Thursday's Therapy - "Breaking Bad" Grief Therapy ~Dr. Joanne Cacciatore alerts...

Thursday's Therapy

"Breaking Bad" 

Grief Therapy

~Dr. Joanne Cacciatore alerts...

Thursday, June 26, 2014

The Holy Longing is Yours: Caveat emptor

(massman: noun,  an average, typical, or ordinary man :  a prototype of the mass society especially when regarded as lacking individuality or social responsibility, as drawing his stereotyped ideas from the mass media, and as easily manipulated by economic, social, or cultural elites)

Every week, I have the privilege to hold a discussion about grief with colleagues Dr. Geoff Warburton & therapist Megan Devine, two dear friends who simply 'get it.'

Both have experienced grief from the inside during the course of their lives and have now devoted themselves to the practice of grief counseling.

We share a sentiment about grief in Western culture. That is, in general, grief is widely misunderstood, castigated, affronted, and bypassed in practice, theory, the media, and even in some spirituality.  Most recently, we discussed the spiritual bypass, and a more thorough triadic diatribe about this topic is forthcoming. I digress (as usual)...

Fast forward to today.

Another dear friend, a medical doctor and researcher in Canada working in refugee health (note: plenty of grief and trauma in this population), recently attended a conference in the U.S.  One of the days in this conference was devoted to "bereavement care".

She was so upset by what she'd heard that she abruptly exited two workshops that were intended to help grieving parents.

She sent me some of the materials to review and I shared her deep concerns. Actually, I was mystified and astonished.

Two clinicians who were presented posited "therapies" which were not only (less than) pseudo-science but more than that: They are potentially harmful to the bereaved.  Their suggested "interventions" may even further disenfranchise, stigmatize, and pathologize normal, albeit painful, traumatic grief.   Their strategies promoted the "unfeeling" and "unseeing"and even medicating of grief... precisely the opposite of what research in traumatic grief suggests as most efficacious, and it was some of the most 'unmindful' and experientially avoidant propaganda I have ever seen.

Experiential avoidance (that is the chronic turning away from or distracting of painful emotions/memories unconsciously), in fact, in the SCIENTIFIC literature is closely linked with substance abuse, physical illness, and other maladaptive behaviors and affect. 

Look, I get it.

Clinicians are not often researchers so they may or may not be able to discern the rigor of a study's outcomes. Many of them don't even have time to read the research and may not understand methodology.

So, herein lies the dilemma: Bad therapy happens. And bad therapy isn't just bad therapy- it's not like a bad haircut. These are people's lives. And not just any people. The most vulnerable population on earth.  Very, very dangerous, indeed.

So here is a rare offering of advice - maybe an invitation - for bereaved persons: caveat emptor.

Be careful with whom you share your grief.

Be careful with whom you share your grief.

Be careful with whom you share your grief.

And be wary of advice wielding, arrogant "clinicians" who think they know it all.

The clinicians who know best are the ones who admit they know nothing. The best therapists are the ones who admit their impotence in the face of such trauma and suffering. They are the ones who say, "There aren't words... I have no cure... And I will join you in the abyss..."

They are some duplicitous charlatans who are out to exploit. But there are also many well-intended who can harm you and me and us all. They often don't read or understand the research, they believe what others in positions of authority tell them without question, they may not be prone to dialectical thinking, and they often pretend to know the unknowable. Even if unwittingly, they end up preying on those who are desperate for any help, presenting themselves as the experts.

They are on the internet, on Facebook, at conferences, in clinical interactions, and in the grocery store.

Western culture, by its nature, promotes the use of nearly any strategy to bypass grief. Drugs, sex, alcohol, shopping, food, gambling, exercise, work, any distraction you can name. Even therapy.  But the sages knew what we seem to have forgotten in contemporary society: No 'intervention' and no interventionist can 'cure' your grief.  There is no panacea. You are not broken, you are broken hearted. And as Rabbi Mendel of Kotzk said 'there is no more whole heart than a broken heart.' 

You are not in need of repair. No alphabet soup intervention (ABC therapy, XYZ medication) and, certainly, no drug can assuage your grief.  The only way is through, and the only way through is with loving, nonjudgmental support, good self care and self compassion, and some other things demonstrated in the literature to be helpful in coping with, not eradicating, grief. And frankly, the source of many concerns about the prolongation of grief resides within our own social groups- others pressuring mourners to 'get over it,' 'move on', 'feel better.' Others who do not remember with us. Others who ostracize us and treat us as lepers. This kind of social reaction is not helpful, and actually is quite isolating and harmful for grievers. So let's focus on an intervention for a sick and intolerant culture that coerces us into believing we are entitled to happiness and comfort and immortality at all times and at all costs.

So if you need some extra support because you are feeling lonely, withdrawn, and confused, that help can come from those who are innate helpers from within your circle of friends/family/faith community and/or from those trained to help you to integrate your grief..., not push it away, decry, avoid, repress, or otherwise deflect it.  Surround yourself with others who have a "PhD" or "MD" or advance degree in common-sense and loving kindness.

Hell, I've seen animals give better 'therapy' than plenty of 'therapists.'

Again my unsolicited advice: Do not believe everything a so-called professional tells you. If it offends your soul, follow Whitman's advice and "dismiss" it.  Rather, trust the wisdom of your own grief. Get help if and when you need it from others who will embrace and uphold you and who understand what SCIENCE says about trauma, grief, and love. Yes, love.

Little in this conference's literature I read as it related to grief was based in science. And, nothing in any of the literature I read from this "conference" felt like love. And this saddens me beyond words.

