HOPE+WELLNESS BLOG
little snippets and advice for
everyday challenges many people share
6 Ways to Support Mental Health After Pregnancy Loss
The period after pregnancy loss can be complicated, emotional, and intense. If you’ve experienced a miscarriage, here are some ways to support your mental health in the aftermath.
Pregnancy loss is multifaceted, and it impacts both mental and physical health. In the immediate aftermath of a miscarriage, you might experience a range of emotions and urges that feel confusing or even scary. Miscarriage is a major loss, even if it’s one that people often don’t talk about.
Losing a pregnancy can be incredibly traumatic. Grief is already a difficult emotion to deal with, but the taboo around miscarriage adds to many people’s pain and suffering. Often, people who experience a miscarriage are encouraged to keep their feelings to themselves, which makes them feel even more alone.
Another aspect of pregnancy loss is the complicated feelings it can bring up around your body and your health. It can be jarring and immensely stressful to think there is something wrong with you or your partner that is causing pregnancy loss, especially if you’ve experienced multiple losses.
Miscarriage can also be expensive, especially for families who are already struggling with money, because they often require medical care or even surgery. Some people struggle to take time off work to deal with the aftermath of pregnancy loss. And in a post-Roe America, losing a pregnancy can even lead to legal consequences, which can make it even harder to seek proper care for your mental and physical health.
The period after pregnancy loss can be complicated, emotional, and intense. If you’ve experienced a miscarriage, here are some ways to support your mental health in the aftermath:
Allow yourself to feel your feelings
Feeling the intense emotions that accompany pregnancy loss can be intimidating. Painful emotions are difficult to experience, and we often do whatever we can to avoid the painful feelings, because they’re so distressing. However, emotions have to be felt to help them pass. Trying to suppress your intense emotions can work in the moment, but they can’t be suppressed forever.
In the moment, it can be hard to remember that the sharpness of this grief won’t last forever, even though the grief might not ever go away fully. Grieving is allowing yourself the time and space to let your life expand around the grief you feel. Eventually, this experience will make up just a part of your story, even if it feels like it’s your whole story right now. You’re not doomed to feel this intensely forever. Doing your best to allow the painful feelings to come forward when you’re able to cope with them successfully can make a big difference in processing your grief.
Remember you’re not alone
Miscarriage is unfortunately all too common, but that doesn’t make going through the experience any easier. There are probably many people in your life that have experienced this kind of loss before, even if you don’t know about it.
Even if you’re not ready to talk to people you know about it, you can look up resources online from others who have gone through this too. You can lean on the wisdom of those who have come before you during this complicated experience without even having to talk about it if you’re not ready.
Talk about it (if you’re up for it)
You don’t have to suffer alone, and you don’t have to keep how you feel to yourself. You’re not the only person who’s gone through this, and you don’t have to get through this on your own. As humans, we naturally seek out connections with others, and those connections can be a powerful source of support during times of grief. If you feel ready to talk about it with someone you trust, don’t hold back.
Speaking with other people who have experienced this type of loss can help you feel less alone, and give you ideas for how to get through this tough time. Sometimes it’s comforting to talk to friends or family, and sometimes it’s helpful to talk to support groups or a therapist.
Try distress tolerance skills
When we’re in crisis, it can often be a painful and scary experience. Distress tolerance skills, which come from Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), are designed to help you make it through a crisis without relying on harmful or self destructive behaviors.
Some of distress tolerance skills to try include:
Distract with A.C.C.E.P.T.S - doing something to take your mind off of the painful emotions you’re experiencing
Self Soothing with the 5 senses - using your senses to bring you back to the present moment
IMPROVE the moment - a set of skills to reduce distress in the moment using your mind and body
Pros and Cons - weigh your choices to help you make decisions from your wise mind
S.T.O.P. - to help you pause before engaging in destructive behavior
T.I.P.P. - using your body’s chemistry to lower your distress level using temperature, intense exercise, paced breathing, and progressive muscle relaxation
Turning the Mind - opening yourself up to eventually feeling acceptance
Radical Acceptance - lowering your distress by accepting what is, instead of fighting against it
Be gentle with yourself
When you’re in the midst of something difficult and traumatic, it can be hard to find the mental bandwidth to be kind to yourself. That doesn’t mean that it’s not important to be gentle and compassionate with yourself as you go through this tough time.
It might be hard to access kindness and self-compassion all of the time, but try to spend at least a few moments each day being kind to yourself. Try talking to yourself in the mirror, or saying affirmations to remind yourself that you’re worthy of care and love.
Acknowledge your loss however feels right
One reason why miscarriage is so difficult is that it feels unacknowledged as a “real” loss by most of the world. Pregnancy loss is something that birthing people are pressured to keep secret, both out of shame and out of grief. An important part of grieving is to find ways to acknowledge your loss in a way that honors your feelings.
Having a memorial, planting a tree, writing a letter, getting a tattoo, or wearing a piece of jewelry to memorialize your baby can be ways to acknowledge your loss and honor their memory. It’s okay to acknowledge how massive this loss is for you in whatever way feels right.
Miscarriage can have a massive impact on mental and physical health. If you’re struggling to cope after pregnancy loss, working with a therapist can help you work through your feelings and find ways to grieve without shame.
