When clients ask me, “Why did you become a therapist?”, my usual response is: “If you knew my childhood history, you’d understand.” According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in five Americans has been sexually molested as a child; one in four…
Does your life feel too boring and predictable? Maybe you need to have an adventure: if you have a little time and a bit of money, that’s all you need. People think that you need to spend a lot of money to go away on…
It’s probably not what you think: I don’t have a problem with drinking. Before I stopped, I rarely had more than two drinks at any occasion, and I often didn’t drink anything alcoholic for a week or two. So why have I stopped then? Years’…
When you left your teenage years and entered your twenties, did you ever feel that you were falling apart? If so, you’re not alone. It’s also true for those of us in our thirties, forties and upwards. Most of us head into “grown-up” life with…
The longer I work as a psychotherapist, the more amazed I am at how we all – myself included – keep doing things that make us unhappy. Call it a pattern or a habit, whatever you call it, we keep repeating behaviors and thoughts that…
Some subjects are timeless, like love. Many self-help gurus say stuff like, “You can’t love anyone else if you don’t love yourself.” Sounds good, but, what does that mean? Loving yourself is a process, it doesn’t happen overnight. It progresses – in stops and starts…
Traditionally, PTSD has stood for “post traumatic stress disorder”. It describes how we may have to tough it out to get through something traumatic (war, rape, bodily harm) and then, when it’s over, we typically “collapse” into a big, ole mess. In this after-the-trauma-is-over phase,…
Does this sound familiar? You don’t feel well. Sure enough you’ve got a cold/the flu and your body feels like crap. You’re sick. Your mental state begins to suffer too. You grow increasingly pessimistic, wonder if you’ll ever get over this “thing”, start to watch…
I don’t consider myself religious, but I do consider myself to be on a spiritual path. I want a kind of spirituality that is practical: something I can use every day to enjoy my life more. Spirituality can exist within the context of religion or…
Fatigued from an overload of shopping, spending, and travel? You’re not alone. Most people describe this time of year – Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, New Year’s Eve and other celebrated holidays – as stressful instead of enjoyable. A 2016 telephone survey conducted by the American Psychological…
