Unless you’ve already been through aspects of trauma therapy, you might be unfamiliar with the term “adverse childhood experiences” or ACEs. Adverse Childhood Experiences are specific criteria that mental health professionals use to assess what traumas children or adults might have faced, and why treatment must resolve these issues before healing can begin. Understanding ACEs...Read More

Codependency The term codependency is often referred to as a relationship addiction. Codependent behavior is learned and prohibits one from having a healthy relationship with others. The relationships formed by the co-dependent person are one-sided and often abusive. Codependent relationships are often seen in families of alcoholics or drug addicts. Despite the term being used...Read More

Is It Normal To Experience Anger During Recovery? Once you decide on a path of recovery, you might be faced with a multitude of emotions including anger.  Anger is normal in recovery, as you face your addiction and the consequences of your addiction on others.  While you were using, you may have used drugs or...Read More

Sex addiction and love addiction are not the same thing.  The exception to this statement is that both typically involve emotional deprivation experienced in childhood.  The sex addict and the love addict come from homes that are not stable or emotionally fulfilling.  The child in this environment grows up feeling neglected and will look to...Read More

Drug addicts stop doing drugs for their recovery. Alcoholics stop drinking for their recovery. Sex addicts stop having sex which creates unhealthy patterns of behavior for their recovery. Shopping addicts learn to manage their budget and shop in a way that is healthy. Eating disorder recovery doesn’t involve not eating but learning how to regulate...Read More

They’re called “road rage incidents”. People get into altercations verbally. If they don’t pull over to hash it out, they do things like throw jests and nonverbal communications at one another. In extreme, yet sadly common cases, they do something aggressive, like cause a traffic accident, which could result in death. Cars are weapons. Anger...Read More

Acceptance is a complicated process. Acceptance is a final stage of the grieving process defined by Elisabeth Kubler Ross. We come and go throughout acceptance during the entire process of grieving. If our grieving goes undealt with, we may never reach acceptance, which means our grief never gets resolved. As a result… …We never let...Read More

When you’re struggling with a mental health condition which is often ultimately defined by not being in complete control, or any control, over feelings and symptoms, it is hard to believe the opposite. It is the lack of control which takes place during active episode of mental health that make us forget that we are...Read More

Depression makes people uncomfortable because sadness is generally coddled and corrected. Many people have an urge to offer unwarranted advice and direction to people struggling with depression. Unfortunately, that advice often falls short and can be more upsetting than helpful. Here is what people struggling with clinical depression cannot do because you told them to....Read More

Most of us will experience body-shaking, explosive anger and rage at some point in our lives. Anger is a secondary emotion, a defense mechanism protecting us against the vulnerabilities of fear and sadness. Anger is also a survival mechanism, ingrained in our evolutionary DNA to fight off predators and threats. Today, we aren’t running from...Read More