Take Time to Smile. . .Daily.

Recently I was participating in a twitter chat and the question was asked "what advice would you give someone to make tomorrow awesome?" I thought for a moment and responded "do something that makes you smile".  In all honesty, it was a response that just popped into my head and was very off the cuff.  But since then I have been thinking about it more and more.

The world we live in makes it far to easy for us to over extend ourselves and get so busy with things that we think we should do that often the things we like or enjoy doing get shoved to the side. I know that at times I am guilty of thinking "I will do that once all the work gets done." Unfortunately the to-do list many of us carry around just gets longer and we never reach the end. I mean I don't know about you but I go to work and there are phone calls, emails, paperwork, and accounting work that all needs to be done, then I come home and the yard needs to be mowed, the house needs to be cleaned, bills need to be paid and there is a never ending list of home improvement projects to work on.  It becomes easy to see how a day can go by and a person doesn't "have time" to do anything they truly enjoy.

Here's the problem with living like that.  I often encourage my clients to look at their energy reserve like a bank account.  We all have things in our lives that take from our energy, think of those as withdrawals, and we have things that restore our energy, those are deposits. If you spend your entire day doing things that take from that account without ever doing anything that adds to the account it results in a situation where you are low on energy and if you keep that up for too long it can become overdrawn. 

When we reach the low or overdrawn energy reserve we get short tempered, irritable, and tired. These are the moments when we snap at someone for asking a simple question, or we go home and lay on the couch for hours because everything feels like it's too much.

The frightening part to me is that it seems sometimes like our society puts a great deal of value on being able to live for long periods of time with little to no energy.  I can't tell you the number of times I have asked a client when was the last time they did something that they really truly enjoyed and they will stare at me for a few moments because they actually have to think about it.  To me the saddest thing is when the answer is "I don't know."

I say screw that. Being a martyr isn't cool or a fulfilling way to live.  How many of you out there remember having a Walkman at some point in your life? (If you don't because you are too young to know what a Walkman is I don't want to know) You remember what happened as the batteries in your Walkman were running out of juice? The tape started playing slower and slower until and the music got more and more distorted until they finally just died.  That is what trying to continue life on an almost empty energy tank is like.  You are still moving and kind of getting things done, but you are gradually getting slower and slower and the quality of the things you are doing is like that music, getting more and more distorted till it's not really music anymore.

This is a Walkman.

So here is what I challenge each and every one of you to do each an every day.  Do something that makes you smile and I'm talking that big I can't help but smile because it's coming from the core of who I am kind of smile. It can be anything big or small. Go to coffee or lunch with a friend, go to a movie, take time to do a hobby you enjoy, watch a funny video on YouTube, go for a walk, hug someone you love.  I could go on forever with ideas. Some days when I get home I just lay on the bed for a few minutes and pet one of the cats, I love them so much and they usually do something that makes me giggle at some point. Whatever you decide, do it, give yourself an energy deposit for the day. I'm giving you permission to make yourself a priority and if that means the vacuuming doesn't get done, ya know what that's okay it will still be there tomorrow and you will have more energy to do it :).

Since I gave that off the cuff answer to the twitter chat a while ago I have been thinking about it a lot and trying to implement it into my daily life.  At the end of my day I ask myself have you done something that makes you smile today? Sometimes the answer is yes and some days the answer is no. Hey I'm a work in progress just like the rest of you. So go forth, take on the world, and don't forget to smile :)

If you need a laugh still today watch any of the videos on this page: http://whineaboutit.tumblr.com/

Grief, Your Way is Okay

Grief. A simple word that names an incredibly complex process. Everyone has an idea of what grief looks like and what is “normal” but the reality is grief is an intensely individual process that can look very different person to person. There is no manual that tells you how to navigate grief or tells you what is “normal” or not. The reality is we only know what is best in our own grief journey and no one else’s.

One of the most significant experiences with grief in my own life started when I was a sophomore in college. In March of 2003 my mom was diagnosed with Stage 4 Pancreatic cancer.  Just for perspective according to the Cancer Treatment Centers of America the survival rate for 1 year post diagnosis is between 12% and 29%, and the survival rate for 5 years just 2%. Needless to say this was devastating news. Mom battled hard for just over a year before she passed away in the early morning hours of July 17, 2004, surrounded by family.

