Wanna kill Christmas?
As we in TwoWiseChicks said in our last, we know it: this time of year is very difficult for some. With that in mind I was invited to write a piece for Voiceboks.com which is a great parenting site, and I was greatly honoured this year to be asked to be a feature writer for their site!
Christmas can be wonderful and fun and festive! I do love it actually. Mostly.
And yes, Christmas can also be a difficult time. At best it’s somewhat stressful, and at worst, deeply, horribly painful.
Well.. Ok.. there are probably many things they are not telling you but there’s one in particular we’re talking about here.
One of the benefits of having an almost crystal clear memory (of the horrors) of being an angst-ridden teen is that it helps when you’re an adult to empathize with teen concerns. And whatever your role, parent, teacher, therapist, when you’re trying to help, empathy is far more useful than irritation, helplessness, anger or frustration (speaking from personal experience, that is). You’ll probably be familiar with those feelings..?!
It’s always nice to hear from a previous client.
As therapists, we have a privileged opportunity to share a precious part of our clients’ journey through pain, crisis, vulnerability – but we usually do not get to hear about the “what happened next?”. Often, after the work is ‘done’, our minds wander back to our clients and we can only hope that things are going well. Hope that our relationship however brief, had some positive influence, that they are happier now. Continue reading
Make your bed!!
Now I know you’re not all teenagers reading this – and I have no wish to trigger memories of irritating parental demands, but I want you to make your bed.
And I have a really good reason for this. I believe you will feel better when your bed’s made.
It’s been something of a theme this month with client work, a sneaking sense of disorder, an un-ease. Maybe it has to do with settling back into an Autumn routine. A lot of us feel we are back to work, back to school, back to the damn Winter.
Here’s a quote I love: “When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.” – CS Lewis
I’m a supporter of all things colouring and make ‘n do – you may have deduced this from a quick glance at the pics I use on this site…You may also have noticed the new colouring craze for adults, and you can’t have not noticed the explosion in online gaming and so on.. Are we going back to play as our world gets more and more serious?
This is Suicide Prevention Month 2015, indeed as I type this it’s World Suicide Prevention Day. Twitter is alive with useful information and resources, talks and seminars are taking place all over the world – and it’s great. And for me, every day should be suicide prevention day.
I listened to Dr Harry Barry speak today about how to reach our young people before they consider suicide. It was great to hear someone echo my thoughts, and those of my fellow professionals. Prevention is key.
Bottom line: we need to “get to” children before they start down the road of hopelessness.
Not a week goes by that a therapist doesn’t hear about a client or a client’s friend self-harming. This is particularly true of therapists who work with teenagers – lately it feels like something of an epidemic.
After first hearing about self-harming behaviour – which usually takes the form of cutting, scraping, hitting or otherwise causing injury to the self – parents and friends usually react in one of two ways:
I intentionally steer away from politics on this site. But it occurs to me that the issue of marriage equality is not a political issue. It’s a human rights issue.
I have friends, family and clients who have been canvassing and have been horrified and hurt by the judgement that they are meeting on Irish doorsteps. As a nation this lack of compassion for each other and for ourselves is at the root of much of our misery. We would do well to work towards change.
I think it was Goodfellas, definitely a mafia film, where I saw the following scene: This guy owed our hero, his friend, $10. Our hero was having a lot of trouble retrieving the money, he kept on trying but his ‘friend’ was creative with excuses.
We’ve all been there right?