Our clinicians at Hope+Wellness have appointments available in our office and online. We serve the McLean, Great Falls, Falls Church, Arlington, Alexandria, and the greater Washington DC regions, as well as offering online services in DC, MD, VA, and all PSYPACT states. Contact us to get started.
Coping Strategies for Managing Grief and Loss
Learning how to ride the waves of grief is like learning how to manage any other intense emotion. It takes time and effort, and often the help of a professional to support you through it.
Grief is a fact of life, but that doesn’t make it easy to deal with.
We will all feel grief at some point in our lives, because life involves change, and change activates grief. You can grieve for many reasons, including the death of a loved one, but that’s not the only source of grief in life. Grief commonly comes up around experiences that involve a lot of change, like moving, changing jobs, becoming a parent, struggling with infertility, dealing with chronic conditions, changes in relationship status, and more.
To our brains, change is loss, and loss means grief.
Grief doesn’t follow a timeline.
Grief doesn’t even always have stages. We commonly hear that grief has 5 stages: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance, but those stages were actually developed to describe what people go through as they face death, not to describe grief itself. While many grievers will feel like they relate to these stages, they’re not the only way grief shows up. Sometimes people have a hard time connecting what they’re experiencing to their grief, because they’re expecting grief to look the way it does on TV. In reality, grief is different for each person.
For some things, the grief never goes away. We tend to imagine that grief lessens over time, and while the intensity can often decrease, many people who grieve have to find ways to integrate their grief into their new life. Instead of grief lessening over time, it’s more like your life grows and expands around the grief. Even this process can bring up grief, because it marks a change, and change often feels like loss.
The truth about managing grief
Managing grief successfully means finding a way to accept that grief is a part of your life now. Acceptance doesn’t mean that you have to approve of the way you’re feeling, just that you don’t let yourself struggle against it anymore. Struggling to accept reality can cause a lot of distress that can be alleviated with acceptance.
Learning how to ride the waves of grief is like learning how to manage any other intense emotion. It takes time and effort, and often the help of a professional to support you through it.
In our culture, grief is a topic that’s often avoided.
We assume grief should be private, or that there’s nothing that can be done when someone is grieving. Our cultural inability to talk about loss and grief leads to people feeling like they can’t share what they’re going through, which can make the distress of grief feel even worse.
Thankfully, there are ways to help you feel less emotionally out of control when you’re going through grief. If you’re trying to find ways to manage grief, try these coping strategies:
Release your expectations of yourself
Grief is different for everyone and everyone responds differently, so there’s no “right” way to grieve. Don’t beat yourself up for what you’re feeling as you grieve. Try to notice when you have expectations for yourself (often you’ll notice them when you start a thought with “I should…”) so you can become aware of how these expectations are making you feel. Grief is hard enough without giving yourself unreasonable standards to meet.
Grief is one of the most intense emotions that we can feel. It’s going to take a lot of time and self compassion to cope with your new reality. You’re not going to be able to function the way you did when you weren’t grieving, and that’s okay.
Ask for support to meet your basic needs
An important part of managing grief is finding ways to meet your basic needs. If you’re not taking care of yourself, everything else will feel so much worse. However, when you’re grieving, it can be hard to do even “simple” things like get out of bed, or finding something to eat. That’s why calling in reinforcements can be helpful.
Is there someone in your life who can help make sure you’re getting enough to eat, taking your meds, and getting lots of sleep? It’s okay to ask for help when you need it. Lots of people want to be able to help, but don’t know where to start so making specific requests can actually be helpful when calling in extra support.
Bring in a professional
Grief is complicated, and it has a far reaching impact in our lives. Sometimes, that means it’s best to get professional support as you navigate this experience. Whether it’s one on one therapy with a counselor who’s experienced in treating grief, or a group therapy session with other grievers, bringing in a professional to help you through this time can make a world of difference.
A therapist who is experienced in grief counseling can help you make sense of your new world, cope with overwhelming emotions, and be more compassionate with yourself.
Find ways to express the intense emotions you’re feeling
Emotions are intense, and they can lessen in intensity when we find ways to express them. Grief might leave you with less energy than normal, so you may need to adjust some activities to meet yourself where you are in this moment, but there are ways to express intense emotions, such as:
Exercise
Somatic techniques, like breathwork
Mindfulness
Making art or using your creativity
Crying
Journaling
Talking it over with someone you trust
Exploring spirituality and deeper meaning
Distract yourself
Finally, grief is so hard, and it’s okay to distract yourself in moments when it’s particularly distressing. Distraction is a perfectly valid coping skill that can be a big help in times of intense grief. Here are some distractions to try:
Play a game (board game, video game, puzzles, etc.)
Read a book
Take a nap
Get into a new show
Make a playlist for someone you love
Go see a movie
Play with a pet or child
Clean your space
Bake or cook something
Creating art of any kind
Are you looking for more support as you cope with grief? Working with a therapist can help you navigate the complexities of grief with self-compassion. Get in touch with our office today to get started.
How to Move Through Grief with Kindness and Self-Compassion
If there was ever a time to be kind to ourselves, it would be during the different seasons of our grief. However, it is not uncommon that we become highly self-critical and particularly unforgiving to ourselves while we are grieving.