Because in the end, grief is not a medical issue. Grief is not an issue to be solved or cured. Grief is an issue of the heart. 

Heed Goethe's harbinger: Beware the massman, the troubled guest on the dark earth.

~~~

Thank you to Dr. Joanne Cacciatore for her heartfelt words or warning to us so that we may protect our grief-torn hearts and souls as best we can in choosing wisely to whom we open our hearts.

Dr. Cacciatore's article:
http://drjoanne.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-holy-longing-is-yours-caveat-emptor.html

Thursday's Therapy ~ Sleep Therapy

Thursday's Therapy

Sleep Therapy

Sleep Better with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia

Do you lie awake night after night, struggling to catch the sleep that eludes you...then feel exhausted and miserable during the day? Don't just suffer stoically—insomnia is serious! It increases the risk for high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, anxiety and substance abuse. What's more, although insomnia often is considered a sign of depression, new research reveals that the insomnia can come first and double a person's risk of developing depression.

Sleeping pills may seem like a quick fix, but don't be too hasty in taking that route. Though these drugs do help some people, they also can have bad side effects...and according to one study, long-term use is associated with increased risk for early death.

There's a much better option that can get you the deep, blissful sleep you need. It's completely safe and drug-free, and because it addresses the underlying causes of insomnia (unlike medication), its benefits persist even long after treatment ends. It's called cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I), and just a few sessions can go a long way to restore normal sleep patterns. CBT-I has been shown to relieve insomnia for a wide variety of people, including older adults and those who suffer from chronic pain, fibromyalgia, cardiovascular disease, mood disorders and other health problems. It can even help people who have been taking sleeping pills for years. Here's what you should know about CBT-I…

IS THIS SLEEP SOLUTION RIGHT FOR YOU?

For insights, I turned to Donn Posner, PhD, a leading expert in CBT-I. He is a psychologist at Palo Alto VA Medical Center in California and coauthor ofCognitive Behavioral Treatment of Insomnia: A Session-by-Session Guide. Dr. Posner confirmed that chronic insomnia is a serious disorder that should be treated. However, he also noted that a few restless nights should not be considered insomnia (important to know so that you don't feel overly stressed about an occasional bad night!).

True chronic insomnia means difficulty initiating or maintaining sleep, despite adequate opportunity to sleep, that occurs at least three times a week and lasts for at least three months, according to Dr. Posner. How long can it take you to fall asleep before it's a problem? Most experts in the field consider 30 minutes of lying awake, either before first falling asleep or after having woken up in the middle of the night, as the cut-off. In addition, Dr. Posner said, "insomnia leads to some daytime consequences—for instance, fatigue, memory problems, difficulty concentrating, poor work performance or even anxiety about being unable to fall sleep. Insomnia is not just a nighttime disorder...it’s a 24-hour disorder.”

If you think that your sleep pattern fits the above description of insomnia, talk to your doctor—a medical problem could be interfering with your slumber, and you may find that sleep comes more easily once that underlying condition is addressed. If your insomnia persists, however, you should strongly consider trying CBT-I.

WHAT TO EXPECT DURING TREATMENT

The first step with CBT-I is for you to find a sleep specialist who offers it. To do this, ask your doctor for a referral to a qualified professional with expertise in CBT-I...or find a practitioner through the Society of Behavioral Sleep Medicine or contact the nearest certified sleep center and say that you’re interested in CBT-I.

Once you choose a sleep specialist, you can expect to undergo a thorough evaluation ofall areas of functioning to determine all the factors that are contributing to your sleep problems, Dr. Posner said. Genetic makeup, internal rhythm, social life, home life and work life are all evaluated...and you are instructed to keep a sleep diary to help pinpoint problematic patterns. Your therapist also tries to determine whether an emotional issue or even another sleep disorder precipitated your insomnia. When the evaluation is complete, the therapist creates an individualized treatment plan, typically consisting of four to six weekly one-hour sessions.

Then the real work begins. As the name implies, CBT-I involves both behavioral and cognitive elements. Though therapy is tailored to each patient, a typical protocol includes the following...

• Stimulus control. You are cautioned against using your bed at any time of day for anything other than sleeping or sex. That means no lounging on the bed to read, watch TV, talk on the phone or surf the Internet. For times when you do go to bed and do not fall asleep (or fall back to sleep) within 15 to 20 minutes, you are told to get up and go do something in another room, returning to bed only when you feel sleepy again—and repeating this instruction as many times as necessary.

The rationale: When a person habitually struggles to fall asleep, he "works" at what should be a natural process...and he becomes conditioned to associate the bed with anxiety, frustration and effort. In contrast, by getting out of bed whenever he cannot sleep, he gives up that struggle. If he applies this rule consistently, over time the bed becomes a trigger for sleep rather than for wakefulness, Dr. Posner explained. That association between bed and sleep is further reinforced when he avoids using the bed at all while awake. The only exception is sex. "If we asked people to give up the bed as a place for sex, they wouldn't comply anyway. But more importantly, during sex you presumably are not trying to sleep, so it doesn't present the same problem as, say, reading in bed with the intention of getting to sleep. It is really sleep effort above all that we try to eliminate," he said.