Her smile and laugh were infectious

In an instant my world had been turned upside down and I didn’t even know where to begin to process what was happening. News spread quickly around the small town I grew up in and before long there was a steady stream of people stopping by the house with their condolences, food, and the offer to “let them know if we needed anything”. Truthfully most of that first day is hazy at best and it was nice to have all the support, but I was numb, and truly had no idea what I needed from anyone. All I knew was I had a list of people I was supposed to call, we needed to go to the funeral home to make arrangements, and talk with the Pastor. Life became task oriented and just getting through the next hour, the next minute was my focus.

My sister, Mom, and Me after her diagnosis

I don’t think the grief actually set in until much later. That first week was about getting “business” taken care of and then at the end of the week my sister and I were back at our summer job. Six weeks after that my sister and I were moving back to college. We told our dad we didn’t want to go but he said “What are you going to do around here” he had to go back to work as well and we knew Mom would want us to continue our education, so we went.

Mom being. . .well. . .Mom

On the surface it seemed as though life was back to normal. Dad was back at work, my sister and I were back at school and attending classes, all the family had gone home, and the cards stopped coming in the mail.  But the reality was it was, that was when the grief process finally started for me, after all the other things stopped. I found myself wanting to call my mom and tell her something that happened that day, and my heart breaking when I remembered I couldn’t. I heard my friends at school complain about their parents and some annoying thing they had done, and found myself getting irrationally angry at them. And some days it just plain hurt to breathe. But other days were okay, I could laugh and have a good time and everything seemed normal.

This is probably the most annoying part about grief, the unpredictability. One day you can feel like your old normal self and other days you can barely muster the energy to get out of bed in the morning. It is confusing and hard to understand not only to you but to the people around you as they are trying to figure out what you need and how to best be supportive, but that is constantly changing, and because it's constantly changing you may not even be able to tell them what you need.

Early in the fall semester when I was back at school, I was lucky enough to start an internship and meet someone who would become a lifelong friend. One day she told me that while I was grieving I got to do whatever I thought was going to make me feel better if only for a moment, and if I wanted to stand on my head I should stand on my head and not worry about what others thought. (Now there are obvious exceptions to this advice, like if what is making you feel better is harming you or others, i.e. substance abuse etc.) But that moment is something that has stuck with me to this day, it gave me permission to grieve on my terms and in my way and helps me remember that whatever I am feeling is okay.

One of my favorite, Me (3yrs) and Mom

That is now the messege I try to convey to everyone who is dealing with grief. That whatever you are feeling is okay and whatever your personal grief process includes IS "normal". It is one of the things I specialize in in my practice and I can honestly tell you that of all the clients I have worked with no two have had the same grief journey. Yet they all feel societal pressure to “get over” their grief and move on with their lives, often leaving them feeling confused, broken, and like they are grieving incorrectly. You can’t grieve incorrectly, grief is a natural process and if you allow yourself to experience it and take it as it comes you will start to feel better and stronger as the days pass. And you will start to heal.

If you are in a grief process also remember the support of others is important. Although people may at times say something that comes across as hurtful or not helpful, they have good intentions and aren’t trying to be hurtful, they just want to help. But because it is such an individual process it can be difficult to know how to be helpful and they can inadvertently bring more confusion to an already difficult process. (Side note: I plan to do a part 2 of sorts to this entry talking more about how to support someone who is grieving, so sit tight for that and let me know if you have any questions you would like me to answer in that post).

Mom at Wrigley with my aunt (her sister) and cousins

It has been 11 and a half years since I lost my mom and my grief looks much different now than it did in those first days but it is still there. This past week I have been following The Cubs in the playoffs (We are born and bred Cubs fans on my mom’s side of the family) and there was a moment when they beat the Pirates Wednesday night in the Wild Card Game where my heart just shattered into a million pieces. Not only was I thinking of how much my mom would be loving this but I also remembered how she used to sit on our living room floor, cross legged, rocking back and forth, calling all the players by their FIRST names, and yelling “HEY HEY CUBBIES” whenever they had a hit or a good play. Eleven and a half years later the pain is still there but I’ve learned to live with it, it’s not as intense or constant as it once was, and it has helped shape me into the person and therapist I am today. And most importantly I got to this point in my way and on my terms.