How to Move Through Grief with Kindness and Self-Compassion
By Jamie Glidewell, LICSW, LCSW-C, LCSW, APHSW-C
“It isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens” ~Pema Chodron
We will all weather the different storms that grief brings to us across our lifetime. Grief is certain and inevitable and it can be an intense, emotional, scary and difficult experience and it can bring a multitude of emotions and a host of physiological symptoms and side effects as well.
To complicate our personal and unique experiences of grief, we live in a society that is generally dismissive of the grief experience which can exacerbate feelings of loneliness and isolation.
If there was ever a time to be kind to ourselves, it would be during the different seasons of our grief.
However, it is not uncommon that we become highly self-critical and particularly unforgiving to ourselves while we are grieving.
Common critical thoughts or sentiments that come up are worries that we are grieving incorrectly, that our grief is taking too long, that something is wrong with us, that we handled things poorly with our loved one, dwelling on what could have been different, thinking about the things we should or shouldn’t have done, the list goes on. Some complicated feelings that can accompany our grief are feelings of guilt, shame, self-blame, and regret; any combination of these emotions can exacerbate grief and also impact anxiety, sadness and depression.
Softening the hard edges of grief
There is not an antidote for grief but there is an approach that can soften the hard edges of our grief. This approach entails meeting yourself with kindness and self-compassion. The goal is not to push aside, dismiss or ignore your feelings of guilt, shame, self-blame or regret.
More so, it is to treat yourself and talk to yourself in the same way that you would a trusted friend. It is showing up for yourself amidst your pain and allowing yourself to hold two things at the same time. For example, it is acknowledging that you may feel guilty for the way you spoke to your loved one before they died, while also holding the truth that you are human and were doing the best you could at the time.
What exactly is self-compassion?
Does this sound too vague or ambiguous at first glance? It may help to pause here and take a deeper dive into understanding what exactly is self-compassion. Dr. Kristin Neff has spent her life’s work researching self-compassion and creating a base of knowledge that supports the understanding that self-compassion can increase motivation, happiness, self-worth, can foster resilience, and reduce psychological distress (Neff & Germer, 2018). There are three components to self-compassion, and they include self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness (Neff & Germer, 2018):
Self-compassion relates to being able to sit with the discomfort of our pain and suffering without resorting to self-judgement, criticism, blame; it relates to being able to meet these difficult and dark moments with our eyes and hearts open and with a tone of sympathy and kindness; talking to ourselves the way we would a friend or loved one.
Common Humanity relates to understanding and embracing the idea that we are imperfectly human and that part of this human experience involves the inevitability of pain and suffering. Common humanity reconnects us to each other during these difficult times instead of falling into the trap of withdrawal and isolation.
Mindfulness involves cultivating and maintaining an awareness of how we are doing and what we need in this moment and the next. It involves recognizing the feeling and sitting with it, essentially riding the waves of emotions as they come. This encourages a more balanced approach that doesn’t dismiss what we are feeling and also doesn’t exaggerate it.
How to put self-compassion into action with grief
Given that self-compassion involves kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness, the question becomes how to best apply it to your experience of grief. Below are some helpful ways to meet grief with compassion
Meet your grief with kindness.
Be curious about what you are feeling and look out for the roadblocks of guilt, blame, shame and try to recognize the ways these emotions are impacting your overall experience with grief. Realize there is room for forgiveness, even self-forgiveness in grief.
Remember that suffering and grief are both an important and inevitable part of being human.
Remember that you are not alone in these painful moments. Community can be a helpful way to process your grief and support groups (in-person, virtual, online, or through social media platforms) can bring deep meaning, connection and a felt sense of being understood. You will learn, and grow and change around your grief and even if you can’t feel this right now, trust your fellow humans who are right here beside you.
Be present in your grief.
Ride the waves of grief as they come and trust that by sitting with the pain and difficult emotions it will allow the room you need to survive what sometimes feels intolerable and insurmountable. By being mindful of your emotions you can also be attentive and caring to yourself, this circles right back to self-compassion and offers the opportunity to be gentle, sympathetic and kind to yourself as you grieve.
This approach encourages clarity and perspective that informs a gentler approach through your grief and actually increases the resiliency to feel the intensity of the emotions such as sadness and longing without them being overshadowed or squashed by the shame or guilt. Spending less time beating yourself up gives you more space and energy to grieve and take care of yourself while grieving.
Expressions of self-compassion
Sometimes people ask how exactly they can express self-compassion to themselves; in other words, how they can practice self-compassion each day. Some specific expressions of self-compassion include the following:
Trusting yourself
Giving yourself permission to grieve fully and deeply
Slowing down
Remembering to breathe
Allowing yourself to rest
Giving yourself grace when you struggle with focus, motivation, attention (or anything else, as things that were easy before the loss may be wildly difficult or unavailable to you right now)
Finding a creative outlet
Letting people know what you need from them
Practicing self-forgiveness
Being kind to yourself! Watch out for the self-criticism. Rather than beating yourself up about things, instead simply notice self-critical thoughts and release them when they come back around (as they naturally will).
Physical acts of self-compassion: placing a hand on your heart and feeling the warmth and pressure of your hand, giving yourself a hug, squeezing your hands together.