• Sleep hygiene. Typically patients are advised to avoid caffeine after noon...and to avoid exercise, alcohol, heavy meals and nicotine within two hours of bedtime. Your sleep therapist also reviews your bedroom environment to make sure it is dark and cool enough to be conducive to sleep. (Many people keep their bedrooms too warm for good sleep.)

• Anxiety abatement. The therapist teaches you how to deal with the anxiety you may feel before heading to bed. For instance, you may often think, I'll be a wreck if I don't get to sleep...or I can't stand lying awake like this! As you learn to counteract that "catastrophic thinking" with rational thoughts—I can function OK even if I don't sleep for eight hours...or Insomnia is unpleasant but hardly unbearable—your anxiety lessens and sleep comes more easily. You also may be shown relaxation techniques to practice during the day and at bedtime. And you learn to avoid staring compulsively at the clock, which only makes you fret more as you calculate how much sleep you're losing. If you need an alarm clock, you may be told to use one without illumination...or to place the clock under your bed where you can't keep checking it.

Commitment is key: Too many people try one or two of the techniques for a few nights, and then if they don't immediately start sleeping better, they get frustrated and give up. "There is nothing magic that will work tonight. It takes dedication and commitment to make CBT-I work because you have to rebuild your innate sleep drive and realign your body's natural rhythms before you'll be able to sleep well," said Dr. Posner. Be forewarned—during treatment, sleep problems often get worse before they get better...but that’s a sign that the protocol is working. It can take a week or two to start seeing real progress. “Given that most people with chronic insomnia have had the problem for years, a couple weeks of work should be a good trade,” Dr. Posner added.

Source: Donn Posner, PhD, CBSM (Certified in Behavioral Sleep Medicine), psychologist, Palo Alto VA Medical Center, Palo Alto, California. A clinical associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, he also is coauthor of Cognitive Behavioral Treatment of Insomnia: A Session-by-Session Guide (Springer).

Entire Article:

http://www.bottomlinepublications.com/content/article/health-a-healing/sleep-better-with-cognitive-

behavioral-therapy-for-insomnia?utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=2014-05-29%20DHN%20NL%20(1)%20remainder&utm_content=&utm_source=Newsletter&cid=46040939&spMailingID=46040939&spUserID=NTE4NTQ2NjcxMTAS1&spJobID=443799612&spReportId=NDQzNzk5NjEyS0

Thursday's Therapy - Sleep Loss: Something Else to Worry About! - Lost Sleep Could Mean Lost Neurons

The protein SirT3 might protect us against late nights, but all-nighters may result in neuron loss.

Thursday's Therapy

Sleep Loss: 

Something Else to Worry About!

Lost Sleep Could Mean Lost Neurons

Article from ScienceNews.org: 
Lost Sleep Could Mean Lost Neurons

Repeated all-nighters may result in brain cell loss, mouse study suggests

BY BETHANY BROOKSHIRE 11:26AM, APRIL 2, 2014

Most of us wish we got more sleep. Every night, something — whether it’s children, work or the Internet — seems to keep us up late. Sometimes it keeps us up all night. Often we comfort ourselves with the thought that if all else fails, we can make it up with a few solid nights of sleep on the weekend.

But new research shows that the brain may not be as forgiving as we hoped. While a few extra hours on the Internet may be absolved, all-nighters like those associated with shift work (not to mention parenting) may end up killing off neurons.

There is no question that sleep is important. It cleans our brain cells and helps consolidate our memories. Lack of sleep blunts our ability to focus, makes us dangerous drivers and can make us eat too much. Jing Zhang and her colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia were interested in the effects of sleep loss on the brain. “Many of us have pulled long nights and/or all-nighters, and we think we’re OK,” says Sigrid Veasey, a neurobiologist at Penn and coauthor on the study. “But what is the effect? Is there a compensatory mechanism? 

Or does the brain pay a price for repeated sleep loss?”

The researchers were particularly interested in the locus ceruleus, an area of neurons deep in the brain stem. The locus ceruleus plays an important role in attention, “fight or flight” and our sleep-wake cycles. But the locus ceruleus is also very sensitive to stress. And late nights can make those cells very frazzled indeed.

To examine how the brain might respond to decreased sleep, Zhang and colleagues put mice in new, interesting environments with other mice to play with and plenty of things to explore. With this mouse playground, the researchers could keep the animals up far past their bedtimes. The scientists looked at mice with normal sleep schedules, mice that stayed up three hours later than normal and mice with a night-shift schedule kept awake during the day for three days straight. In all cases, the mice could get as much sleep as they wanted during the night, their normal active period.

In a paper published March 19 in the Journal of Neuroscience, Zhang and her group showed that three hours of lost sleep in the mouse playground produced an increase in Sirtuin3, or SIRT3, a protein in a cell’s mitochondria. SIRT3 has a lot of functions, and one of them is reducing chemicals called reactive oxygen species. These molecules are capable of binding to and disrupting all sorts of cellular processes. ROS are a natural by-product of a cell’s daily life, but too many accumulating in the cell can get dangerous as the molecules bind to normal proteins, causing damage and eventually cell death.

By increasing SIRT3 protein when mice stay up late, the brain cells in the locus ceruleus are ready to deal with the ROS. But when the mice partied all night long, the situation reversed. SIRT3RNA levels went down, while ROS levels continued to increase. 

With three days of eight-hour sleep deprivation, the neurons in the locus ceruleus actually began to die. Napping didn’t make up for the sleep lost.

SIRT3 appears to be a key protein for protecting neurons from damage from ROS molecules during late nights. In mice lacking the gene for the SIRT3 protein, even three hours of sleep deprivation resulted in neuron injury from ROS.

“We didn’t think the brain got injured from sleep loss,” Veasey says. “Now we know it does.” 

