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Codependent relationships are generally not very healthly. Find out if a relationship in your life is draining you dry.
Mar 06 2014
4 Suggestions in How To Have Happy Kids
Young Woman Mother with Daughter Girl (Photo credit: epSos.de)
4 Suggestions in How To Have Happy Kids – Vol. 241, March 6, 2014
There are many stories out there about kids who are suffering from anxiety, depression and drug addiction. How about we speak to how to prevent these problems from occurring?
The most important gift that you can give your kid is unconditional love. Years ago I had a mother call me regarding working with her depressed son. I had worked with many kids who were depressed and felt that I could help him out as well. He turned out to be a kid with significant learning disabilities, among them the inability to focus his attention making him a poor hypnosis client.Though I didn’t formally hypnotize his mother, she put herself into trance, as I was working with her son. About a month after we had done the work together she wrote me an email telling me that though she was disappointed in the fact that her son didn’t seem much better, that she, after our work together, had gained an awareness that she never accepted her son for who he was. This was a huge acknowledgement on her part, opening this mother’s heart to accepting her child for who he was unconditionally.
The second most important gift that you can give your kid is self-love. The best way to do this is to help your kid to aspire to do the best that the kid can do without putting too much pressure on. I had a teen client in a few months ago who was getting all A’s in her honors classes along with one B. She had come in to see me because she was depressed. In her case, her mother was hypnotized along with her daughter as this was what the daughter requested. The client’s mother came to understand that her need to please others by being perfect was being projected onto her daughter. The result was putting way too much pressure on her daughter to get all A’s. The mother had no realization that this pressure on her child was one way in which her daughter felt that she was “not good enough” to be loved for herself.
The third most important gift you can give your child is self-respect. Taking time to listen to your kid’s feelings is very important. This can be a bit tricky because most people when they hear a challenge that another is facing will tell them how they can identify with it based on their own experiences. About six months ago I was at a forum on how to better get teens to listen to their parents. In it, the psychologist who was running the program had asked a parent to do a role play with him. The subject was of her teen not being invited to a party. The parent playing the role went into the story of how she too was not invited to a party when she was her child’s age. The psychologist pointed out that her speaking of her situation had nothing to do with the child’s feelings and could come across as minimizing her daughter’s situation. The result of that response would be to create anger at the mother and a sense that her situation was not important. Really all the mother needed to do was to validate her daughter’s feelings by letting her know that she had every right to be upset with the situation and asking if there was anything that she could do to help her daughter feel better. The focus was to be totally on the daughter’s experience.
In this world of materialism many parents do their best to give their kids the material goods they feel their kids desire.Like any relationship, the most important thing that you can give your kid is your time and attention. In this case I am speaking of doing things with your kid, that your kid enjoys. I had a teen client come in to see me who was having a difficult time with her mother. One of the things that came out in that session was the fact that she and her mother never spent any time together. Her mother was spending much more time with her younger sister with whom she shared many interests. In this case the mother acknowledged the discrepancy with how she treated each daughter differently. As a result of this work the parent asked her child what interests she had that she could do with her mother. They ended up deciding to play tennis together.
The best way to raise happy kids is to let them know that you love them unconditionally. Allow them to be who they are, while helping them to aspire to be the best that they can be based on their own ability levels. Validate your kid’s feelings by truly listening to what they are saying. Share common interests with your kids to develop a closer relationship. If you do these four things you are on your way to creating a happy and well adjusted kid.
Mar 03 2014
Be In Control of Your Own Life
Vol. 78 July 2009 – Be In Control of Your Own Life
When I was a teenager I worked in my father’s dental office While he was finishing up his paper work I would ask him a lot of questions about how he made the decisions that he did. He answered them quite honestly and for that I will always be grateful, for he left me with so much wisdom after such a relatively short period of time to get to know him as an adult. He passed away at the age 61 when I was 23 years old, 24 years ago now. The great thing though is that the man and his wisdom is continuing to come through to me in ways I could never have imagined all those years ago.
My father was a self made man. Born of a poor family, his father passing away when he was 12, he found himself the youngest in the family with two older sisters, he being the only man in the house. Continue reading
Mar 03 2014
032:To Best Deal With Someone Who Is Dying
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Death is, and always will be a part of life. Get some advice on how to best handle a dying loved one.
