Betrayal — Don’t Go It Alone

What do you do when you discover that your partner has betrayed you? Who do you tell? Who do you lean on for support, advice and a reality check? Where do you turn when you are hurt, enraged and devastated? On whom do you lean for urgent comfort with the burden of secrecy during this traumatic experience?

As you journey through this very painful time you may experience shame, humiliation, rage, devastation, resentment, contempt, guilt, anger, uncertainty and fear. You should not be alone. Isolation is a deserted path to depression. That said, what do you do with all your feelings? And, since it’s not something that goes away overnight but lives within you 24/7, what do you do with that gut-wrenching pain? To whom do you reach, if not your hurtful partner?

Having worked with a few hundred couples during the last 30 years, I have painfully witnessed that for most victims of betrayal reaching out for support can be a quandary. In fact, it is quite complicated. You need a space to process what you can and allow someone close to you hold some of your pain. But it is challenging that you, like your dishonest spouse, do not want to repeat the process of holding a secret.

When we have pain, actually too much of it, we need someone to hold a piece of it so that we are left with just the right amount in order to work through or master our emotional excess. That is what mastery is about; in fact it occurs throughout our lives starting with infancy. As a child, we typically have the opportunity to reach for an adult with issues like how to master the anxiety of leaving behind one’s bottle, diapers and bed.

So where do we go as adults? Who will hold some of our pain while we work on what we can? The concept of community, despite social media, has closed the gates some on connection. When confronted with an issue like adultery, where do you turn? In the crisis or immediate stage of discovery, you might be tempted to react and reach for anyone and everything to get as much information as you can to assuage your anxiety, to direct your sorrows and to ultimately secure validation for your suspicions. I don’t recommend this. Perhaps finding out if others in your close circle know can be useful or validating, but it can also be humiliating. You don’t want to look like the hysterical crisis-driven victim; you are not a powerless victim.

Remember that you are sharing information that is not just yours. It belongs to other people as well. It belongs to your partner, both of you as a couple, and anyone else possibly involved as well. Information often leaks out to others who might be affected, like children, families, co-workers, etc. So asking first “to whom does the information belong?” is critical. But, at the end of the day, it is still your information and you’re the one who needs support from someone other than your partner who betrayed you.

In the middle of this painful crisis you should have at least two confidants, so that when one is unavailable you have someone else to turn to. Your confidants should be people who value you unconditionally. It could be a friend, mentor, parent, sibling, or other relative. You need someone to honor your pain, grief and experience. Someone able to listen with a clear and supportive ear and be free of judgment — of you or your partner. And you don’t want to create a burdensome, one-sided relationship. Listen to them, rather than making them simply a receptacle for your pain. They also need to respect your boundaries and not share what you’ve told them with others.

They will not be there to rescue you — they can’t take all your pain because without pain you will not have the opportunity to mourn, grieve, and grow. 

There certainly are those with whom we should not share. Under no circumstance should you share your experience with children. Reaching for siblings or other family members could be a good choice. However they may choose to protect and shield you, rather than allow you to grow from your experience. 

Parents may or may not be a good choice. It all depends upon the relationship you have with them — and the relationship your partner may have with them. Parents can potentially be highly judgmental and unable to carry the pain for their child. They might also struggle with their own shame and worry about how the community will respond to this situation. 

There is no substitute for a non-judgmental safe relationship with a psychotherapist who can help you navigate the waters after the storm — because it is your journey and not anyone else’s.

Remember, as you move through this process, the pain and the story of the pain will shift. Those who support you will walk that path with you.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/25/betrayal-dont-go-it-alone/

5 Creative Ways to Connect as a Family

The most powerful way to genuinely connect with anyone is to give them our time and attention—genuine, all-in, physical and emotional attention. Without our phones. Without any electronics. Which, of course, is very hard to do today. Because we’re all busy, making important calls and answering important emails. We’re all working hard for our families. We’re all doing our best.

But there are small, meaningful ways we can reconnect every single day—all the while encouraging and sharpening our kids’ creativity, curiosity, compassion, sense of self and problem-solving skills.