She explains that the next step will be to see if there is similar damage in humans who have done large amounts of shift work, perhaps by examining post-mortem brains. Veasey also plans to see if increasing SIRT3 can protect against the effects of all-nighters.

While it is interesting to see a new role for SIRT3 in sleep, Matthew Hirschey, a cell biologist at Duke University, says that it’s not necessarily surprising. “SIRT3 is a mitochondrial protein, he says, “and mitochondrial function touches so much of biology.” In addition, because every cell in the body has SIRT3 in its mitochondria, increasing SIRT3 might have more effects than protecting your neurons from a late night.  “Generally,” Hirschey says, “it appears to be a good thing, but some cancer cells have high SIRT3 as well.”

It will also be important to see if the locus ceruleus can recover from neuron loss, and if it even matters. Zhang’s group did not run behavioral studies to see if the sleep-deprived mice had deficits in attention or memory, or if these reversed with recovery sleep. They also don’t know if neuron loss continues over long-term shift work, or if the brain can adjust. 

But Veasey says the current findings are scary enough:

“All of us in the lab take sleep a lot more seriously than we used to!”

Picture:  NINJA999/FLICKR (CC BY-NC 2.0)

Article: https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/scicurious/lost-sleep-could-mean-lost-neurons

Thursday's Therapy - Self-Care: Soothing Your Traumatized Brain + Video: Relaxing Nature Sounds

Thursday's Therapy

Self-Care: Soothing Your Traumatized Brain

+

Video: Relaxing Nature Sounds

What many people do not realize is that Child-Loss not only involves a lifetime of Complicated Grief, but it also involves an extended period of Trauma. {Tommy and I are in the 7 3/4 year of grief, and we still battle the Trauma aspects of Child-Loss.} 

A client this week was describing her trauma to me and asking what to do to help herself when she feels so traumatized over facing her loss and the dire possibilities of potential loss. A newly Grieving Mother was writing me an email about the same time asking essentially the same thing, how to survive her Child-Loss Grief and Trauma. I decided these questions were so important, I needed to answer them in this blog post so that we could all be reminded of some of the basic survival tactics to our Traumatic Grief.

I explained to my client that the culprit lies in the "primitive part" of the brain which consists of the Amygdala and the Hypothalamus-Pitutitary-Adrenal or HPA system. Once the Amygdala receives the bodily sensations that trigger "Danger!," it sends out the pertinent "Fight-Flight-Freeze-or-Dissociate" message to the Hypothalamus, Pituitary and Adrenal glands. Unfortunately, the Amygdala can continue to send "Danger!" messages even when the very real danger has passed, leaving traumatized minds, bodies, hearts, and souls whose trauma continues to signal current "Danger!" repeatedly...

For a Child-Loss Griever, our bodies become so worn down from our raw grief as well as our severely traumatized systems, that ofttimes, generally after a period of the first two years of grief, we become worn down, with the blessed initial shock that once graciously cushioned us from the vastness of the devastation of our loss, then starting to wear down, so that our "primitive brain" gets triggered more easily and thus begins to signal "Danger!" more often. This typically happens by year three (3); the third year was exactly the time for Tommy and me that was the absolute worst period of time over these past 7 3/4 years of our grief and trauma.

In that 3rd year after we lost our child, PostTraumatic Stress symptoms began to exaggerate. Hyper-vigilance (ever on the alert for more danger to the lives of our living loved ones), Hyper-arousal (our body jumping at the sound of a sudden noise, or being more reactive in general), Sleep Disturbance, etc. seemed to escalate. We were so thrown by our sudden demise at such a seemingly unusual time in our grief that we began to research every psychologist/psychiatrist parent who had lost a child until we found two simple sentences that brought sense to our chaos:

"Fish (1986) found that the grief of mothers was more intense after 2 years than it was in the beginning, and it did not taper off until after 5 years.... Likewise, in a study of 54 parents following the death of their child..., Rando (1983) found that grief actually intensified in the third year."

from  

What Forever Means After the Death of a Child (page 82)

by Grieving Mother, Kay Talbot, Ph.D. 

We learned from Dr. Therese Rando, Ph.D. (whom we mentioned in the above quote), and from Dr. Bessel A. Van der Kolk, M.D. that the Traumatic Loss of Our Child damages the brain, and that the sensing of continued signals of "Danger!" would only accentuate the damage to our brain! So we knew we needed to reverse what Trauma we could to help our poor brains heal.

Especially for someone traumatized by Child-Loss, it takes extra effort to do anything, even Self-Care. Over those first two years, we found ourselves neglecting the less important things in life (like cleaning the house, good hygiene, etc.!) to make room for the time needed to grieve our child. We made it a point to help ourselves feel some sense of soothing by spending much time outdoors, allowing our traumatized bodies and brains to experience soothing sensations to help calm the stirred up agitation. We found we needed to re-focus and get back to those self-soothing, highly comforting habits in the third year so that our brains could begin to rest and not feel the need to be hyper-alert. 

Sensations are what trigger the primitive brain to react, so we learned that soothing our sensations with right-brained activities was quite helpful. The right brain is the "creative" brain that enjoys art, music, sunshine, a breeze flowing across the skin, petting the dog, cuddling with the dog (and each other), swinging on our patio while enjoying the view of the flowers and birds, and watching the breeze gently moving through the leaves of the bamboo, oak tree, and flowers, all while listening to our little rock fountain waterfall's constant flowing. Such soothing comforts our bodies, souls and spirits and sends soothing messages to the Amydala so that it can relax and know that there is peace, not danger. This allows the incoming messages to the brain to be processed out of the primitive brain and on up to the more reasoning PreFrontal Cortex so that we can wisely choose what we need to do to process such traumatic material, helping it to flow on out of the body, having been re-worked.