Feb 27 2014
How Does The Unconscious Mind Get Our Needs Met?
Why Doodling Matters (Photo credit: giulia.forsythe)
How Does The Unconscious Mind Get Our Needs Met? – Vol. 240, Feb. 27, 2014
There are many ways that our unconscious mind helps us to get our needs met. These are not necessarily items that we understand as “needs”, yet they still function as such. Let me give you a few examples of what I am speaking about here.
I have a prospective client call who is feeling depressed. When she comes in for her first session and we do her detailed personal history, it is clear that she felt her younger sister got all the attention. Her unconscious mind was helping her to get the attention of her parents by becoming so ill that they had to take notice and take some action to help get her well. I have seen this pattern repeated with bulimic clients as well.
Another prospective client calls saying that she needs to be seen for weight loss. She has no idea why it is that she continues to eat even when she isn’t hungry. With a bit more investigation the story is told is that she was sexually abused when she was younger and still felt much pain over the incident regardless of the therapy that she had already gone through. She was eating to keep her self safe from sexual advances – or at least that was the method that her unconscious mind was using to achieve that goal.
A client can’t figure out why it is that going on job interviews is a problem. He can make the call and get the interview date, but is unable to make it for the interview. He very much needs the job, yet can’t get himself to go through the interview process. Through a bit of conversation it comes out that this gentleman was fired from his last job even though he made great sales numbers and had no idea why this happened. His unconscious mind was protecting him from being hurt again by a future employer.
It is important to understand that your unconscious mind will do all sorts of things to help you to not have to be hurt again. The only problem is that many times the reason for the defense mechanism may have out lived its need. As a result, the defense mechanism is causing you harm instead of helping you in any viable manner. It is through understanding how the unconscious mind is working to try and help you, but which is actually harming your quality of life, that you can go ahead and help it find more productive ways to help you out. In many situations the client really doesn’t understand the connection between the thoughts and behaviors that they are wanting to get rid of and the deeper reason for them being there. Once that connection is better understood, releasing the negative thoughts and behaviors becomes a lot easier allowing for a much better quality of life.
Feb 25 2014
Announcing the Publication of “Do I Have An Eating Disorder? Now What” on Amazon.com for the Kindle
This book speaks to all those who both are experiencing the eating disorders of anorexia and bulimia and any practitioner who would like to know of an alternative method of treatment which really truly has the capability of putting these two sometimes deadly illnesses in the client’s past. I am honored to have the forward of the book be written by a past client of mine, Leslie B., who has successfully been free of ALL thoughts and behaviors related to her eating disorder for the past THREE plus years. It is my hope and desire that ending the devastation that these two illnesses wreak not only those that experience them, but also on all those people that the ill touch is in the not too distant future.
I have included access to an MP3 recording with the book based on the in-person work that I do with my clients.
Do understand also that this book came into being because Leslie B. and two other eating disordered clients that I was working with back in 2007-2008 assertively asked me to make this treatment option more well known to all those who could benefit from it. I trust that I did you all a good turn: Leslie B. Carolyn S. and Laura G. all who have blessed this website with their stories of healing with the courage it takes to do so. I sincerely thank you all.
I have dedicated this book to the first person that I knew who had anorexia back in 1972 before the medical community had any real understanding of it, Laurie Gilman, who unfortunately passed away November 29, 1973 of pneumonia her body too weak to fight off. She was 18 years old. I was a kid of 12 years old at the time of her passing.
You may check out the book here:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=do+i+have+an+eating+an+eating+disorder&x=0&y=0
Anyone who reads the book who would be willing to write an honest review for those who are thinking of purchasing it would be entirely welcome.
I sincerely offer this book as my small way to illicit some much needed change in how we treat eating disorders both in the treatment modalities used and more importantly respecting the needs and desires of those afflicted to have a proactive involvement in their own treatment this being my largest learning from my clients.
Feb 25 2014
031:Taking Care of Yourself As You Take Care of Your Disabled Parent
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Today’s topic is how caregivers can take care of themselves while caring for their loved ones.