By Brianna Riddlebarger
Medications can be a wonderfully helpful tool for mental health, sleep, and cognition. So can supplements and many other holistic medical interventions. But, medications have limits.
Just like other emotions (such as happiness or peacefulness), you can’t magically conjure motivation. The problem is, many base their actions on whether that feeling is there. This is risky and leads to inaction, self sabotage, avoidance, or even self-loathing.
By Brianna Riddlebarger
Mania and psychosis typically respond well to medication intervention - either by targeting it altogether or by reducing intensity of symptoms so that they are easier to manage. Getting help early on is important, but it’s also important to know a few other things when you are watching your loved one in a manic or psychotic state.
Empowerment is a buzz word in our society today. Empower is a term frequently used in political circles to motivate certain people groups to act confidently toward a certain cause.
Motherhood is a complex mixture of wonderful, exhausting, and terrifying. Nothing will make you feel more whole yet also very powerless. From conception, pregnancy, labor and delivery, toddler stages, school age, teenage phases, college transitions, to the duration of your child's life, the worry never stops.
You get home from work. You cook dinner. You eat your dinner on the couch while watching your favorite show. You promised yourself you’d only watch one episode, but what’s the harm in watching one more? Next thing you know, you wake up at 1 AM on the couch, still in your work clothes and totally disoriented.
Studies show that daily routine has many benefits for our mental health. Routine can sound boring, but efficient and effective use of time actually creates space in our day to do more of the activities that we consider fun. We talk about routine a lot—and for good reason. It is one of the most important things we can do for our mental health.
Grief is defined as “a natural response to loss” and is typically associated with distress, agony, sorrow, anger, emptiness or yearning. We commonly understand grief in its 5 stages after death: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
Grief is a process that is typically avoided and can unfortunately lead to lasting health issues as a result. And in that blog, we identified things in this life that may need to be grieved that are beyond loss of life or death.
Whether you realize it or not, you have expectations of yourself and others in your life - at home, at work, in your extended family, from your friends, and even from strangers! For example, when you’re changing lanes while driving, you expect someone to either slow down or speed up so you can merge.
While there's definitely helpful tools and advice for healthy parenting, there are some very basic principles to establish first. Before you dig into any details on reinforcements, discipline, gentle parenting, setting boundaries, etc, there are some basics that can be extremely helpful in creating a safe and healing environment for your whole family.
"When I made the phone call to Solstice Pacific I really had no idea what to expect. I just knew I needed help and someone to guide me through the process. The patient advocate I spoke to told me there were a few options available to someone like myself."
