What to Say to Your Family to Communicate Boundaries Around the Holidays
In healthy families, there are no expectations around the holidays. Family traditions and celebrations are fun and flexible. So, discussions about where and how to have family gatherings are simple and enjoyable. However, in other families, holidays can be full of pressure. The discomfort often starts long before an event, in the planning stages. There’s…
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How Work Stress and Burnout Negatively Impact Family Relationships
Most of us have heard the term “quality over quantity.” This term refers to having less of something valuable versus more of a cheaper version of that thing. When it relates to time, it’s usually to reassure a person that the time they spend with someone is enough. And I agree with that to a…
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10 Signs of Loneliness in A Marriage
Many of my clients with histories of childhood emotional neglect often feel lonely in their marriages. They also often struggle to acknowledge this loneliness. This confusion is easy to understand as loneliness can take on many forms. Below are some ways loneliness can show up in your relationship. I hope this helps you to identify…
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How to Support a Partner with Seasonal Depression Without Burning Out
As a therapist, I often see how Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) can impact relationships. My clients, whose partners struggle with SAD, often notice the strain it puts on their relationship. My clients want to support their partners but often overhelp and feel burned out. Learning how to validate a partner with SAD while maintaining your…
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4 Common Relationship Stressors
All relationships have their moments of stress. These moments can be defining points of growth and connection in a relationship. But they can also drive a couple apart. In this post, I continue the concept of good versus bad stress, but in the context of relationships. Below, I introduce four typical relationship stressors and how…
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4 Signs of Toxic Relationship Stress
As I wrote in the previous post, no relationship can escape stress. So many forms of pressure can enter a relationship, no matter how strong and healthy it is. However, stress has to be short-term, manageable, and lead to something good. Otherwise, it turns toxic and deteriorates the health of the individuals and the relationship.…
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Why Am I Always Overwhelmed? How Anxiety and Emotion Dysregulation Relate
In my work as a therapist, I often find clients start therapy stating they feel overwhelmed. They are unable to describe their feelings any further. And that’s okay because helping clients name and distinguish between feelings is a large part of my work as a therapist. In the post below, I want to examine what some…
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An Illinois Therapist Shares 3 Ways Therapy Helps You Stop People-Pleasing
Most of my clients know the right things to do to support their mental health but struggle to do them. For example, my clients know that boundaries and self-respect are essential to stop people-pleasing, yet they still have difficulty saying no to others. As a result, they feel shame. However, this divide between knowing what…
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How Feeling Overwhelmed Can Be a Sign of the Need to Grieve
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the pressures of life. Whether it’s from overwork, strained relationships, or taking in too much information, overwhelm shows up. Being a therapist, I know feeling overwhelmed is often more than just the result of external stressors. It’s usually a sign of emotional need, especially the need to grieve. This…
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How Emotional Dysregulation Keeps You Stuck in a Cycle of Anxiety and Burnout
When emotions become difficult to manage, it can be dysregulation, which keeps one stuck in a cycle of anxiety and burnout. As a therapist, I see firsthand how this affects my clients. Most of my clients seek therapy due to work or relational stress. They have tried for years to problem-solve and feel better, but…
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