Above all, be patient with your grief and be patient with the journey towards self-compassion. They both take time and self-compassion takes practice.
References: Neff, K., & Germer, C. K. (2018).The mindful self-compassion workbook: A proven way to accept yourself, build inner strength, and thrive. Guilford Press.
4 Tips for Dealing With a Friend Breakup
If you’re struggling with a friendship breakup, know that you’re not alone. So many people have been through this kind of pain, and whatever reaction you’re having is valid. Here are some of our top tips for dealing with a friend breakup.
4 Tips for Dealing With a Friend Breakup
Breaking up is hard. When we think of breakups, we often think of the end of a romantic relationship, but any kind of relationship can end. Ending friendships, or friend breakups, is especially hard, no matter which side of the breakup you’re on. Some people feel that breaking up with a close friend is actually worse than breaking up with a romantic partner. Either way, a breakup is a breakup, and it’s normal to feel pain and confusion after a relationship of any kind ends. The end of a friendship means the end of an era- no more trust, no more intimacy, no more fun. Coming to terms with this change can be really difficult.
We have a lot of cultural messages telling us that friendship is supposed to be for life (“Best friends forever!”), so it can be a great source of shame to lose a friendship. Losing friends is also tough because it can majorly change your support network. When a romantic relationship ends, we usually count on the support and encouragement of our loved ones, like our friends and family. After a friend breakup, turning to that friend is no longer an option, which can be really hard to grapple with.
Why do friendships end?
Friendships are like any kind of relationship - they are all unique. Some are situational, like when you work with someone. If you’ve ever left a job, you know that sometimes you don’t stay as close to your former coworkers as you did when you worked together. Some friendships come from being in the same school or town, and once one of you is no longer local the friendship fizzles. Some friendships fade away and some end with a disagreement or conflict. No matter how your friendship ended, it’s hard. Adjusting to the fact that you can’t rely on that person the way you once did takes work and time. It might be hard to open yourself up to a close friend for a while, and that’s okay. It’s a big adjustment, and it’s okay to follow whatever timeline you need.
If you’re struggling with a friendship breakup, know that you’re not alone. So many people have been through this kind of pain, and whatever reaction you’re having is valid.
Here are some of our top tips for dealing with a friend breakup:
Update your social media settings
If you’ve gone through a friend breakup, you might even find it hard to deal with years after the fact. Friends are such an integral part of our lives that it can be tough to remove someone completely. You might still see old pictures of them around, you might be reminded of a trip you took or an inside joke you used to have with them. Social media websites might constantly bombard you with memories of years past, which can be really heartbreaking post-friend breakup. You can turn off that feature on many social sites, so if you’re in the midst of a friend breakup you might want to protect yourself that way. You can always revisit it once the pain isn’t as fresh.
Focus on what you learned in the relationship
Every relationship teaches us something. Some relationships teach us how to communicate, how to value ourselves, how to set boundaries, how to love someone, and some even teach us how relationships end. This might be hard at first, but focus on the good parts of what you learned from each other. Relationships aren’t failures because they end. All relationships end at some point, and it’s okay. Learning how to process and move forward from the end of a relationship is an important skill.
Talk about it
One of the reasons why losing a friend is so hard is because there’s a sense of shame associated with it. When your BFF is no longer your forever friend, you might feel unworthy, rejected, or confused. This is because so many people keep their friendship breakups to themselves. It’s okay to talk about it and explore your feelings with the rest of your support network. Talking about it with a therapist can help you make sense of your emotions. When more people talk about the struggles they have with something, it can help us all feel less alone.
Forgive yourself
In the aftermath of this relationship ending, you might be searching for reasons why. You might be blaming yourself for the things you did or didn’t do. You might be wondering what’s wrong with you. It’s okay to acknowledge that you played a role in the friendship ending. However, you don’t need to keep beating yourself up about it. You’re a human. You’re allowed to make mistakes. You’re also allowed to forgive yourself for those mistakes. That doesn’t mean you are going to do it again or that you haven’t learned. Forgiveness is a gift you can give yourself so you don’t feel the need to ruminate on what went wrong between you. Acknowledge what happened, admit you did the best you could at the time, and tell yourself “I forgive you.”
Losing a friend so hard. If you’re dealing with the loss of a friendship that was important to you, know that there’s nothing wrong with you and you will get through this. Talking about it in therapy can help you come to terms with the loss and cope with your reaction in a more personalized way.
If you’re looking for support with the loss of a friendship, our clinicians are here for you.
4 Myths About Grief
There are a lot of common myths about grief that get passed around as general wisdom in hard times. Today we’re going to unpack some of those myths to hopefully help you understand your grief a little better when it shows up.
In the last year, we have all dealt with an enormous amount of grief. We’ve lost people, community gathering places, jobs, homes, etc. But for something that is so common, we don’t usually know a lot about grief. It is an uncomfortable and difficult feeling to have, so many of us don’t talk about it.
But grief is common, and not understanding it actually makes it harder for us to navigate our grief and, eventually, move past it. And what’s even harder, is there are a lot of common myths about grief that get passed around as general wisdom in hard times. Today we’re going to unpack some of those myths to hopefully help you understand your grief a little better when it shows up.
