Blogs
I don’t know how to forever banish the voice in my head that tells me I’m a failure. I know who I am. I know what I have to offer the world. On my worst days, none of it matters because I feel like I’m a failure. On my best, I’ll wake with renewed hope and by day’s end am fighting back tears of angst, staring numbly at the wall.
Research has been fairly consistent in identifying the link between body image issues and eating disorders. Can school-based intervention programs, therefore, help reduce the onset of eating disorders in young people by giving them the tools to develop high body esteem and satisfaction?
Living with complex posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is hard and often makes life feel like a struggle. You may struggle to get out of bed, do your daily chores, put on a good face for those around you, or you may even feel like it's a struggle to live.
Managing cravings is perhaps one of the most challenging barriers you must face in recovery, thus there are numerous benefits to documenting those cravings on an official craving log. If addiction is like an earthquake in our lives, cravings are the continual and sometimes catastrophic tsunamis that follow. I define cravings at the mental, emotional, or physical reminders that tug at your soul and remind you that your addiction still exists. They tend to be at their most extreme in early recovery, but in some cases, cravings can be experienced for years following your sobriety date. So let's see how beneficial a craving log might be for your personal addiction recovery.
Our social life helps us to build and maintain our self-esteem in so many important ways. Friends, family, partners, colleagues, acquaintances, strangers – all these people can help to boost our self-esteem when it’s low, as well as allow us to view ourselves in a more realistic, down-to-earth fashion. (Of course, people can have the opposite effect on our self-esteem, too, but it’s important to distance yourself from such toxic people.)
Mental illness is an invisible force. The suffering it causes is not physical in the same way that the suffering caused by a broken bone is physical. Even a relatively common mental illness like depression often goes unseen. This invisibility can make us feel helpless in proving to others that our illness is real.
Have you ever noticed how an abusive relationship makes you miss out on life? While thinking about what to write for this week's post, I became fixated on the fact I never got to see George Carlin perform live. I had the tickets, I was ready to go, but at the last minute, I decided to back out. Why?
The miracle question might just be one of the most powerful tools you can use to overcome anxiety and creating the quality life you want to live. The concept comes to us from solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT), but versions of it were used in older theories of counseling. It's a question that on the surface is deceptively simple, but when you explore it more deeply, it becomes more than a question. It becomes an answer. Put on your explorer clothes, and let's examine the miracle question so you can use it to overcome anxiety.
I thought I would offer a snapshot of a day into my life with borderline persoanlity disorder (BPD). This account is of a day when my BPD neither calm nor at crisis level, but moderate in strength. There is no such thing as a typical day with borderline personality disorder due to the intense and quickly changing emotions associated with this condition.
I have been asked recently, "Can I voluntarily give myself dissociative identity disorder?" For most of us with DID, our first reaction is to wonder why anyone would ever want to? The truth is, however, I have shockingly come across individuals inquiring how they can develop the disorder. Well, the answer to whether you can voluntarily give yourself the disorder is unequivocally no, you cannot.
I've had those same feelings. I used to get upset that I left a part of me behind and that I would never get it back. Now that I'm almost 11 years out, I've realized she served her purpose and that something even better was waiting for me. It's a new improved me. You WILL find her. Just be patient and kind to yourself in the process. Give her time to grow. <3
Love and light-Jenn