Meditation, Exercise, Spiritual Practices you enjoy such as reading your Bible (or Bible graphics on Facebook or Pinterest if your mind is having a difficult time focusing!), Prayer, Making Time for our minds, bodies, hearts, souls, spirits to Re-work the Grief and Trauma, help not only to soothe, but also to essentially re-weave that fragile foundation of our lives that gives us the eternal "meaning" that reminds us we will be with our child again, and thus helps us to endure the daily battles a little better.

Doing this kind of self-care by self-soothing can help to re-wire the brain to repair the damage that already had been done by the Sudden Traumatic Loss of our Child! If you noticed yourself "losing" you car after parking it in a large parking lot, this is a symptom of that damage to the brain. The trauma of Child-Loss seems to attack those habitual, normal, everyday processes that we once did without thinking, such as easily remembering the steps to showering, shaving, washing our hair, how we would normally dress without even thinking about it, etc. That is why people think they are going crazy when they arrive at work (if they are able to work) only to discover their dress is on backwards, or wrong-side-out, or that they have on two different colors of shoes! This is the Traumatized Brain at work, and it is perfectly "normal" (as in, it is quite common) in Child-Loss Grief and Trauma. That is one of the reasons we feel we are "walking through molasses" daily because suddenly we have to think through all our otherwise normal habits, simply to remember the steps to accomplish them!

Soothing your traumatized brain is doable, and it is important to establish these soothing habits for the rest of this earthly lifetime because as we all know by now, grieving our child, (and thus needing to calm our systems) will last our entire lifetime. We will always love our child, so we will always (this side of Heaven) grieve our child.

Relax: 8 Hours-Relaxing Nature Sounds

Video: http://youtu.be/eKFTSSKCzWA

Thursday's Therapy - Surviving Mother's Day

Thursday's Therapy

Surviving Mother's Day

Every Angel Parent can face the ultimate tragedy and survive. It's the day-to-day living, after the fact, that will bring you to your knees. 

~Barbara Karrer, Grieving Mothers

We know holidays are bad, simply bad. Tommy and I laughed tonight as we pondered the thought of "moving our anniversary" date to another month since our wedding anniversary falls just nine days after Merry Katherine's birth date, but we couldn't find a month in the whole year that didn't have something in it that makes the month hard for us to survive! But you can imagine how "cooked" we are after her birthday; there is no way we feel like "celebrating" just days later! So, yes, all holidays are bad:

Christmas. New Years. Son's Birthday. Tommy's Birthday. Valentines Day. Merry Katherine's Birthday. Son and Daughter-in-law's Anniversary. Daughter-in-law's Birthday. Son's Birthday. Mother's Day. Father's Day. July 4th. Death Day. Ellie's Birthday. My Birthday. Halloween. Thanksgiving. Christmas. Wow! A lot of days that are extra-sad!

But it hit me tonight that Mother's Day (and Father's Day as well) is universally bad among bereaved parents. A day that has been so special with special family (complete-family) memories now becomes sad because one of our precious children is not here to celebrate. What are family holidays for if one of the "family" can never be with us to "celebrate"?

The absence of her presence looms large through the room, and we just can't do it! 

At least not yet we can't.


Part of the pain is --- she is not here. The other part, possibly equally painful, is that we love our sons, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter dearly, and we so hate that our limitations make us so "abby-normal" that we simply cannot meet on that day. So add to our pain and grief the disheartening realization that we are likely disappointing the others in our family whom we love equally!

Well, "That's just what be's!" my sons tease me. It is what it is. They graciously take us where we are, always knowing we can "celebrate" on another day. We are blessed to have two tender sons who love us in spite of ourselves.

TeriAnn is so right in her graphic when she says,

"A mother's grief and mourning knows NO end,  

her love--- NO boundaries."

~TeriAnn Sargent 

So, what do you do when the Grief-and-Mourning and Love compete against one another on this special day?

These therapists are stumped!


P.S., Just stumbled upon Tanya Lord's suggestions for holidays that grace-fully address our broken hearts' situation:

I guess what we unwittingly have been doing is practicing three of these wonderful rules:

"Allow traditions to change to accommodate the missing space." 

"Allow me to say no to invitations." 

"Remember that much of what I do is a reflection of my grief not my feelings about the holiday or my friends and families. Though I am hurting I still love and care."

(Thank you Tanya Lord of "The Grief Toolbox" for your very sensitive and caring suggestions!)

~Sweet blessings to all your grieving hearts~









Top graphic - Thank you to 
Barbara Karrer of Grieving Mothers Muzy
http://grievingmothers.muzy.com/?next_start=1349230938#lightbox_post_89889660

Other graphics, thanks to

TeriAnn Sargent, Grieving Mother,
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=315809168567565&set=pb.118424748306009.-2207520000.1398549550.&type=3&permPage=1

Tanya Lord of The Grief Toolbox,
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=139176552897495&set=pb.118424748306009.-2207520000.1398556725.&type=3&theater

both, found on Facebook's

2012: Love and Loss

Thursday's Therapy ~ Good Grief - A Short Animated Documentary About Grief ~Griever, Fiona Dalwood

Thursday's Therapy

A Short Animated 

Documentary 

About 

Grief

~by Griever, Fiona Dalwood

Writer, Director, Animator

Good Grief, a remarkably powerful and touching animated short film by Australian director Fiona Dalwood, shows how five different individuals cope with loss. Whether the loss was that of a parent, a bunny, an amputated leg or a good friend by suicide, each person’s compelling story of grief rings familiar with anyone who has had (a) loss of their own.

