction and mental health diagnosis'; and even many years later, I've learned that my family can be a huge trigger for me.
Taking a vacation when you have schizoaffective disorder and there’s a pandemic going on can be very tricky. But I went for a weekend getaway to Door County in northern Wisconsin with my mom a couple of weeks ago--our annual Mother-Daughter trip--and we had a very good time.
Anxiety has many nasty effects, one of which can be making us too nice, too passive. I'm guilty of this. While I do consider myself to be genuinely kind and considerate of others, I often take this characteristic a bit too far, putting my own thoughts and emotions aside and even altering my actions for the sake of others.
As a kid, anytime I watched TV, read a book, or engaged in an activity where I had to sit for long periods, I would rock back and forth. To my parents, watching me rock backward and bang the back of my head up against the couch was no odd site since my brother was also a "headbanger" as they would jokingly call it.
However, up until recently, I learned that my means of self-soothing as a child is called stimming—and there's a connection between self-stimulatory behavior (stimming) and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Dealing with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at work can be stressful. Navigating flashbacks, panic attacks, and hypervigilance is difficult in any setting, but managing these symptoms in a workplace can feel impossible. When you're constantly worrying about judgment from your coworkers and peers, it can be hard to focus on the job at hand.
Most of us are well aware of the importance of a strong work ethic to succeed in one's professional life, but the idea of a healthy rest ethic isn't well known. In fact, thanks to today's hustle culture which demands that we work as much as possible, we are acutely overworked across generations. Irrespective of what certain people in positions of power want us to believe, overworking, also known as hustling, is bad for the mind and body.
You're going to need to talk to people about your bipolar disorder. It doesn't matter what stage of the illness you are in -- just after diagnosis, deep into treatment or in remission -- you need other people to know about your mental illness. So let's talk about why you need to talk to people about your bipolar and how to do it.
It’s the middle of the summertime, and every day is hot and humid. I hate this time of year; I find this kind of weather so anxiety-provoking and draining.
Building healthier self-esteem takes courage. Your courage will help you make the changes you choose to make to your actions and attitudes that will allow you to feel more confident and self-reliant. But where do you find the courage to become the person you wish to be? How do you begin to practice courage to build strong self-esteem?
As the eyes and ears of American society are fixed on dismantling more than 400 years of racial injustice at this pivotal moment in time, the intersection of racial trauma and eating disorders must be part of this broader conversation.
In 1998, aged 32, I finally sought professional help for lifelong fight with depression. I was diagnosed with dysthymia (mild depression) and put on a variety of meds until 2007. The meds failed miserably and I admitted myself to the local psychiatric hospital in a suicidal state. My doctor's parting words were "maybe it wasn't dysthymia after all". I left the hospital rebranded atypical rapid cycling bipolar II and given a new set of meds. They failed miserably. About three years ago, I found a trauma specialist who diagnosed me with CPTSD and a dissociative disorder. She, a new psychiatrist and my integrative physician agreed I needed to get off the useless meds. It has taken three years of slowly lowering the dose of each. *Today* is the first day in 22 years I haven't taken a psych med.
The trauma therapy has worked. I believe deep in my core that I have finally emerged from my hell and that two decades of meds kept me there.