MYTH 1: Grief is just about death
The death of a loved one is of course a source of grief, but grieving actually isn’t referring to a loss from death specifically. It is any sort of loss at all. You can grieve the death of a loved one, the end of a relationship, losing a job, moving out of your house, etc. Grief is simply the recognition that what you once had (or wanted to have) has been taken away. And the grieving process is however you navigate that loss, whatever the loss is.
MYTH 2: There are 5 stages of grief
There are many stages of grief. Most of us have heard about the 5 stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance)–so much so that they’re even mentioned in popular media like The Simpsons, 30 Rock and New Girl. And while one may experience one or some or all of these stages, it’s not the checklist we believe it to be. You don’t neatly go from denial to anger to bargaining to depression to acceptance. Some people won’t feel every single one of the five, some people will feel all five at once. Sometimes you will feel angry and accepting at the same time–that’s the complicated part about grief. It’s messy. You might go from denial to acceptance right back to denial. You might be angry the whole time. You might not be angry at all. While the five stages can happen while grieving, the roadmap we seem to think it is is just too neat to really reflect how people process their emotions.
MYTH 3: Grief looks the same on everyone
As you might have been able to piece together from the second myth–grief isn’t going to look the same for any two people, because we aren’t following a handy little grief recipe. We’re feeling real, complicated, and intense emotions. And every person feels and processes their feelings differently, so of course your grieving process will look different to someone else's. Some might need to cry a lot. Some might not cry at all. There is no wrong way to grieve. The only “wrong” way to grieve would be to stop yourself from grieving at all. Refusing to acknowledge the loss won’t make those feelings go away, it will just make them stronger when they come up later.
MYTH 4: There’s a clear end to grief
Grief and mourning are not the same. Mourning is the actions you take when grieving (for example, if a loved one died, mourning would be things like a funeral service, a wake, a memorial, etc.) but grief is that feeling of loss–and that feeling might not go away even when you’ve “completed” your grieving process. And by that I mean, you have acknowledged your grief, you’ve sat with it, explored it, allowed yourself to feel it fully. You’ve taken your mourning steps, and you feel as though it’s no longer debilitating, and you feel as though you’re ready to move onto a new stage of your life. Finishing that process doesn't mean you’ve dumped out all of the grief you have for the loss. It might come back in waves later on. You might think you’re “over it” and it might come back later and make you sad. That’s okay. Grief does that–it lingers. While time eases how much it stings, it doesn’t erase the loss.
If you’re looking for support as you navigate your grieving process, therapy can be a great place to start. Get in touch with us today and we can help you.
5 Reasons You Might Consider Ending a Friendship
Whatever way works for you and your situation, know that it is okay to feel a bunch of conflicting feelings about ending a friendship. You might feel relieved to not have to deal with them anymore. You might feel sad remembering the good times you had together. You might be angry at the way they treated you. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s okay.
5 Reasons You Might Consider Ending a Friendship
Friendship is a special kind of relationship. Friendships often transcend romantic or familial relationships. Our friends may know the most intimate versions of ourselves, and that kind of intimacy is special. We often hear phrases like “friends forever!” and assume that it’s true- and for many friends, it is. However, lifelong friendships aren’t the only friendships that are worth having. Some friendships are based on proximity or common interests, and those things can change over time. It can be a source of great shame to have a string of former friendships in your past, but it’s actually very normal. There are all sorts of reasons that friendships end, but ending a friendship is a very hard choice to make. If you’re considering ending a friendship, know that it doesn’t make you a bad person. You’re allowed to voice your needs and you’re allowed to draw your own boundaries. The most important thing is to continue treating people kindly and with respect.
When we think about breakups, we tend to think of romantic relationships. However, you can break up with friends too. There are a lot more resources out there for dealing with the end of a romantic relationship than the end of a friendship, which can make it hard to cope in the aftermath. Some friendships end with a mutual decision, some end with a disagreement, and some just sort of fade out. Each type of ending can be painful in its own way, even if you’re the one who ended the friendship.
Ending a relationship of any kind is never easy. As humans, we are wired for connection, so it can be confusing and painful to end a connection that was special to you. Sometimes, ending a friendship will come after having conversations with each other about boundaries or expectations. You might feel better if you approach them with a conversation first instead of just ending things right there. There might also be situations where you feel better ending the friendship without talking about it first. Whatever way works for you and your situation, know that it is okay to feel a bunch of conflicting feelings about ending a friendship. You might feel relieved to not have to deal with them anymore. You might feel sad remembering the good times you had together. You might be angry at the way they treated you. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s okay.
Here are a few reasons why you might consider ending a friendship:
You feel worse after you spend time with them
How do you feel after you spend time with this friend? Do they leave you feeling rejuvenated and calm, or tense and upset? We all have bad days, but if this person regularly leaves you feeling hurt or disrespected, it might be time to have a serious conversation about how they treat you. You are allowed to have expectations for the way people treat you and if people can’t meet them, you don’t owe them a relationship.
You no longer work together or live near one another
Many friendships are proximity-based. Think about friends from high school or college, or different jobs that you’ve had. After you leave that common space, you don’t always stay close. That doesn’t mean that the friendship wasn’t meaningful to you or important, it just means that when you no longer have things in common, the friendship might naturally fade. We all have different resources available to us, and you might not have the capacity to manage all of your friendships all of the time. It’s natural to sometimes let relationships go.