Inspired by the loss of her own mother and the grief that ensued, director Fiona Dalwood went about finding out how the experience of loss transforms us. With a shoestring budget and months of hard work, she made Good Grief, a beautiful short film that has been described as “adorable and heartfelt.” Accessible to children and adults alike, it is being used in educational programs as a starting point to discuss the process of grief and what some of the positive outcomes of grief can be.

Good Grief

(Winner of at least ten (10) film awards)

~Fiona Dalwood

Article presenting the animated Grief film:

http://laughingsquid.com/good-grief-a-powerful-animated-short-film-showing-how-five-different-individuals-deal-with-loss/

Thursday's Therapy - "If It Isn't Meant to 'Cure' Grief, What Good is Therapy?" via Huffington Post

Thursday's Therapy

"If It Isn't Meant to 'Cure' Grief,

What Good is Therapy?"

via Huffington Post,

~Megan Devine, 

Grief Advocate/

Counselor

Posted: 04/03/2014 4:05 pm EDT Updated: 04/03/2014 4:59 pm EDT

Print Article

If It Isn't Meant to "Cure" Grief, 

.........What Good is Grief Therapy?

~by Megan Devine, Grief Advocate/Counselor

There's a lot of sketchy stuff going on in the world under the guise of "grief therapy." Sixty-day cures, 30-minute solutions. Diagnostic labels that show how "unwell" you are, and medications to fix that for you.

Therapeutic approaches to grief run the gamut of wise and beautiful stewardship to diagnostic medical lecturing.

I'm a therapist.

I've been a therapist for well over 10 years and was in related social and education services for the decade before that.

In my work as a clinician, I had to give people diagnoses. That is the way that therapists and other professionals get paid: We give a diagnosis that the insurance companies have decided they will reimburse for care.

Choosing a diagnosis, at its root, is a checklist and a process of elimination or inclusion. If I give you a diagnosis, it tells any other people you might be working with that you share at least some of the same challenges that other people with the same diagnosis do.

At its best, a diagnosis gives your team relevant information without you having to go through the same questions over and over again.

"At its best," however, is rarely how it's used or seen.

Even before I became widowed, I never was much for pathology: that medical-izing of normal human experience. I gave my clients the least stigmatizing diagnosis I could while still accurately conveying their struggles.

I couldn't see someone as being deeply flawed just because they were in pain. I refused to treat anyone as though what they were feeling was inherently wrong.

After becoming widowed, I found myself way too many times on the receiving end of that medical view, being told that who I was, and how I was, was wrong.

As though my intense, deep grief were pathological and corrupt: a sign of an unwell mind.

I didn't just get it from the people around me -- the friends, family members, and casual acquaintances. Some of the most corrective and judgmental people were other therapists. Some had even been my colleagues. One I had even looked to as a decent teacher in his field.

The overwhelming response from both the pros and the casual observer was that since I was in pain, I was clearly doing it wrong.

Seeing a therapist is tricky business -- so many (even some good ones) subscribe to that over-arching belief that grief needs to be corrected somehow, that it needs to be pushed through.

If you're on this grief path, no doubt you have heard a zillion and one suggestions about how you can do your grief better. You've been encouraged to get out of it fast, to go back to "normal" life.

But there is a different way to approach grief.

Many, many years ago, in what seems like an entirely different life, I was studying herbal medicine. The subject for one class was herbs for immune disorders. What the instructor taught that day has stuck with me now for over 20 years.

She said that many clinicians approach an immune disorder with herbs to stimulate and push the immune system, trying to get it to work harder and faster. That approach is misguided, she said. When you have a condition like this, your immune system is already working as hard as it possibly can.

Trying to make it work harder is only going to fail.

The herbalist taught that what was needed in this situation were herbs to come in underneath the immune system, herbs to walk up beside it and support it. The most useful medicines are the ones that don't push, but give the system roots. Nourish it. Help it continue to do what it is trying to do.

The system isn't working wrong, it's working as hard as it can.

Grief has your heart working as hard as it can.

When you are in pain, you don't need to be fixed. You don't need to be labeled as broken, your feelings shoved into codified lists. You don't need to be pushed to get better fast.

What you need are those things -- those people, those places, those words -- that come up underneath you and give you roots. You need those things that nourish you, that help you do the work your heart already knows how to do. The work it is already doing.

A good therapist is a wonderful thing: They know that there is nothing about you that's wrong. They know their role is to listen and validate, to come up alongside you and provide support.

They bolster your roots; they lend you stability.

Good therapy isn't a cure for what's wrong. And that makes all the difference in the world.

How about you? Have you found a therapist who truly listens and supports you in your grief? 

Megan Devine is writer, grief advocate, and clinical counselor. She is the author of the audio program When Everything is Not Okay: Practical Tools to Help You Stay in Your Heart & Not Lose Your Mind. You can find this and other resources on her website, www.refugeingrief.com.

Thank you to Huffington Post, and to Megan Devine for use of her article. 

Thank you to the artists, Moussin Irjan and David Agenjo, for the use of their amazing paintings here on my blog post.

Grief Therapy Post, from Huffington Post:
 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/megan-devine/grief-therapy_b_5077196.html

Grief Pictures: 
1st: via Visual Poetry  Kansas Wright on Pinterest - Saatchi Online Artist: Moussin Irjan; Oil, 2012, Painting "What warms the soul?"