Journaling and Why You Should Try It.

Last week I wrote on the last page of my journal. This is not a new experience it has happened a number of times since I started journaling in my early 20’s. But it’s always an oddly bittersweet experience for me. On one had I love picking out a new journal to continue my story in, but it also feels like something is ending when I finish a journal. But one thing remains the same, when I go to tuck that journal away in the box with the rest of the filled journals, I take a few minutes and flip through old entries. That time of reflection is usually interesting and serves as a reminder to me of where I have been and how much I have grown and changed in the last decade or so. As I flipped through old journals this time I got to thinking about how helpful journaling has been to me over the years and how much it has helped my clients as well.

Every journal I've ever filled :)

Journaling is one of the first things I recommend to the majority of my clients. Here are the main reasons why:

1. Bringing Clarity

This is the main reason I journal. But I also occasionally have a client that comes in and during intake struggling to put into words what they are thinking and feeling or they know what they are feeling but they can’t pinpoint what is causing that. Free journaling or stream of consciousness journaling can be very helpful in bringing more clarity or sense to what you are thinking and feeling. I encourage people to just write whatever is on their mind without concern for it making sense or flowing from one paragraph to the next. After all this isn’t a college term paper. I personally will sometimes sit down and decide I am going to journal until I literally have nothing left to say.

2. Remembering the Good

Gratitude journals have become very popular recently. People are wanting to stay focused on things they are grateful for rather than all the negatives, which can bring an excellent balance to our tendency to focus on what is going wrong. When I have a client that is not super comfortable with free journaling or tends to get stuck in a really negative place I recommend that they try structuring their journaling based on this template I got from Duff the Psych. It provides some space to free write about whatever you want. There is also a space to write 3 things you are proud of that have occurred since you last journaled and space to list 3 goals you have for that day. I have used this template before and at times it can be difficult, but that’s okay it’s supposed to be.

3. Keep an eye on yourself

Are you thinking about making some changes or setting a new goal for yourself? Journaling can be a great way to track your progress. You can track the concrete parts of your goal but you can also have space to process your emotions about the changes you are making and identify the places that are tripping you up. Journaling through the process of change can help you catch yourself when you are slipping into old patterns and help you see that progress is being made even when it doesn’t feel like it.

4. Get it out

Sometimes we truly need to just vent about a situation or how we are feeling. Journaling is a great way to do that. When you write it down you are getting it out of your brain and on the page and when you are done you can walk away having purged some of the. . .ick. Often times after a good journaling session I feel as though I have had a good conversation with a good friend. And that really is what a journal can be. . .a good friend that is always available and will never tell a soul what you said.

5. Time to Reflect

As I mentioned above I often take a few minutes to reflect on old entries when I have finished another journal. This is one of my favorite things about journaling. I can look back at where I have been and how much I have grown and changed over the years. It’s important to take this time to reflect on your journey and take note of the progress you have made and ask are you headed in the direction you want to be headed in. Whether you throw your journal out when it’s full or you have a growing box of journals tucked away somewhere (like me) take a few minutes every once in a while to flip through old entries.

My recommendation is that everyone give journaling a try and get creative. There is no rule book that says journaling has to be written word only. I think the written part is important but I have also incorporated song lyrics, drawing and collaging into my journals. Whatever I felt was going help be best express myself at the time. Recently I had a client that was a much better verbal processor than a written processor so he would do audio journal entries. Journaling options are only limited by your creativity.

So give it a shot and see what you think. If you are comfortable with free journaling get yourself a blank journal and go to town. If you are a little less sure of where to get started give the template by Duff the Psych a try, or you can go to Amazon and find tons of journals that will provide you with prompts to get you started. I will include a couple of links below to examples.  Happy journaling.