They violated a boundary or your trust
If someone has violated your sense of trust, it can be hard to stay in friendship with them. Friendships are intimate relationships, which thrive off of trust. When that is broken, it can be difficult to stay close to one another unless you both commit to doing some serious communicating. That might not be what you want to do, and that’s okay. Trust is a basic tenent of many relationships, and its okay to end a friendship when you no longer feel that trust.
You feel taken advantage of
Do you contribute equally to the relationship, or is your friend always asking you for favors but never reciprocating? All relationships have some give and take, but over time it tends to even out. Are you always the one initiating plans? Do they only contact you when they need something from you? If you only hear from someone when they can get something from you, it’s natural to feel frustrated and resentful after a while. Friendship is supposed to be mutual, so if you’re doing all the work, it might be time to end things.
Your interests change
Lots of friendships start around a common interest, like hiking or games. Our interests often change over time, especially when we have new experiences. Sometimes, what interests you no longer does and you move on. It might be painful to leave people behind, but as your interests grow so will your potential pool of new friends.
Ending a friendship is a hard and personal decision. What is right for one friendship might be totally wrong for another. If you’re considering ending a friendship, know that it doesn’t make you a bad person. Our needs change over time, including the needs we have in relationships. Friendships take work and trust, and sometimes that’s just not possible or practical.
If you’re looking for support as you decide to end a friendship, therapy can be a great place to cope with the loss of an important relationship in your life.
7 Ways to Remember Your Lost Loved One
Loss is a universal experience, but it is still not something we are ever prepared for. No matter how much we understand about loss intellectually, when it happens to us, it’s hard to know what to do. Grief is something we will all feel at some point, and there is no set timeline for working through grief. There are stages to grief, but it’s not a linear process. Part of learning to live with grief is figuring out ways to honor the person you lost while managing your grief.
Loss is a universal experience, but it is still not something we are ever prepared for. No matter how much we understand about loss intellectually, when it happens to us, it’s hard to know what to do. Grief is something we will all feel at some point, and there is no set timeline for working through grief. There are stages to grief, but it’s not a linear process. Part of learning to live with grief is figuring out ways to honor the person you lost while managing your grief.
Grief is difficult to talk about, especially since we still tend to shy away from expressing extreme emotions as a culture. A lot of people don’t know how to respond to someone who is grieving, because they’re afraid of saying the wrong thing or making things worse, which can make the experience isolating. It might take some time before you feel ready to actively honor and remember your lost loved one, and that is okay. Remember, grief is different from everyone. What is comforting to one person might not work for you and vice versa. Someone else’s timeline probably won’t look like yours.
It may take you some time to decide on ways to honor your loved one after their passing. You might go through some trial and error to find something that feels good for you. Remember, if something doesn’t feel good, you don’t have to do it. These ideas won’t eliminate grief or cure it, but they can help you sit with your grief and feel closer to the person you love.
Here are some ways to remember your lost loved one:
Donate in their name
One way to honor someone’s memory is to make a donation in their name. Is there an organization that was important to them or a cause that was near to their heart? You can donate money, time, or supplies to many organizations in someone’s name as a way to honor them. It may make you feel better to know that their name is out there doing good in the world.
Keep a living reminder
Another way to remember someone is to create some sort of living reminder. Plants are a great way to do this. You can get a plant (it could be a favorite one of your loved one or a plant that makes you think of them) to remind you of the person. Taking care of the plant can be a nice outlet for the love and care that you still feel for your loved one. You could get a houseplant and keep it in a special place in your home, you could plant a flowerbox outside a window, or even keep a garden in their memory.
Hold onto something of theirs
Keeping an item of theirs can help you feel like that person is still close to you. It could be a voicemail they left you, so you can keep hearing their voice. It could be a favorite shirt or stuffed animal, or piece of art, jewelry, or even household items like pots and pans. If there was something you used to do with your loved one, like cooking or traveling, it might be helpful to keep a memento tied to that to remind you of those times you had together.
Donate their belongings
After you’ve gone through their things to find what you want to hold onto, you can honor their memory by donating some of their things. This is a nice way to share the love + memory of your loved one with others. Parting with their belongings might not feel easy, so don’t force yourself if you don’t feel ready. It can be nice, though, to think of their belongings getting a new life and bringing joy to other people.
Make new traditions for holidays and big events
One of the times that grief comes up a lot is holidays or big events like anniversaries. Were there traditions they cared about for the holidays? Was there something special you used to do on birthdays or other special occasions? It might be painful to do things exactly as you used to when your loved one was with you, but you can come up with new traditions specifically designed to honor the things they loved about holidays or big events.
Keep talking about them
Talking about emotions is always hard, especially when there is loss involved. YOu might feel weird talking about your grief all the time, but don’t feel guilty for sharing how you really feel. It can be really powerful to honor your emotions by naming them and asking for support from the other people in your life. Sharing happy memories, goofy anecdotes, or just talking about who they were as a person is a way to keep their memory alive.