2nd: via Artistic Appeals  Kelli Kayy - Saatchi Online Artist: David Agenjo; Acrylic, 2012, Painting "Bejin"

Thursday's Therapy - 3 Tips to Shrink Anxiety

Thursday's Therapy

3 Tips to Shrink Anxiety

Tommy and I will never forget when at a Grief and Trauma seminar by Therese Rando, that Therese asked, 

"What is the premier emotion that a Child-Loss Griever experiences?"  

Answer: "Anxiety"! 

We are finding that observation to be oh-so-true, somewhat because we are still unsure of what our grieving bodies and hearts can and cannot do!!!

So, we hope the following article from PsychCentral will be of help to many of us Child-Loss grievers as we learn to cope with that anxiety more effectively:

3 Tips for Using Exercise to Shrink Anxiety

By Margarita Tartakovsky, M.S.

Associate Editor

We know that exercise is a boon for our mental, physical and emotional health. And it’s particularly helpful for easing anxiety.  “[M]oderate exercise has been shown to have a significant effect on anxiety and mood,” said Marla Deibler, PsyD, a clinical psychologist and director of The Center for Emotional Health of Greater Philadelphia, LLC.

For instance, exercise reduces the stress hormones adrenaline and cortisol. And it stimulates the production of feel-good endorphins.

It also leads to an increase in activity levels in the serotonergic system, which may help to decrease anxiety and improve mood, Deibler said.

Plus, “moderate to intense exercise raises core body temperature, which is accompanied by a simultaneous reduction in muscle tension, thereby affecting the experience of anxiety.”

So if all this can help, how can you motivate yourself to do more of it?

Recently, researchers have been exploring another hypothesis behind the benefits of exercise in easing anxiety: Inflammation and oxidative and nitrogen stress (O&NS) may play a role in contributing to anxiety, while exercise may act as “anti-inflammatory and anti-O&NS agent,” according to the authors.

So, whether you struggle with occasional anxiety or a diagnosable disorder, exercise can help. It’s a powerful part of your self-care routine and an effective adjunct to anxiety treatment. Below, experts shared how to make the most of movement in minimizing your anxiety.

1. Find Activities You Enjoy

According to the experts, the best physical activities are the ones you actually enjoy doing and will continue doing. “With the exception of yoga, which has specifically been shown to be helpful, research does not specify what activities are better than others [for anxiety],” said Deibler, who also pens the Psych Central blog "Therapy That Works."

So what are your favorite ways to move? What activities did you love to do as a child? What just sounds like fun to you? What activities have you always wanted to try?

Ideally, you can participate in physical activities “at least five times per week for a minimum of 30 minutes,” said Maura Mulligan, LICSW, the director of the Center for Wellness at Wentworth Institute of Technology. 

But you can start by figuring out what activities you’d like to do at least three times a week.

You might not notice significant improvement in your anxiety right away. It might take regular exercise — three to five times a week — for several weeks, she said. 

To observe your improvement, Mulligan suggested journaling your symptoms for four to six weeks.

2. Sample a Variety of Activities

Mulligan encouraged readers “to try many different activities and to not give up if one or two are not well received.” Think of this as an experiment that’ll help you explore your exercise likes and dislikes and boost your well-being.

For instance, yoga is “very helpful in having individuals focus on breathing techniques and quieting their mind, which are useful skills in anxiety reduction.”

Other activities you might try, she said, are: swimming, running, dancing, taking long walks, hiking and participating in classes at the gym. 

And, again, remember to focus on activities that feel good for you. “What works for one person may not be useful or enjoyable for another.”

3. Practice Meditation

Carla Naumburg, Ph.D, a clinical social worker and author of the Psych Central blog, "Mindful Parenting," suggested cultivating a daily meditation practice.

This study showed the brain mechanisms involved in bringing anxiety relief while meditating. 

Positive changes have even been observed when meditators aren’t meditating.

“You can meditate inside or outside, any time of day or night, as long as you won’t be disturbed.”

Meditation isn’t about eliminating your thoughts. It’s about learning “to observe them and let them go.” The easiest place to start is probably your breath.

Start by simply noticing your breath “coming and going.” Another option is to count your breaths to 10, and then begin at 1. Whenever your mind naturally wanders, just start counting again, she said.

Naumburg also suggested starting with just two minutes of meditating a day. “If you can do that for a few days in a row, bump it up to three or four minutes.” Also, learn the language of mindfulness, she said. Check out Mindful.org and Susan Salzberg’s book Real Happiness, which includes audio of guided meditations.

Physical activities are a healthy way to minimize anxiety. Remember that the key is to find activities you genuinely enjoy, and practice them regularly. 

Article: http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2013/07/17/3-tips-for-using-exercise-to-shrink-anxiety/

Thursday's Therapy - 7 Tips to Boost Your Brain ~Women's Health Magazine

Thursday's Therapy

7 Tips to Boost Your Brain

~Women's Health Magazine

Brainpower: Sharpen Your Mind

7 mind-boosting tips to boost your brainpower and memory and sharpen your mind

~Cristina Goyanes

Of all the things you've got on your mind — work, bills, that weird, new stain on the kitchen floor — your mind probably isn't one of them. But now that you've started blanking on your own cell phone number and freezing when the ATM asks for your PIN, maybe it's time to start thinking about it. See, your brain tissue is steadily being chipped away — some of it by the natural aging process and some of it by such brain shrinkers as stress and cigarettes. Luckily, there are ways to strengthen your brainpower the way you build your abs. All it takes is a quick seven-step diet and exercise plan designed to boost your memory, attention span, and all the other things that will restore your skull-covered hard drive to its maximum power.