You’ll find simple, beautiful ideas in the new book The Creative Family Manifesto: Encouraging Imagination and Nurturing Family Connections by Amanda Blake Soule. Soule is an author, editor-in-chief of Taproot Magazine and blogger at SouleMama, which she’s been writing since 2005. She lives in a 200-year-old farmhouse in Maine with her husband, five kids and various farm animals.

According to Soule in the book, “When our every evening is spent not in front of the television or looking at a screen, but instead connecting with ourselves and the people around us through the channels of creativity, we see the world in a different light. We see all the possibility, all the ideas still to be dreamed up, all the room from which we can find our place in the world.”

The first page of The Creative Family Manifesto fittingly features a manifesto. Which includes everything from unplugging to playing to believing in the impossible to encouraging curiosity to telling stories to making art to being silly to loving fiercely. Below, you’ll find ideas for doing just that.

Doorway Theater

Creating a theater inside your house is a great way to encourage kids to perform everything from plays to puppet shows to concerts. Which you can do by creating a doorway theater: Soule used a shower curtain tension rod and two long curtain panels in their double-door-sized opening between the dining and living rooms. This created a stage and a backstage for props (in their dining room). She also added flashlights, which created spotlights.

According to Soule, “This theater stayed up for months and saw use every day as one performance after another was practiced, dress rehearsed, and ultimately, ‘performed.’”

Parlor Games

Well before computers, TV and even radio, families would pass the time in the evenings by playing parlor games. Soule and her family play charades with a twist: They pick a category, such as animals or emotions. Next they jot down different words associated with that category on small pieces of paper, which they put in a jar. One family member picks a piece of paper from the jar to act out.

Another game is the endless story. One person starts telling a story for a certain amount of time. Soule uses a 1-minute hourglass with her younger kids. When the time is up, the next person takes over the story. As Soule writes, “The story takes twists and turns, and new characters emerge.”

Family Drawing Time

Soule and her family try to do this every night, especially during the winter months. Basically, each person works on their own art projects, side by side. And it doesn’t matter whether you can draw or not. Doodling totally counts!

Have a special drawing book for each person, including yourself, that you only use during this time. Also, have different books for inspiration. This might be anything from old magazines to field guides for flowers or insects.

Seasons Tree

Soule and her family keep a Seasons Tree at the center of their dining room table. This is simply a branch with smaller branches on it, which goes inside a vase, jar, glass or bowl. They also include other things, such as dried beans or rocks or seashells to keep the branch in place.

Next they decorate their tree, according to the season or holiday. For instance, for Valentine’s Day, they fill the tree with handmade heart ornaments. To celebrate springtime, they decorate the tree with colorful ribbons. For autumn, they add leaves, which they’ve drawn or painted on paper and cut out.

Special Birthdays

These are wonderful ways to make your child’s birthday extra special. Dedicate a spot in your yard as your child’s birthday garden. Each year plant a new tree or flower for their birthday.

Write a love letter to your child. Soule and her husband write about memories from the past year or what they cherish about their child at that age. She hopes these letters “someday serve as a reminder of who they were and, most importantly, of how very much they were and are always loved by us.”

Lastly, after the candles are blown out, each family member says something they love about the birthday boy or girl, something they remember from the year or something they wish for their upcoming year.

Here’s the (great) thing about real connection: It doesn’t require much. It requires turning off technology, and turning our attention to each other.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/25/5-creative-ways-to-connect-as-a-family/

5 Ways to Curb Social Media During the Holidays

The holidays are fast upon us and, in the blink of an eye, Thanksgiving, Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa, and New Year’s Eve will have already come and gone. Along with the holiday season comes much time spent with family from near and far, attending parties, preparing elaborate holiday dinners, and buying expensive gifts to show loved ones how much we care about them.

For some, the holidays are a time to reconnect with family and friends they might not get the chance to see at other times of the year, bringing about feelings of joy and happiness. But for others the holidays can stir up unwanted feelings of angst, depression, and anxiety, and the holidays can be triggers for eliciting feelings of low self-esteem and shame by drawing comparisons to others.            

