Category Archives: Mental Health
From Survival to Safety: Nervous System Regulation is the Missing Piece in Healing
Six years ago, I was so close to death that my recovery goals were to drink a little water, eat a piece of toast, and walk to the end of the driveway. That was all I could manage. My hair … Continue reading
Posted in Mental Health
Tagged class, classes, co-regulation, connection, Foundations of Regulation, IPNB, Relational Neuroscience education, safety
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Psychiatric Confinement Through the Eyes of a Torture Survivor
One of the most important connections in my history is between the torture and trafficking I survived as a teenager and what happened years later when I was sent to a psychiatric hospital after developing intensifying suicidal ideations from Lexapro. … Continue reading
Trauma Anniversaries: An IPNB View
I experience trauma anniversaries throughout the year. There is no month or season untouched by abuse and neglect at the hands of caregivers and others in positions of power. For a survivor, such anniversaries are not merely calendar dates, but … Continue reading
Posted in Mental Health, Trauma
Tagged body memories, chronic trauma, complex trauma, flashbacks, months, Psych ED, recurrent triggers, seasons, Trauma, trauma anniversaries
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Is Your Therapy Safe? 6 Questions to Ask a Potential Therapist
Understanding Harm in the Mental Illness Industry A lot of people have been harmed in one-on-one therapy. Not just disappointed, but harmed. They have been gaslit, pathologized, controlled, dismissed, punitively misdiagnosed, and worse. That happens within a system built around … Continue reading
Posted in Mental Health
Tagged abusive systems, CBT, cognitive therapy, connection, modalities, questions, safety, techniques, therapy
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Games Therapists Play
The pop psychology book, “Games People Play” was published in 1964. I remember reading it as a teenager in the 70’s. It described common relational patterns among people, like the “Yes, But” game, in which a person complains, another offers … Continue reading
Posted in Mental Health
Tagged games, Games People Play, gaslighting, manipulation, pop psychology, talk therapy, therapist, therapy
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Grief Moves When the Body Is Allowed: Trauma Integration and the Power of Witnessing
I went into my craniosacral appointment without an agenda, not trying to make anything happen. I laid on the treatment table and my doctor cradled my head with his hands. Before long, I felt a huge wave of deep grief rise … Continue reading
Self-Harm: A Survival Adaptation, Not a Character Flaw
A few years ago, when I was struggling the hardest, I occasionally engaged in self-harm. My body knew the practice offered relief, but I still felt some shame, because I’d been indoctrinated to believe self-harm is a kind of pathological … Continue reading
Where Psychiatric Labels Fall Apart
Psychiatry puts forth the idea that a person is one thing, then something happens inside them, a kind of switch, and they become something else. As if so-called “mental illness” appears without context, history, or conditions that accumulate over time. … Continue reading
Posted in Mental Health
Tagged behavaioral health, capacity, Community, conditions, Mental Health, network, psychiatry, Psychology, resilience, support
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There is No Shortcut to Meaning
A LinkedIn member posted that “Changing ‘why is this happening to me?’ into ‘what is this trying to teach me?’ is a game-changer.” From an Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) perspective, that reframe can actually be harmful because it skips over the … Continue reading
The Mental Illness industry: It Ain’t About Health or Care
The mental illness industry does not exist to heal people. It was largely built by Gilded Age industrialists to control the population, keep people functioning as workers, and pathologize suffering caused by systemic conditions. Instead of recognizing distress as a … Continue reading