Brain Booster 1: Your Heart

The reason you misplace keys or can't remember what you ate 9 minutes ago? Normal aging shrinks neurons (brain cells) and drains neurotransmitters (the messengers that communicate between and among cells). But getting your heart rate up can reverse this process by increasing blood flow to the brain to improve memory and overall brain function, says Arthur Kramer, Ph.D., a professor of cognitive neuroscience at the University of Illinois.

"We examined brain structure before and after fitness training and we found increases of brain volume in a number of areas," 

says Dr. Kramer, whose patients improved 10 to 15 percent on a variety of memory and attention tasks after exercise. The minimum:

You can reap benefits from as little as walking 30 minutes three times a week.

Brain Booster 2: Your Back

Hauling your everyday (80-pound) shoulder bag can leave you tired. Carrying whiny kids can leave you frazzled. And both may injure your back — and your brain — in the process. A recent Northwestern University study found that people who suffered from chronic back pain lost up to 1.5 cubic centimeters (equivalent to 1 teaspoon) of gray matter per year. That's because the area of the brain that copes with the stress of the pain (the lateral prefrontal cortex, for those scoring at home) becomes depleted and dysfunctional enough to affect emotional decision-making, says A. Vania Apkarian, Ph.D., whose previous work found that patients with chronic back pain were slower decision-makers.

Best way to beat back pain: build muscle in your lower back and abdominals to support the spine. Try the reverse trunk curl. Lie flat on your stomach and fold your hands under your chin. Lift your chin and chest off the floor about 3 to 6 inches. Aim for three sets of 10 to 15 repetitions three times a week.



Brain Booster 3: Your Waist

A body mass index below 25 not only means you'll look great in a bikini but that you'll be more likely to remember that you do. A recent Swedish study found that women who had a BMI of 27 (25-30 is considered overweight) were more likely to experience loss of brain tissue in the temporal lobe (that's your brain's main hub for memory function and one of the first areas affected by Alzheimer's). That's because extra fat generates more chemicals that can be toxic to your brain, says Deborah Gustafson, Ph.D., the lead study author and assistant professor at the Institute of Clinical Neuroscience in Sweden.

One class of these chemicals — called free radicals — latches on to cells, disrupts the way they function, and can kill them. Aging naturally chews away at your memory, but excess fat may speed up the process. For each point your BMI increases, your risk increases 12 to 16 percent. "If you decrease your body weight, you're going to slow potential atrophy," says Dr. Gustafson, who recommends a BMI below 25.

Brain Booster 4: Apples

Eat one a day and keep your neurologist away. Researchers from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, recently discovered that animal brain cells treated with the antioxidant quercetin were able to resist damage from those brain-frying free radical cells (above).

"We know that quercetin, commonly found in apples, has a great potential to protect against chronic diseases, including Alzheimer's," 

says Chang Lee, Ph.D., the principal study author and chair of the department of food science and technology at Cornell. Since fresh apples contain high levels of quercetin, Dr. Lee suggests that one a day may help combat neurodegenerative diseases. Other foods high in quercetin include onions, plums, and berries.

A Kandinsky painting 

Brain Booster 5: Your Desktop Wallpaper

Set up a Kandinsky painting as your desktop wallpaper, and it's like 10 pushups for your brain every time you look at it. Researchers from the University of California at Davis found that the brain first detects recognizable patterns, such as shapes and lines, and then starts to break down new and different elements.

Taking in an eyeful of complex images may ultimately help slow natural brain deterioration, 

says study author Scott Murray, Ph.D., a researcher at the University of Minnesota. Looking at a painting that actively engages your thoughts is far more challenging — and better — for your brain than staring out a window, which likely offers familiar views and much easier interpretation, Dr. Murray says.

Or, as another famous artist Pablo Picasso said,

"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life."

~Pablo Picasso 

Brain Booster 6: Español

Knowing how to say "Yo quiero Taco Bell" versus knowing how to order your whole meal in Spanish may mean the difference of a few brain cells. A recent study from the University College London found that bilinguals have more gray matter than monolinguals.

"It appears that gray matter, which is critical for performing simple as well as complex tasks, is shaped by what we learn and by our experiences in general," 

says Andrea Mechelli, Ph.D., the lead study author. Even people who picked up a second language at age 35 saw an increase in gray-matter density, says Dr. Mechelli.

Where to start? The easiest second language to learn is the one you're most likely to encounter; for most, that's Spanish. "Find a way to immerse yourself in situations where people are actually using that language," says Dennis Baron, a professor of English and linguistics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. For other ways, try community college classes, or go online to look at foreign newspapers that have illustrations to help you understand.

Brain Booster 7: The Mall

In a recent study of 1,000 participants, researchers set out to find why 75-year-old women tend to maintain better brain function than 75-year-old men. The result: they shop. That's because shopping requires more physical and mental activity than sitting around and watching golf, says Guy McKhan, M.D., study author and professor at the Mind/Brain Institute at Johns Hopkins University.

"They're being physically active, mentally active, and tend to see themselves as having a role to play in life," 

says Dr. McKhan. Deciding what to buy, for whom, and how much to spend is one way to keep your brain — and your eye for a bargain — active on weekends.

Article:

http://www.womenshealthmag.com/health/how-to-boost-your-brain-and-memory?cm_mmc=twitter-_-womenshealth-_-content-health-_-brainboostingtips