Holiday-related anxiety and depression can stem from family conflicts, divorce, complicated blended family dynamics, and recent deaths of loved ones. Also, disappointments around major life events, such as unexpected job loss or difficulty finding a job, financial struggles, and disappointments around intimate relationships can be sensitive topics that would want to be avoided and not be discussed openly at holiday gatherings.

When we feel badly about ourselves, our social media habits can exacerbate these feelings, making difficult times more difficult. Spending hours on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat or Twitter witnessing friends and family enjoying their holiday season, their vacations, or celebrating momentous occasions can elicit deep feelings of depression, envy, comparisons, and shame.  When we’re going through tough times, setting unrealistic expectations and putting pressure on ourselves to make the holidays “picture perfect” as may seem to be the case for our “friends” on social media can set us up for feeling worse.

Below are 5 tips to help with curbing social media during the holidays:

1. Gain a realistic perspective around social media. It’s normal for us to showcase our achievements and the highlights of our lives. This is part of the human condition. But, no matter how wonderful a person’s life might appear on social media, life has its down moments for everyone.
2. Cultivate mindfulness regarding social media habits. Work on developing mindfulness around the time of day you use social media. For example, if you have a particularly challenging day ahead of you, going on social media in the morning may not be the best decision, especially if it will trigger bad and lingering feelings, making it hard to get on with your day.
3. Tune into your emotions. Before going onto social media around the holidays check in with how you’re feeling. If you think seeing posts of friends and family having fun engaging in holiday activities will make you more angry, envious, sad or anxious hold off on going on social media for that hour, day, or week. Wait until you’re in a better emotional place before going back on social media.
4. Consider joining online groups that can provide emotional support. For some, stopping social media or even pulling back from using it as much might be an unrealistic goal. Consider broadening your virtual relationships to include support groups or joining groups and/or professionals pages that offer both advice and support.
5. Make an in person plan to see a trusted friend or family member. Having positive relationships are crucial for good mental health. So, cultivating and making an effort to maintain our important relationships is paramount and should be a priority.  Whenever it’s possible, up your communications to being in-person. When this is not a possibility use text or private messaging before resorting to more public and less intimate social media sites. Be conscious of not completely relying upon social media as a means of communicating with and relating to close friends and family.

 As with all things in life, nothing is either all good or all bad or completely wrong or absolutely right, so striking a healthy balance between time on social media and time off and between holding on and moving on should be helpful, especially if this holiday season might be particularly challenging.


Happy Holidays!

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/25/5-ways-to-curb-social-media-during-the-holidays/

Psychology Around the Net: November 25, 2017

Here in America, it’s been only a couple of days since Thanksgiving; however, a lot of you might know someone who’s had their Christmas decorations up for a while…you might even be that person! If so, there’s a psychology behind that.

Keep reading for more, as well as more on how avatars can help people with schizophrenia, common personality traits among people who believe in conspiracy theories, why alone time can help creativity, and more.

Why Stand in Line On Black Friday? The Psychology Explained: According to M.I.T.’s Professor Richard Larson, we’re not standing in those lines for the discounts; we’re doing it for the tradition.

Avatar Therapy ‘Reduces Power of Schizophrenia Voices’: Despite taking medication and engaging in cognitive behavioral therapy, around one in four people with schizophrenia still experience hearing voices. Now, a new study out of University College London and King’s College London has found that confronting an avatar on a computer screen can help patients with schizophrenia better cope with those often insulting and threatening hallucinations.

Experts Say Putting Up Christmas Decorations Early Can Make You Happier: There’s psychological reasoning behind why some people put up Christmas decorations long before children start listening for reindeer, and it’s fairly simple: extending happiness.

Secrets and Lies: The Psychology of Conspiracy Theories: Researchers find that people who believe in conspiracy theories usually have personality traits such as paranoia and mistrust, cynicism, anxiety, and feeling powerless and uncertain. How does believing in conspiracy theories affect a person’s life and what can we do to stop those negative effects?

