Posts

Showing posts from April, 2018

Have a Difficult Kid? Do These 7 Techniques

Image
By: Christine Hammond LMHC Maggie and James were involved parents. They participated in their kid’s school, coached a team or two, helped with homework, and knew the names of their kid’s friends. But for some reason, one of their three kids was constantly in trouble. The other two enjoyed a great reputation at their school but their sister was the exception. She spend hours in the principal’s office, got in fights, struggled to make friends, and was difficult to teach. Her parents ran educational tests only to discover that she was brighter than her grades would reflect. On a daily basis, Maggie feared being approached by another parent or teacher with a story of her daughter’s behavior. It always started the same, “I have the funniest story about your daughter. You will never believe what she did today.” Believe what she did? Are they joking? Of course she acted out, when didn’t she? After a frustrating couple of years at school, Maggie and James brought their d

The Dangers of Complaining – How Whining Harms Relationships

Image
By: Dwight Bain LMHC   Ever hear your kids or partner whine about something? Did it make you feel better or frustrated? My guess is it irritated you because listening to somebody complain doesn’t help the relationship improve. In fact it doesn’t help anyone improve and is an indicator of maturity. Listen to these words of wisdom from a bumper sticker. “The more you complain- the more you will find to complain about.” Whatever you focus on is what you get more of, so when you move away from complaining and whining you can move toward finding something better. It takes no more time to see the good side of life than to see the bad, and when you make this switch it helps the relationship and even your health by preventing energy loss. Randy Pausch wrote about this energy drain in his book, “The Last Lecture,” listen, “If you took one-tenth the energy you put into complaining and applied it to solving the problem, you'd be surprised by how well things

Finding Peace in the Face of Abuse

Image
By: Christine Hammond LMHC Aaron was deeply troubled. He finally came to the realization that he left his abusive childhood home only to recreate it as an adult. This was not his intent. He wanted more for himself and his children. The peace he longed for had never been achieved either within himself or in his environment. His mother was an abusive alcoholic who died in a drunk driving accident. His wife didn’t drink but became addicted to Adderall after taking some of their son’s ADHD medication. Her behavior went from normal to hyper to chaotic in a short period of time. Now their whole household was in turmoil as she said and did whatever it took to keep taking the drug. Addicts turn abusive when they feel deprived of their drug of choice. Aaron was blamed for everything that went wrong as his wife continued to spiral downward. Even though Aaron wanted to separate, he was afraid to leave the house for fear that things would get worse for his wife and kids