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Showing posts from February, 2015

Fifty Shades of Grey and Informed Consent

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Fifty Shades of Grey-the ebook Prior to reading the book, I thought 50 Shades of Grey had to be a middle-aged woman's lament about her hair. Okay, that's the last joke. Men Can Stop Rape I bought the book months ago, needing an ebook to read while the nails dry. It could take me a year to finish just one ebook. But I lost my place, which happens when you use Kindle on multiple devices, and never found it again. Not being patient with such things, I switched to a print book,  Understanding Mass Violence: A Social Work Perspective which is pretty good, actually. The poster above is from the Men Can Stop Rape organization. I bought a bunch of them.  Not that Fifty Shades of Grey is about rape, but it is about hurting. And therapists deal with hurting pretty often, tend to wince when people intentionally hurt themselves. Doctors as a rule are down on self-harm, risky behavior. My father-in-law, a family doctor, called people who ride motorcycles organ donors . Knowing it is danger

Other People's Stuff

It has been some time since we linked over to other people's blogs and websites. We are totally overdue. Here are some goodies. (1) EMDR   Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing. Still one of my favorite techniques, although it requires a little upper-arm muscle, focus, and yes, intensive training. That can be tough, that trip to San Diego in the winter. (There's a post on this blog about it somewhere, all about me, naturally.) For many years we used EMDR primarily to treat PTSD, but now it is popping up in all kinds of other ways. Check out this link to Anastasia Pollak 's Not just for trauma: EMDR and Performance Enhancement . She even explains how it works, the theoretical why, that is. And of course, so does the founder, Francine Shapiro. (2) TopCounselingSchools infographic is tops in my book. How we love a good visual, check it out. (Blessings, Brietta, thanks for your patience.) (3) How to Give a Time Out: Give a Time In Instead  We used to use The Green C

13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do

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I have to admit, lists rankle me, especially when they are lists of  shoulds .* But Amy Morin  wrote a list of should nots . The book,  13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do,  pulled me in, just like  Where Have I Been All My Life , life coach Cheryl Rice's biography, last week. Love those book tours.** The good news is that the list of don't  isn't as focused on avoidance as it  leads on. That's good, because avoidance isn't generally therapeutic. In fact, it can be anti-therapeutic. Just don't  ___ (fill in the blank),   never works, not for very long. Humans are far too willful, prone to habit and addiction. Therapy is a process, an examination of the whys and the wherefores of pain--the opposite of avoiding problems. We even suggest that patients lean into problems. Don't avoid. " Bring it up in a safe place " (before leaning in  in vivo ). Enough focus and we get sick of feeling sick, leave it for awhile. Remember what the late Morri