It’s Not the Existence of Facebook That Affects Your Mental Health — It’s How You Use It: Facebook (most social media, really) gets a pretty bad rap when it comes to, you know, your self-confidence and mental health in general, but your experiences with Facebook could have more to do with your habits than with the platform itself.

Why You NEED Some ‘Me Time’: Study Shows Solitude Is Good for Mental Health Because It Drives You to Be More Creative: There’s a distinction between avoiding socializing due to fear and choosing to spend time alone to engage in creative activities, and new research suggests that intentionally spending more time alone (but still recognizing that socialization is important to your development) can help you improve your creative thinking and well-being.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/25/psychology-around-the-net-november-25-2017/

ADHD and Abandonment: A Powerful Lesson

Abandonment has been an issue of mine for as long as I can remember. I’d have an absolute panic going to school, hugging my mom relentlessly asking her not to let me go. When she went to work, I’d hold on to her leg and she would drag me around the house, explaining that while she loved me she also had to help others (a school counselor) and I would have fun when I got there (which, I might add, I always did).

Then there was my grandfather’s death when I was in high school. My calm, comforting, patient, understanding grandpa Pete. He was always my island of calm in the storms of my life. And watching him succumb to ALS when I was in high school, it literally crumbled me. I remember at his funeral I locked myself in the bathroom in a ball on the floor sobbing uncontrollably at his departure.

And then of course there was my biggest sadness; the loss of my dad to suicide. A tragedy at 19 I almost never recovered from. The complete and total devastation to my spirit and questioning of how I might move on took years to sort through in ways other than addictive behaviors that kept me going.

I think with my ADHD, and the variety of traits that go along with it, abandonment hits even harder. As when I feel abandoned, the impulsivity kicks in and I do anything and everything I can do in that moment to relieve that pain. It is a disorganized, reactive, approach lacking any attention to detail or rationality. And I would bet I’m not the only one that struggles with this type of abandonment and ADHD dilemna.

I’ve had years of therapy, done EMDR, hypnosis, and a number of other methods that have helped significnatly. I mean significantly. Thank goodness for these techniques, as I feel they have played a key role to alleviate some of the physical symptoms and get more to the root of the cause. Yet I do still feel that abandonment quite strongly, even when I am not being abandoned. It is simply irrational.

What I’m excited to share, is my ‘aha’ moment tonight with my spiritual mentor, Gigi Azmy of Anchored Awakening. Literally brilliant. One of those moments that you think, ‘this will change me’.

As I was relating my latest percieved abandonment experience, and the texting that followed, she asked me: “What are you so afraid of with abandonment”? I thought, logically, that people leave me. Which is true. They do. But the reality is everyone does at some point, that is just part of life.

And how do you react to that, she asks? I think about it a bit, and I talk about my impulsivity; the holding on tight, texting, hanging, ignoring, attention-seeking, lashing out, etc. Basically ANYTHING I can think of to get their attention and make sure they are still there. In an impulsive, non-rational way or relationship building way.

She then asked, “And how do you feel about abandoning yourself?”

What? Hmmm. Wow.

I had to sit with it for a minute.

It took me aback. As while others abandoning me is scary, what IS even scarier is that I abandon myself. That i step out of my power, out of who I am as a person, and come from anyplace other than love when connecting with people.

That I resort to an irrational, scattered, confusing person is DEFINITELY scarier than others abandoning me. As if I am not here for myself, showing up as who I am in my best version, what does the rest matter?

So as of tonight, abandonment is no longer my biggest concern. Abandoning myself is, which is what I do each and every time I give my power to someone else over a perceived ‘abandonment’. Even in death. As my connection to myself, my power, my spiritual guidance and my internal joy is the only thing that ever threatens to take my joy.

And that is a powerful lesson.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/24/adhd-and-abandonment-a-powerful-lesson/

The Real Power of a Power Ballad: How Music Shapes Our Moods

Like most people, music fuels a large part of my life. In times of emotional highs and lows, I turn to music as a way of making sense of different experiences. I’m one of those annoying people who, once I find a song that I connect with, will play it on repeat. All day. All week if I have to. (Apologies and love to my former housemate for never once complaining!).

