This is Us - Lessons from William Hill
My wife and I are a little late to the game in discovering the NBC show This is Us (we rarely get to watch TV due to having a couple little ones), but we finally started watching. As with the rest of America, we’ve been captivated by the family dynamics, and the obvious affection the characters have for each other. In particular, I fell in love with William. The biological father that Randall finally just met at 36 years of age, and at a time when William is already in the end stages of cancer.
How Do I Not Burden My Family?
Millions of people are coping with mental health issues at this very moment. It could be anxiety, depression, ADHD, or chronic stress. It’s pretty common to walk through life shouldering these burdens by ourselves.
Nobody wants to burden family, friends, or acquaintances with their problems.
Unfortunately, this means that the majority of people with mental health concerns end up not receiving appropriate treatment or support. Only one-third of those with a diagnosable anxiety disorder reach out for help!
How to Find the Best Therapist for You
You’ve struggled for long enough with the stress and constant worry and decided it’s time to work with a therapist. But what’s the next step?
It’s not like you’ve done this 100 times before like meeting with your family physician. How do you know who’s good? How can you trust someone you don’t even know?
Searching for a therapist can be just as scary as the thought of going on with the issues that have you thinking of getting help in the first place!
Here are some tips that will hopefully make the process a little less stressful for you, and help you to find the therapist that fits with your personality and needs
How to Stop Those Pesky Negative Thoughts
You had a good day. Got the kids to bed without too much fuss and they didn’t kill each other. Enjoyed dinner with the family and it felt like things were going well.
Then it happens. Out of nowhere, the little dark angel in your head reminds you of how yesterday wasn’t so hot. In fact, it says that yesterday you were a failure as a parent.
It starts off quiet, but before you know it, all you can think about is the many mistakes you’ve made. You focus on how everybody else is a better parent than you. You know your kids are going to be messed up as adults because of your screw ups!!
Why is Parenting So Hard?
There is no denying it. Parenting. Is. Hard. My wife and I have split working and caregiving duties at various times, so we both gained a healthy respect for the challenges and blessings of both sides.
Working is difficult because you miss the kids, but you often get socialization and adult conversations throughout the day. Staying home is rewarding for the closeness that develops between parent and child, but there is very little rest and you start to wonder whether your conversational ability is going to be stuck at a 3 year old level forever. It’s so difficult to get that perfect balance of family, work, social, and personal life that lead to feeling fulfilled and happy.
But people have been raising kids successfully for thousands of years, why is it so hard for me?
5 Tips to Improve Your Child's Behavior
We love our kids, but that doesn’t mean we always like them. Children are programmed to test boundaries, which means breaking rules that we know they already understand. As soon as it seems like things are going smoothly, one child or another enters a phase of defiance. It can be so frustrating to continually be trying out different systems of discipline and feeling like they are ineffective. It’s overwhelming to check out Amazon.com’s parenting section (there were over 200,000 results for “parenting books”). Which book actually works? How do you know who to trust? What if I waste my time and money reading and it doesn’t work with my kids? Friend A says to try this method, but Friend B says that didn’t work for them. There are a million things that race through your head when trying to decide what to do next. I understand the frustration because we all know that every child is different, so you may even need several styles of discipline in your own home! While there are many methods out there, it seems there are several universals when it comes to discipline, which I will share here. Here are my top five tips for effective discipline.
5 Tips for Getting a Good Night's Sleep
Sleep is probably the most underappreciated aspect of health. The doc always tells us to eat less junk and more vegetables, and to move our bodies 150 minutes each week. We’re told that eating better and exercising improve our physical and mental health, which is true. So you work for one third of the day, and one third of the day you try and do healthy things like exercise, but what about that final third of the day. When we’re busy with deadlines, or our schedules are jam packed because of our kids’ sports, sleep is often the first thing we sacrifice. “I’ll make up for it when I’m dead,” is the common joke. Sadly, the joke has some truth to it since poor sleep can double your risk of death.
Ask Me Anything on Reddit Along with 24 Other Therapists!
This post is a little different than my usual blogs. Last week I took part in a huge series of Ask Me Anything (AMA) threads on Reddit with many other online therapists. If you're unfamiliar with AMAs, it's an opportunity for random people on Reddit to ask questions of a celebrity, or an expert of some kind. As a group, we answered questions on an unbelievable range of issues, and I'd encourage you to look through the threads of topics that may apply to you. I've linked all the threads below.
5 Tips to Better Play
In earlier blogs I discussed the importance of getting on the floor and playing with your children Part 1 and Part 2. It’s not unusual for parents to come into therapy with their children and sheepishly comment on how they are not sure exactly how to play with their kids. And I can’t blame them! It’s not like there’s an instruction manual, or a course in school, and it just doesn’t come naturally to every parent. Here are five tips that I hope will make play time with your kids more enjoyable for both parent and child!