When I'm in the "Wild"

This past weekend I went to my home town for the annual Fall Festival. When you have gone to the Fall Festival as many times as I have (32 to be exact) it becomes mostly about the food and seeing people from my childhood and the food. I mean really the food is great, I am from a small town with a large Mennonite and Amish populations so you can imagine what deliciousness they cook up. But I digress.

Back to the seeing people from my childhood. Sometimes that can be fun, and other times it can be interesting. Usually at some point in the conversation people ask "Where are you working these days". To which I respond, "Oh, I opened my own office about a year and a half ago and work as a mental health therapist." At that point one of two things happens, either they say "Oh" and take a large step back, looking at me like I have a third eye or grew a tail or something, or they say "Oh Boy I really need to come see you" and start delving into all the stresses they have in their life.

This can also be interesting when the person that is taking a large step back is a member of your family.  I've got one of those in my family and on more than one occasion the response I have gotten to a question like "You seem upset what's going on?" is "Don't therapize me. (I don't know if therapize is a word, but that's what she says) You know I don't do emotions".  At that point I usually tell her "I'm not, I'm just asking" and then let it drop. It can make a casual conversation more like a mental workout.

After a weekend at the Fall Festival and quality family time and thinking a lot about how people reacted to me. I thought I would let you all in on a little secret. When I'm not at the office, just like the rest of you, I'm not working.

So let me put all of your minds at ease. No, I am not diagnosing you, no, I am not analyzing everything you say, and no, I do not think you should be committed to a psych ward because of what you just said. Basically when I am out with friends or at a small town event (like this weekend) I want to be a normal person, talk about normal things like the whether or the news or my cats. When I ask about your day or your family or what you have been up to it's because I am interested as a friend or an acquaintance not because I am secretly working up a bio psycho social evaluation on you. Think of it like this, if you know someone that works as a server in a restaurant do you assume they want to bring you your dinner when they are at home. . .I sure hope not cause I'm guessing they don't.

That being said, it is also true that part of what makes me a good therapist are my naturally occurring temperament and personality.  Yes I am a caring person, yes I find people interesting and love (at times and in the right setting) to hear their stories and where they have been and get to know them on a deeper level, I am also by nature a good listener.  Those are things I CAN'T shut off just because I am not at work.  I have also spent a stupid number of years in school and training to be a therapist and as a result of that training I have a knowledge base that happens to pertain to mental health and I can't just shut that off either. It would be like asking someone who works in insurance to pretend like they know nothing about the insurance process when someone mentions they were rear ended on the way to work the other morning. They probably can't do that.

Moral of the story when a therapist is out in the real world they do not treat the people around them like clients.  They do however have personality traits and knowledge that they can't shut off.  So let's makes a deal.  If/when we meet anywhere other than my office, I won't treat you like a client if you promise not to take a step back and look at me like I have a third eye.  Deal?

Goals: Knowing When to Let Go.

October 18, 2015 was suppose to be a very special day for me.  It was going to be the day that I participated in my first half marathon.  I have always thought it would be cool to finish a half marathon and at the start of 2015 I was looking for a long term goal that would keep me focused and give me something to work for.  After consulting some trusted friends to make sure I wasn't crazy and getting the anxiety monster under control, I decided to go for it.

Almost immediately the universe seemed to be throwing up road blocks to try and get me to quit.  February and March were filled with a respiratory virus, a stomach virus and an episode with gout (If you don't know what gout is, google it, I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy).  Despite early set backs I was determined to continue and through all of that did my best to stick to my training and was making progress.

In the beginning of May (Cinco de Mayo to be exact) I was greeted at the end of my work day with a phone call saying there had been a fire at the house (Surely someone is messin with me right?). I raced home, the whole way thinking "Don't get pulled over don't get in an accident". I arrived home to find 2 fire engines in front of my house, fire hoses running to the back of the house, and firemen hauling tarps full of insulation out of my house and dumping it in the driveway. I was in the middle of a bathroom remodel and was told the fire appeared to have started over the bathroom in the attic (Ugh). That night I just stood in my yard and stared at my house in a fog of not really knowing what to do or think or say.