Music has an incredible impact on our emotional states. It has the power to help us feel like we’re not alone, and sometimes the right lyric can save you. It’s no surprise that we seek out songs that align with our current states of being.

We tend to make our musical choices unconsciously, through feeling and meaning rather than deliberate choice. But how helpful is this?

Knowing that music has such an influence on our mood, perhaps when we’re feeling sad we need to be reaching for the songs that match how we want to be feeling, rather than those that match how we actually feel?

All By Myself

Research has long shown that sad music intensifies negative emotions in people with a disposition towards rumination and depression. Rumination refers to the tendency to repetitively think about negative emotional situations, and the causes behind them. Listening to sad music amplifies feelings of sadness and can lead to individuals ruminating more about negative or stressful situations in their life, both past and present.

I think we can all relate to this idea, particularly with difficult situations we’ve gone through. When we experience a breakup we’re drawn to music of the same theme, reliving and overthinking the situation. Compare this to the “lightbulb” moment during your breakup process when you switched to a happier song — how did that impact your mood, however briefly?

Garrido, Eerola & McFerran (2017) conducted research looking at how individuals experiencing depression used music to ruminate about their experiences. They specifically focused on how they might use music within group settings to see whether this form of ruminating provided stronger social cohesion and positive benefits.

The results revealed that people with depression used music to ruminate individually, and were more likely to do so in a group setting too. But they also found that ruminating over music in a group became a tool for building coping strategies — including reflecting. The study’s findings go some way to offering insight into the ways in which group interactions around music can support individuals and provide important social benefits.

A Change Gone Come

It’s good to know that listening to, and ruminating on, sad music with friends can actually be a productive activity. However, if you’re anything like me, most of us have the tendency to indulge our ruminative disposition solo.

The answer, as with many things in life, is around self-awareness. Simply being aware of how music influences your mood can allow you to make changes to how you use it to create a more positive frame of mind.

Katrina McFerran, a Music Therapist based in Melbourne, sought to demonstrate this first hand through her work with young people. Essentially she wanted to highlight to young people that being more conscious of the ways they engaged with music could help them avoid the rumination trap.

In partnership with Headspace, McFerran and two other therapists worked with young people to assess how they engaged with music and created a two-session intervention to see how they could encourage them to use music more positively.

Using the Healthy-Unhealthy Music Scale (HUMS), they were able to ascertain how young people were currently using music and if they were aware that the ways they used music were healthy or unhealthy. The great part about this study was that it focused on starting a conversation and increasing awareness as a priority.

As I mentioned above, music is a big part of my life, and I’m sure many of you agree. What can be difficult (and I will admit this myself) is acknowledging that those songs we’re addicted to are effectively keeping us stuck in our negative loop. And that one of the main reasons we’re so addicted to it is because it allows us to stay within our ruminating. It feeds our negativity.

Once we actually take the time to consider what we’re listening to and just how much it influences us, it can be a real lightbulb moment that causes us to reflect on our behaviours — and make positive changes.

Which is exactly what McFerran found through her work.

Through increased awareness, young people reported feeling a greater sense of agency around how they could use music to support them in healthy ways. Young people continuously report how important music is to them, so giving them the tools to think about how they could put it to action to promote positive mental health and cope with stressful situations is a huge breakthrough.

Feeling Good

I’m a big fan of a weepy indie ballad, and nothing’s going to change that. But I know that listening to 20 such songs in a row will leave me contemplative and, let’s face it, stuck in a ruminating rut.

The good news is using music to change your mood doesn’t have to mean changing your music preferences. It’s about how you use specific songs. Psychological research has repeatedly shown us that in order to incite a long lasting change, the best effects come from creating small, gradual changes.

Playlists are a great way to use music to do this. They’re perfect for helping you to work through negative emotions by first acknowledging them and then leading them into something better.

