Source: Photo by Dima Pechurin on Unsplash Setting and maintaining boundaries with family and friends starts with asking yourself what you want your boundaries to look like. It can be difficult to differentiate between what you truly want and need versus what you feel you should do. This is further muddied by the expectations that…
Treatment Approaches
What Is Sexual Health?
Source: Photo by Leticia Pelissari on Unsplash Have you ever taken time to reflect on what your sexual health means to you? Depending on our personal histories and our accessibility to resources (educational, medical, etc.), we may not have an idea of what sexual health means. Historically, sexual health has been understood as avoiding unwanted…
Preparing for Winter 2020-2021: An Investment in Your Future Self
With winter on the horizon and the pandemic still raging, the prospect of many more months inside with constricted holiday gatherings, limited opportunities to spend time outdoors, and narrowed possibilities for entertainment outside of the home, may incite feelings of distress, frustration, and apathy. While this winter may look different from winters past, the experience…
Mindful Parenting
Many new parents and parents-to-be reflect on the question, “What type of parent do I want to be?” This question can seem so monumental and challenging to answer. This article offers a way to sort through how to arrive at answers. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) can help us in this exploration. The goal of…
Dialectical Behavior Therapy in the Treatment of Trauma
Note: This article is primarily intended to be a resource for mental health professionals who are treating individuals impacted by a history of trauma and who are seeking additional evidence-based tools to support their work. If you are not a mental health professional, you may also find this article helpful in learning more about the…
Assertiveness Training: Using DEAR-MAN Tool to Get More of What You Want and Less of What You Don’t
What makes communication important? Communication refers to the manner in which we express ourselves with one another. Communication, whether verbal or nonverbal, is used to pass information to others and, conversely, to understand what is shared with us (Gudykunst, 2004). While the premise of exchanging information seems simple, communication can feel fraught when setting a…
Applying DBT to the Treatment of Trauma: Trauma Explained
Note: This article is primarily intended to be a resource for mental health professionals who are treating individuals impacted by a history of trauma and who are seeking additional evidence-based tools to support their work. If you are not a mental health professional, you may also find this article helpful in learning more about the…
What Can Avoidance Teach Us?
Avoidance can be a very powerful coping strategy. We all do it – we avoid and we ignore. We try to push it away. It can work quite well in the moment. If it wasn’t so effective in the moment we wouldn’t use it so often. So why do we avoid? In the moment, we…
Letting Go and Finding Acceptance Amidst the Coronavirus Pandemic
Living through a time of massive uncertainty and change can rattle the most steadfast of people. Now, compound those feelings with possible financial insecurities, the stressors of childcare, the loneliness and monotony we may experience within our homes, and the risk of real health exposure for ourselves and our loved ones, and you might feel…
Demystifying Gottman-Based Couples Counseling
We are inundated with relationships-focused books that offer a variety of often contradictory advice. The multitude of perspectives can be overwhelming. It is easy to feel paralyzed. Which advice is right? What will actually make a positive, sustainable difference in a committed relationship? The Gottman Method of couples therapy provides couples with accessible, evidence-based blueprint…