Ultimately the fire ended up causing very little damage and was emotionally traumatic more than anything. But the fall out started to take it's toll on me, facing the realization of how bad it could have been combined with the relief that it wasn't and that my furry babies were okay, dealing with insurance, people trying to be helpful and comforting but sometimes making it worse, and bringing the bathroom remodel to a halt until the investigation was over which resulted in me having to go the neighbors house daily for about 2 weeks to take a shower (Thank God for wonderful neighbors, seriously I love them). And through it all I continued to train, because I was NOT going to quit.

July gets here and I start having horrendous back spasms to the point where riding in a car and hitting bumps would cause terrible pain.  I went almost 2 weeks without being able to run (or really move much) before telling anyone what was going on. I found a chiropractor and told my trainer that things were not going well and we needed to talk and figure out how to make up lost time and work with my still healing back (I was still determined to make this happen, my mentality was I am going to do this or die trying).

I went into the conversation with my trainer thinking we would make some tweeks and get back on track and things would be fine.  That's not what he said, in fact he suggested that I may have to consider dropping out of the race this year. WHAT? QUIT? I'm not quitting, I don't quit once I start something.  I had not even allowed myself to entertain this notion and when he said it, it shook me to my core and I instantly became so overwhelmed that I couldn't even speak or look up from the table.

I knew almost immediately he was right, at least part of my brain did. But when I tried to let my brain "go there" there was a part of my brain that just screamed "FAILURE" (for real, like audibly and everything). And was telling me things like "of course you quit, you always quit" (not true)  and "everyone knew this was going to happen from the start so they won't be surprised you're a quitter but they will be disappointed in you" (also not true, but what can I say a certain part of my brain is a total bitch). At the end of the day with a lot of tears and even more disappointment, I accepted what I knew to be best for me both physically and mentally and decided not to attempt the half is year.

The weeks since that decision was made have been some of the most challenging I have had in recent years.  Trying to make peace with coming up short on this goal and trying to figure out where to go from here.  One thing that became crystal clear was my struggle with failing.  I had taken on this goal and there was a part of me that was going to sacrifice EVERYTHING, including my health and well being to meet the challenge. In a very literal sense my attitude was I am going to make this happen or die (or cause serious injury) trying. That way no one can say I didn't do everything possible and no one can say I quit. Often times it seems failing is equated with being a failure. I know that is how I was feeling. Ultimately I had to take a step back and realize that yes I failed to reach my goal but that does not make me a failure as a human being.

There is a huge difference between quitting at the first sign of trouble (which I could have done when I got sick in February) and being able to admit that at some point legitimate road blocks have come up pushing a goal out of reach. There seems to be an attitude that once a goal is set we can get there no matter what, come hell or high water, if we just put our minds to it. Which is a dangerous mentality and amplifies the feeling of failing if things don't work out. Plain and simple life happens, it's unpredictable and shit gets in the way, and there are even times when you do exactly what you are suppose to and come up short. And oh boy is that a tough pill to swallow, and disappointing, and painful, and yes by definition means you failed BUT it DOES NOT change your value as a person and does not make you a failure as a human being.

I have also spent some time thinking about my true motivations for wanting to complete a half marathon (before I blindly decided to jump in for next year).  Like really why?  I realized that while it was a true desire of mine to do a half, it came from a desire to prove myself to all the people I felt didn't believe in me. Let me tell you right now, that isn't going to get you through 13 miles of anything. It is important to know the true motives for goals you set for yourself and to occasionally check in with yourself about what is driving you. Will this bring you happiness and a sense of accomplishment outside of what anyone else thinks? Did this goal come from within you without pressure from others (there's a fine line between someone inspiring and challenging you and pressuring you into something that isn't good for you)? If the answers to those questions are no, that's a sign of potential trouble on the horizon. As for me, no decision has been made at this point about whether or not I will attempt to train for another half, I still have some thinking to do.

The final thing I have learned from this process is that sometimes when you are open to taking a step back and re-evaluating what you are doing, it makes space and room for some pretty amazing things to happen. In the midst of these challenging weeks I have also had some incredible highs that I know wouldn't have happened had I continued pushing forward with training. Work has been fantastic, I have made some new connections with new people and hello, I'm blogging again. We only have so much space with in ourselves and our lives for various things. Sometimes when we can let goal of certain things or goals in our lives it makes room for other things or new paths and goals.