Write a letter to them
A common feeling that people have while grieving is the desire to talk to the person one more time. Obviously, writing a letter to them isn’t a perfect substitute for this, but it can be healing to express exactly what you want to say to them, even if you never show it to anyone else. If others are missing your loved one too, you could write letters as a group and read them to each other as a way to share + honor their memory.
If you’re looking for support as you work through your grief, our clinicians can help you through this process.
4 Ways to Support Someone Struggling With Infertility
It’s natural to want to support the people you care about, so if you know someone who is struggling with infertility, you’re probably looking for a way to genuinely help. Here are some ways to support someone experiencing infertility.
Sometimes, someone we love is going through something we have no experience with, but we still want to support them. That’s part of having relationships with people, romantic or otherwise - they’re built on care and mutual support. That’s why it’s so frustrating when someone is experiencing something that we can’t really help with, like losing a loved one, the end of a partnership, or even struggling with infertility.
We still have a lot of cultural taboos in the United States, and talking about mental health, especially when it comes to the mental health of folks who can get pregnant, is difficult for many. Part of why it’s so hard to talk about pregnancy loss and infertility is because it’s still dismissed and not talked about openly. We also tend to think that carrying a child to term is an easy, commonplace thing, but for some people, it just isn’t possible. As a society, however, we usually expect folks struggling with infertility to keep it to themselves. If someone you know has confided in you about infertility, that is a very big deal - that means they trust you enough to react appropriately and support them.
The reasons that people experience infertility aren’t always understood, which can make the experience even more devastating. Some of the factors thought to be involved are genetic defects, viral or bacterial infections, hormone imbalances, and autoimmune disorders. However, much of the time there isn’t an easy answer as to why the person is struggling to conceive.
It’s natural to want to support the people you care about, so if you know someone who is struggling with infertility, you’re probably looking for a way to genuinely help. Here are some ways to support someone experiencing infertility:
Practice holding space
A lot of times our instinct is to help and protect the people we love, especially when they’re hurting. However, sometimes the best thing you can do is just be there and hold space for the emotions they’re going through. “Holding space” means being physically, mentally, and emotionally present for someone. It means putting your focus on someone to support them as they feel their feelings instead of focusing on your own.
Don’t ask, “Have you tried x?”
They have probably been working closely with their physician to figure this out - while asking “Have you tried X?” might seem helpful, it’s just unnecessary. Assume that they know their body and their medical history better than you. We often feel the need to throw out solutions when someone is in pain, but that probably won’t make the person feel better, only ourselves.
Watch what you say in general
Feeling like they can’t talk about their experience with infertility can make the experience even more lonely. Some common responses to hearing about infertility are, “You can always try again,” "Whose fault is it?", "What's wrong with you?" “How are you paying for all that?" “Have you considered adoption?” “Maybe it’s not meant to be.” Most people who say these things don’t intend to be cruel, but these statements can minimize the grief and sorrow that the person is feeling. Instead of saying something just to say something, think carefully about how your words will be interpreted.
Limit the baby talk
If you have kids or are expecting a child, it’s natural to want to talk about it. However, there are probably plenty of folks in your life who can handle these conversations - don’t push them on a friend who is dealing with infertility. Know that your friend probably doesn’t really resent you for your family, but it’s tough to talk about all the same. Try to be as kind and understanding as possible, and don’t take it personally if the other person needs some space from baby and pregnancy talk.
If you’re close with someone who is dealing with infertility, it can be confusing to know how to help. Remember to be kind and think about the other person’s needs and just hold space where you can. If you need more ideas for support in this area, our clinicians can help you come up with some.
Processing Non-Death Related Grief
Some of us might assume that grief is exclusively reserved for death, but there are lots of ways grief can come up in someone’s life. So, if grief isn’t just the sadness that you feel after experiencing the death of someone close to you, what is it? What does it mean to be grieving?
What do you think of when you think of grief? Someone you loved + lost? Sadness? Heartache? Numbness? Charlie Brown? There are no wrong answers. Grief is experienced differently by everyone.
Grief covers a wide variety of experiences, and many of us have felt grief at some point in our lives. Grief can be felt over the death of someone, the loss of a friendship or relationship, divorce, moving, switching jobs, losing your faith, the death of a pet, anticipating a future loss, and so much more.
Some of us might assume that grief is exclusively reserved for death, but there are lots of ways grief can come up in someone’s life. So, if grief isn’t just the sadness that you feel after experiencing the death of someone close to you, what is it? What does it mean to be grieving?
Dictionary.com defines grief as: “something that causes keen distress or suffering.”
This definition works, but it doesn’t really speak to the complicated nuances of grief. Grief Recovery takes it one step further in their definition of grief: “Grief is the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior.”
We all experience changes in our daily patterns from time to time, and it can be a really disrupting experience. Now that we understand that grief is about more than loss of life, we can recognize the emotional process we go through during periods of extreme change as grief.
When we thinking of grief, we typically think of loss of life of some kind, but grief can be felt for a variety of reasons. Some experts call this kind of grief disenfranchised grief. Kenneth Doka coined the term, which means “Grief that persons experience when they incur a loss that is not or cannot be openly acknowledged, socially sanctioned or publicly mourned”.