Creating a playlist that starts off with a couple of sadder songs but gradually builds into songs that you know help you feel more positive is the way to go. Ending your playlist with positive music will leave you with a good feeling you can take forward into your day.

And it doesn’t have to end there! A tailored playlist can help keep you motivated in a number of areas of your life. For me, a playlist of big Beyonce hits definitely helps motivate me when it comes to hitting the gym!

As mentioned the key thing to take away from this is that music has an enormous power to influence our moods, and with better awareness of that, we can make small changes around our music listening habits that can lead to real positive differences in our daily lives.

That’s pretty empowering.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/24/the-real-power-of-a-power-ballad-how-music-shapes-our-moods/

How to Understand Gaslighting

The term gaslighting comes from Patrick Hamilton’s  1938 play Gas Light, which was later made into a film in 1944 starring Ingrid Bergman. In both the play and movie, a wife becomes concerned about the dimming of her upstairs lights. When she discusses it with her husband, he dismisses the incident by repeatedly suggesting it is “in her head.” Gradually the wife begins to doubt her sanity. In reality, the husband is causing the lights to dim in an attempt to make her doubt her own mind.

Gaslighting is an extreme form of emotional manipulation that is aimed at controlling the way someone sees themselves and their reality. Through tactics such as denial, lying, and contradiction, this form of psychological abuse tries to destabilize a person from the outside in.

People with personality disorders, such as narcissistic personality disorder or antisocial personality disorder, may use gaslighting as a way to control spouses, children, co-workers, or any other relationship where the person with a character disorder feels vulnerable. Psychologist Stephanie Sarkis, PhD, describes some of the warning signs of gas lighting: “They deny they ever said something, even though you have proof. You know they said they would do something; you know you heard it. But they out and out deny it. It makes you start questioning your reality — maybe they never said that thing.”

Since gaslighting is usually only one symptom of a much bigger problem, other noteworthy behaviors include:

• The ability to charm during the early stage of a relationship.  
• Using pity as a mechanism to trigger guilt.
• Extreme anger over anything rejection related.
• Stalking. Whether online, in the car, or in person, this behavior is often found with those who gaslight.

Oftentimes those who gaslight have superficial relationships with those around them. They may keep friends at a distance and only see them for a short period of time over long intervals of absence. They may present themselves in an entirely different light to people who do not see them day in and day out. Those they do have romantic or familial relationships with, are often isolated from their own friends or family. It is as if a line has been drawn around those that have found themselves too close. Once inside the circle, it can be extremely difficult to get out. Because of the severity of this extreme and controlling behavior, someone who gaslights often finds themself very alone. Family may not stick around, friends may never materialize.  

If you suspect you may be a victim of gaslighting, ask yourself these questions:

• Is there something that just “isn’t right”, but you can’t put your finger on it?
• Do you have less self-esteem than you used to?
• Do you doubt your abilities to function despite what others may say?
• Do you feel confused?
• Do you feel like you’re constantly “overly-sensitive” or “just being dramatic”?
• Do you distrust yourself?
• Do you doubt your opinions?
• Do you feel isolated?

Recovery from gaslighting requires recognition. It is hard to recognize your own thoughts as real if the only person you’re around is someone who’s telling you they aren’t. Calling friends, finding a therapist, and talking to family are all good ideas to combat isolation.

Since most people who gaslight control finances, having a plan before leaving is imperative. Whether this is finding a way to learn a skill or finding a job through a friend, once you leave someone who uses this tactic, it can be dangerous to return. Becoming independent will take discipline and a strong support system. This may seem daunting at first, but the relationship one has to the gaslighter will never be like it was in the beginning.

Being subjected to this form of manipulation can be traumatic and it may be crucial to seek therapy. As Ariel Leve explains, “it wasn’t the loudest and scariest explosions that caused the most damage. It wasn’t the physical violence or the verbal abuse or the lack of boundaries and inappropriate behavior. What did the real damage was the denial that these incidents ever occurred.”

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/11/24/how-to-understand-gaslighting/