Overall, 2015 has certainly been a year of ups and downs, and the last 6 weeks have been some of the most painful, challenging and filled with growth weeks I have had in quite a few years. Even as I write this I still struggle with moments of feeling like a failure (Hey we are all a work in progress). That being said I wouldn't trade this experience. If you take nothing else from today's post please remember that no matter how many times you may stumble or fail you are a person with value and worth. You are one of a kind and you are amazing.

F**k Anxiety!. . .Word.

Raise your hand if you have struggled with anxiety. Okay granted I can't see any of you but I'm guessing if I could a lot of you would have raised your hands. I know I do, most days it's pretty low key and the worst that happens is that my right foot starts to twitch (always the right, I don't know why, the left one is lazy) and I don't usually even notice until someone near me says, why are you shaking. My usual response is "I didn't know I was", but once it's pointed out I realize that damn anxiety monster is acting up. On rougher days I have the full blown, upset stomach, tingly hands, fast breathing, racing heart, feeling hot and sweating. Not helpful in daily life, unless you are fleeing a woolly mammoth.  I'm sure many of you know what I'm talking about and let's just agree it sucks and if we could take a pill and kill that monster for good we would.

Unfortunately that is not how it works with anxiety.  That jerk creeps up on you at the most inopportune times, even when you've been working hard to manage it, and robs you of sleep, time, or sometimes once in a life time experiences. One of the greatest opportunities anxiety took from me was the chance to go the top of the Eiffel Tower. They seemed to think letting someone on the elevator having a panic attack was bad idea. Weird how that works out. Clearly that experience (15 years ago) still bugs me some days, damn anxiety.

Through years of work and therapy (yes even therapists go to therapy) I have for the most part been able to get my anxiety under control. I also spend a fair portion of my professional life helping others get their anxiety monsters under control. And in both of those arenas I been on a constant quest for a better way to explain/cope with/understand anxiety that didn't feel so clinical. And then it happened, like a gift from heaven, I stumbled across a self help book that was everything I was looking for and even things I didn't know I was looking for.

Now before I lose half you because you hate self help books and your eyes are starting to glaze over, let me say I hate self help books too. I find most of them to be a little too sunshine and rainbows for me. More often then not I get to a chapter that seems to suggest if I just think happy thoughts every thing will be great (Unfortunately that gets a little hard to understand when your thoughts are full of sunshine and rainbows and life kicks you in gut anyway). At that point I close the book, resist the urge to throw it through a window, and instead throw it in a box to go to Goodwill. So if this book were like that, you wouldn't be reading this and I might be pricing a new window. :) But I digress.

The title is what first caught my eye. . .are you ready. . .cause this is pretty awesome.  The title of the book is Hardcore Self Help: F**k Anxiety by Robert Duff, Ph.D.  Yep, I knew at that moment this book and I were going to be friends.  I immediately bought the audio version (after my non techie self figured out how to use audible, that was ridiculous) and started listening, because ain't nobody got time to wait for things to ship.  The introduction had me cracking up and by Chapter 1 I thought to myself "YES!!! FINALLY someone gets it!!! And he's talking to me like a friend, rather than a psychologist; using big words and jargon that real only proves he's super smart (which he is) but doesn't help me get my anxiety in check because I have no idea what he's talking about (okay, I do understand most psychologist jargon cause I spent a lot of years in school, but you know what I'm saying)!!!

Allow me to highlight the reasons I have fallen in love with this book:

• It's short, most days I have the attention span of a goldfish.
• The book is maybe 50 to 60 pages (I'm not sure it doesn't have page numbers) but I know the running time on the audio book is about 1 hr 15 min.  Everybody can find time to fit that in, you know it, I know it, so just get rid of that list of excuses right now.
  
