Blogs
Loving an alcoholic is challenging, regardless of whether or not the alcoholic is in recovery. There are certain personality traits common to alcoholics which add strain to relationships with friends, family, romantic partners, or professional connections when left untethered. What are some of these personality traits that come out when loving an alcoholic and how do they affect these relationships?
Kids aren’t the only ones who can benefit from playing in the sand; adults and kids alike can reduce anxiety when they play with sand. Play therapy, which involves many different techniques including sand play, is a legitimate therapeutic approach to treating a multitude of mental health issues.
When people think of play therapy, they often think it’s something for children and issues unique to childhood struggles. While play therapy is used largely with children, it is used with adults, too. And beyond official play therapy, kids and adults benefit greatly when they, on their own and outside of a therapy session, simply play with sand to reduce anxiety.
One important skill to acquire when you you have anxiety is learning how to avoid future-tripping. Future-tripping, also called anticipatory anxiety, is part of the human condition of peering into the imagined future and anticipating the outcome. Everyone does this to some degree or other. It's one of the blessings (or perhaps curses) of having a human brain with a frontal cortex. A person without an anxiety disorder may see a pleasant outcome, while an anxious person will likely imagine the worst outcome possible. The truth is, we don't know what's going to happen. That's why future-tripping when you have anxiety is a good thing to avoid.
Is there a need to regulate group homes for adults with severe mental illness? Recently, I was living in a privately run group home, and to make a long story fit the word count, witnessed abuse and reported it. I'm now living in a transitional housing program for adults with mental illness run by a public community mental health center, and life is considerably better there. It made me think about the need to regulate group homes for the mentally ill.
People with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder are no strangers to taking medication. Often, they take multiple medications, like me. I take so much medication I have trouble keeping track of it. But I take medication for my schizoaffective disorder, because it’s part of my treatment plan and it means I can live a full life.
Expecting too much from yourself is damaging to your self-esteem and overall wellbeing. It's good to have high standards, but it's important to be reasonable with yourself. Expecting too much from yourself can be associated with disappointment, burnout, anxiety, and depression, as well as low self-esteem. It's therefore in your best interest to stop expecting too much from yourself.
I have been thinking a lot lately about having a sense of worthiness and belonging. Researcher Brené Brown has discovered that worthiness and belonging are key traits in living a blissful life.
Language can stigmatize people with mental illness, and I am quite sensitive to noticing all of the words that seem to counteract society’s movement toward removing stigma for people who live with mental illness. Do you ever cringe when you hear the word "crazy" or "psycho?" I do. I feel that we have come so far in many respects in shaping our stigmatizing language for the good of many groups such as the terms, "gay," "retarded" or "lame," so why are we still so stigmatizing with language when it comes to mental illness?
Do you know how to report abuse of an adult with mental illness? Sadly, I'm currently in this situation. I am living in a short-term group home for disabled adults, and, recently, I heard a staff member yell, "I'm going to punch the next person who says [expletive]." Under Indiana law, I'm obligated to report that. This made me research how to report abuse of an adult with mental illness.
If you have binge eating disorder then you know compulsive hunger. This is not just hunger. It's binge eating disorder's hunger. This need to eat is not average, normal, or everyday. It's an insistent, controlling, demanding order to eat food and not stop. Compulsive hunger is part of binge eating disorder.
Where do we go from here? Most of the family thinks just to let her hit bottom and then if she reaches out to help any we can. Some want to just keep paying her bills and just let her sit in the house with no responsibilities. Never been on medication and impossible to get to her when she refuses to talk to ANYONE.
Help.
On the day we agreed to videochat to make things less awkward IRL she woke up with a migraine so we rescheduled to the day after, I made sure to assure her that it was okay and to take her time. Later that day, in the late evening we had a nice chat but suddenly she stopped replying, even though nothing had happened. The day after I texted her good morning and said I hope she was feeling a little better. she wouldn't open my texts.
A couple days after I sent her a longer text saying that even though I had only known her for a short time I care a lot for her and would like to know how she are doing, telling her I'm there for her, assuring her I'm not going anywhere even though things might not be very easy. She wouldn't open it.
A week later I sent a text saying not to feel bad about not answering and that I will be there when she is able to answer again. It's been two weeks since this and she still hasn't opened my texts. She hasn't been active at all.
I don't know what else I can do. I assumed she might have fallen into a depression. I have tried to just not think about it anymore, and I haven't that much but when I do it sort of kills me inside...