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Self-esteem boosters are a good way to begin your journey to building or improving your self-esteem.
When you are feeling insecure, nervous, or lacking confidence and self-esteem in a situation, your body language reflects it. Remember the first day of school when you were growing up? Were the confident kids the ones looking down at their shoes, mumbling, and standing shrugging their shoulders? No, they were the ones who were smiling at you, inviting you to sit with them at lunch, and walking around the halls with a purpose. Think about how this plays out in adulthood. Do you walk around like the shy kid who gets pushed around in a crowded cafeteria, or the self-assured, student who has no problem raising her hand in class and making new friends?
Hi! I’m Andrew Foell, barely 40 and diagnosed with adult ADHD in my early thirties. I prefer to be called Drew. Somewhat characteristic of many people with adult ADHD, I refer to myself as a “jack of all trades and master of some.” That segues into some of my credentials: I earned a Master of Arts in Instruction in the late nineties and have taught secondary English and developmental English—a supplementary class for students with ADHD and other diagnoses. Currently, I work as a literacy tutor, again serving similar populations. I am a member of our district-wide PBIS (positive behavior interventions and supports) implementation team, and I believe strongly in early intervention. Research and writing are personal passions as are mental health and mental health advocacy.
Savvy marketers everywhere understand that branding is an essential element of market domination, sustained growth, and “share of mind”. Put simply, your brand is your customer’s opinion of you, a complete set of assumptions which influence every interaction.
Sometimes we feel as if we're getting worse instead of better. Sometimes we feel as if we're in more pain, not less. This is due to emotional thawing.
Schizophrenia, as horrifying as it may be, gave me a glimpse into alternate realities and showed me another world that defies and transcends the physical world in which we live. Before contracting the illness, I considered myself to be a man of science, rationality, and skepticism. My training and education within the sciences demanded it. It was during these studies that I became entrapped in my first psychotic fantasy.
Worry can have our anxiety all up and out of control, and worry never helped one person. Last week I posted a vlog: Love and Fear, The Only Two Emotions. Today's vlog picks up on that theme and lets us know how to love someone rather than worry about them.
Something triggers a bad day. A poor night’s sleep. Receiving bad news. Stress at work. Relationship worries. It could be anything. We would hope that if we are going to be upset, it would stick to that one trigger and we can figure it out and get over it. But it doesn’t work that way, does it? Depression is a sneaky little monster that whispers negative, depressing thoughts in your ear, feeding and fueling itself, and pretty soon you are not just thinking about what triggered you, you are spiraling, going round and round in your head about every other thing that has ever gone wrong in your life. Depression Monster wins again.
“Medication levels the neurobiological playing field.” Biederman, J., & Spencer, T. (2002)
After receiving a diagnosis of adult ADHD, the most commonly asked questions people have are around ADHD medications. Despite the fact that we have been using the same psycho stimulants to treat ADHD for over 60 years, and have studied them over and over again for effectiveness, short term and long term side effects and contraindications, doubt remains.
In order to help provide some answers, dispel some myths and help people stay at choice around their ADHD treatment options, here is a synopsis on three of the top questions and their answers around ADHD medication.
Emily Roberts, MA, LPC, is known by many as The Guidance Girl. She is a trained psychotherapist, psychological consultant. She is also the author of Express Yourself: A Teen Girls Guide to Speaking Up and Being Who You Are. Her mission is to empower, inspire, and educate others. She is passionate about teaching her workshops about self-esteem and self-confidence. Her experience in private practice, academic settings and hospital settings helped her develop programs and workshops for children and adults of all ages, which focus on loving yourself and feeling your best. As an expert in the” millennium generation”, she frequently speaks to parents and schools on cyberbullying and technology related issues, as well as lectures on developing self-esteem and empowerment.
Addiction is death. I don’t just mean physical death. I mean emotional, mental and spiritual death as well. Addiction has the ability to destroy lives – and I should know. I have seen first-hand how addiction has destroyed relationships, leaving individuals broken and beaten down. I have this experience.
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...