• He GETS it. Few things in this world feel as good as being understood.
• I mean really, think about a time when you felt truly understood by someone else.  Like explaining how you were feeling or what you were going through wasn't hard and you didn't feel like you had to defend yourself, the other person just got it. Feels pretty damn good right? Nothing in this world is 100% but if I was a betting kind of gal I would put a lot of money on you feeling understood while reading this book.
  
• It's funny, laughter truly is the best medicine.
• This is one is pretty self explanatory, but let me paint you a picture with my imagination brush of a woman laughing so hard as he listened that had someone walked in the house they would have had some questions about what was happening.  Just imagine me walking around ear buds in, cleaning the house, laughing out loud, like really loud. There were a couple of times even the cats were looking at me like "What the hell is wrong with you?"
• Additionally, it is incredibly difficult, bordering on impossible, to feel anxious while you are laughing, so that's a win.
• The suggestions are practical, easy to follow, and easy to implement.
• Look, bottom line we are all busy and if we are presented with "12 steps to a new you" most of us aren't going to make it too far because it's just too much at once and can feel like a heavy duty over haul of your life, and good or bad change is hard and stressful.  Suggestions in this book are simple. 
• Breathing? We gotta do that anyway so it's no big deal to take a few minutes and add a little intention and structure to it so that maybe you can calm the hell down rather than hyperventilating.
• We are going to worry about a situation regardless right? So why not take that time, practice following a few easy steps, answer a few questions, and try to make that time productive rather than worrying in circles that do NOT bring about any resolution?  Everything in this book is SIMPLE to learn and EASY to start to implement but can make a HUGE difference in coping with anxiety.

I could go on for days, (some of you probably feel like I have if you follow me on twitter, @ajgus83) I can NOT possibly say enough good things about this book.  Absolutely 10 out of 10 recommend.  I ordered an obscene number of copies and officially have strongly recommended/made any client (and a handful of friends) I currently have that even kind of deal with anxiety read it.  They have all LOVED it.

The one DISCLAIMER I will give about this book is that Duff is not afraid to swear freely and often so if you are easily offended by that, swearing just isn't your jam, or you are a youngin maybe not the book for you.  But over all fantastic and if you are like me and swear like a sailor anyway the swearing in the book is no big deal.  You should definitely CLICK HERE or use any of the other links I've provided and get your hands on a copy TODAY.

I would also strongly recommend you check out Duff's website www.duffthepsych.com, he has a blog with some great ideas and information as well. He also periodically offers custom guided relaxations (last I checked there were still a few available), which are also fantastic but that's a whole different blog post. I have had the privilege of getting to know him a little bit via email and the internet.  He's a pretty awesome guy all the way around.  I know we will all be hearing more from him and about him in the future.

Unfortunately nothing is an immediate fix-all and even with this book anxiety can still be a pain in the ass but this book is certainly a good place to start in the journey towards getting the upper hand on that wench called anxiety. In less time than you think, you can have the tools to wake up every morning kick anxiety in the face and make it your bitch.

I went sleeveless!

The title of this entry may seem like an odd statement.  I mean I live in Iowa and it is September (and has been ungodly hot this weekend), it's not like I'm announcing that I ran around sleeveless in January in 3 feet of snow.  But none the less this is sort of a big deal in my world.  Allow me to explain.

I went to a wedding in Chicago last weekend and like all girls needed a new dress for the occasion. I found a delightful sleeveless number that I LOVED.  But I hesitated before purchasing it because I haven't always been comfortable showing off my arms to the world. The reason for that has nothing to do with the fact that when I wave it looks like I have flags attached to my arms and everything to do with the fact that I have quite a few visible scars and some of the most visible are on the upper part of one of my arms.  At minimum when visible people will stare, awkwardly and uncomfortably.  On occasion people ask, with a very concerned tone in their voice "what happened?"

Me and my sister, pre-wedding all dressed up.

"What happened?" Simple enough question and in my head there is a simple enough answer "I did it to myself." But those words rarely come out of my mouth because I know that makes everyone uncomfortable, including me. Let's be honest I'm not particularly proud of that part of my life (that part of my life being almost a decade ago, I have not cut myself in about 10 years*).  So for years I've kept my scars mostly hidden to avoid the awkward questions and on the occasion that it did come up mumbled some lame excuse about having a bastard for a cat. People will believe just about anything you tell them, no matter how far fetched, to get out of an awkward situation. I did these things not just for the comfort of others but because I also wanted to avoid the gut wrenching anxiety and shame I felt about what I had done to myself.

In recent months and weeks, however, I started to realize that somewhere along the way my thoughts about my scars had changed.  I am not as ashamed of them as I once was, and I've realized that most of the shame I do still feel is related to how others in my family feel about my scars not how I feel about them. There are still awkward interactions, stares, and some anxiety in my gut when I know someone is staring but I have stopped hiding. It's damn hot in the summer around here and I'm tired of not being able to wear what I want, and having the scars of my past always be a part of me getting dressed in the morning. Frankly I have allowed that part of my past to take up too much brain space over the years.

 But as frustrating as it is to have your past haunt you in the clothing decisions you make every morning and the desire to take some of that brain space back and use it for other things, it took much more than that frustration with the status quo and desire to shift my thinking. I had to find a way to forgive myself for the choices I made so long ago.  For me that forgiveness came from recognizing and accepting the fact that at that time I didn't have any better coping skills.  It sounds silly but it's true the circumstances of that time were so overwhelming my brain essentially shut off because I didn't even know where to start let alone how to adequately cope.

Another important piece of me forgiving myself, and something that some people struggle to understand about self harm, is remembering that I didn't want to die. Yes I had had some suicidal thoughts, but my self harm was not about wanting to die it was about trying to find a way to survive the pain I was feeling for just one more day. At the time I was in a very real fight for my life and as destructive and unhealthy as some of my choices were in that time, I survived. And really at the end of the day how can I be ashamed of myself for fighting so hard to stay here?

The answer is I shouldn't be.  And while I still have, and probably always will have, visible (what I now call) battle scars I don't want that to be the reason I don't dress the way I want or don't go to the pool or won't change clothes when other people are around. I don't want them to be a reason for me not living my life to it's fullest and in the way I want.  Those scars are part of my history, a part I can't make go away and quite frankly a part of my history that has contributed hugely to the type of person and therapist I am today.  And I like that person (most days) so I chose to embrace her and all her baggage :)

So that's it. That's the story of why me wearing a sleeveless dress to a wedding in the middle of August is a big deal.  Moral of the story?  Be proud of the battles you have won and the ways you have grown and changed even if you aren't always proud of the tactics you used to get there. Some days that is still hard for me to remember but that's okay, we keep truckin.

And along those lines please understand that I am in NO WAY glorifying self harm encouraging any one to use self harm as a way to cope with life or any situation, it is simply part of my journey. It is not a HEALTHY or POSITIVE choice and quite frankly is VERY DANGEROUS. If you or someone you know is struggling with self harm, depression, anxiety, or suicidal thinking please see the references I have included below. **

I hope you all don't mind my sharing such a personal story pretty much right out of the gate (at least on this time around in my blogging adventure) but it's something that has been on my mind this week, is something I wanted to share, and was the topic that got me thinking about blogging again.

*The short version of my history is that when I was a sophomore in college the world as I knew it started to fall apart (I changed majors after failing a class, lost a job I loved, and my mom was diagnosed with cancer) and I had my first serious bout with depression.  As part of the battle to cope with that depression and cope with my world crumbling around me I turned to cutting.  I did seek therapy almost immediately. prompted by some VERY good friends but still struggled with self harm for a few years until I was able to a) develop more constructive coping skills and b) felt I was worth enough to stop harming myself.  As I stated above I have not self harmed in about 10 years.  Please feel free to ask if you have further questions about anything in this blog post or my own journey with self harm.  I am hoping my story will help others in some way shape or form.  However, that being said I try to be an open book as much as appropriate, but I reserve the right to decline to answer any questions I am not comfortable with or feel would take this discussion in a negative direction.

**If you or anyone you know is struggling with self harm or suicidal thinking please seek help.  You can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 24 hours a day.  For more information on self harm including signs that someone may be self harming and other general information click here. I also recommend checking out Skin Game: A Memoir it is the story of one woman's struggle with and overcoming self harm.