Disenfranchised grief is the grief that comes up we feel we are not able to openly acknowledge or mourn our loss. It can be extra difficult to grieve this way, because a big part of the grief process is getting support from folks in your life, and disenfranchised grief can make you feel like you’re alone.
Here are some situations that can lead to grief:
Moving
Changing schools
Leaving a job
Starting a new job
Loss of faith
Change in financial status
Divorce
Change in health status
Ending a friendship
Loss of a home
Infertility
Estrangement from family
Things to remember about grief:
Loss is not a competition
You don’t have to prove your loss to anyone or perform grief in a certain way. If anyone gives you a hard time, that’s their problem, and not yours. Your grief is personal to you, so you get to direct your process. Some types of loss are harder for people to understand, like a loss of faith. Not everyone feels the same way about faith + religion, so folks who don’t have a religious background might not understand the unique pain that comes with a loss of faith. Remember, you don’t have to prove anything to anyone.
Talk it out
Just because you feel as though you are not entitled to publicly grieve doesn’t mean that’s the case. There’s still a lot of stigma around mental health issues in this country, but don’t feel like you have to bury your feelings of grief for the comfort of other people. You can ask permission to vent or talk about sensitive subjects, but don’t feel like you can’t be open and real about your feelings just because you’re not grieving a death.
Actively process your feelings
As with most feelings, you can’t just bury grief down and expect it to pass. Grief is going to hurt - there’s no way to avoid it. Even though it feels impossible, it’s important to actively process your feelings when you’re grieving. There are lots of different ways to start the process of feeling your grief. Journaling, meditation, therapy, regular movement, and making art are a few places to start.
Take your time
Grief, unfortunately, is a long process. There’s no way around the pain of grief. Ignoring the pain will just make it worse, so its important to acknowledge your feelings. The way you feel has an impact on your health, mentally and physically, so make sure you’re not burying your feelings away. You might be feeling a whole mix of emotions, like anger, sadness, disbelief, fear, relief, numbness, devastation, loneliness, and others. Let your feelings come, without judgment.
If you’re struggling with your grief, know that it’s often a painful process and there’s no shame in asking for help. Our counselors can help you find a way to process your grief that works for you.
20 Journal Prompts for Grief + Loss
Journaling can help with meaning-making during the grief process. Here are some prompts to help you get started.
Do you take the time to journal?
Journaling can be a very valuable practice, and best of all it’s a pretty cheap way to process your feelings. You can start a journal that’s specific to your feelings of grief, or you can keep a general journal for all of your thoughts. There are also no rules on the actual how of journaling: you can journal by hand, via an app, in a note on your phone, or wherever works for you. Your journal, however you decide to keep it, is just a private space for you to write down what you’re feeling. It can take whatever form you want it to, whether it’s exploring and releasing the emotions you’re feeling, coming up with ways to cope, or tracking the things that are making you anxious. Journaling can be a fantastic, active way to engage with our emotions without letting them overpower us, especially complex emotions like grief that we don’t always have a ton of experience with.
Grief is something that we all experience from time to time, but it’s a hard thing to talk about. It’s also important to remember that grief can be a response to all kinds of things, not just losing someone. While most folks are familiar with the grief associated with loss or death, there are many kinds of grief out there - you can grieve after a divorce, career change, loss of a pet, or even after a move, and that’s not a complete list. As a matter of fact, the definition of grief is not only the reaction to loss, but it can also encompass “the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior.” You can also experience anticipatory grief, which is grief caused by the anticipation of a loss. This kind of grief can be the result of losing someone after a long illness, worrying about loss as someone ages, or even after anticipating the kind of loss and destruction that a global pandemic can bring. Grief is a pretty universal experience, but everyone reacts in their own way to grief.
Journaling can help with meaning-making during the grief process. An important task during the grieving process is to figure out what your new life looks like after experiencing loss. Using a journal to work through your thoughts and feelings can help you construct a new self-narrative. If writing about tough topics like grief and loss has you feeling emotional, that’s totally normal. In fact, crying is a natural way to relieve stress and regulate emotions - it’s a physiological function that we’re born with, so if you have the urge to cry or get upset, try to allow yourself to feel those feelings. Taking the time to journal your feelings can help you explore your internal world, express yourself in a safe, judgment-free zone, and make meaning of the situation causing you grief.
If you’re grieving and looking to start a journal, you might be stuck on where to begin. Here are some prompts to help you get started:
Today, I miss…
When I feel upset, I can call…
Today, I remembered…
This experience has taught me…
Do I have any regrets about this situation?
If I could say something to you, I would say…
What are some ways you’ve expressed grief in the past? Did they feel helpful to you?
What feelings am I looking forward to? What feelings do I want to leave behind?
Write a list of activities that you can engage in to make yourself feel better
Do I feel comfortable asking for help? Why or why not?
Who is in my support system?
Make a list of ways you feel taken care of both by yourself and by others.
What’s a positive memory I have of this person or situation?
How did this person or experience make you feel?
If you are grieving the loss of a person, write down a list of things specific to them that you admired.
What creative ways do I use to express my feelings? If I can’t think of any, what are some I can try?
Make a list of a few different ways you can honor your loved one or your loss.
When I am overcome by grief, here is a mantra or affirmation I can use to comfort myself:
Here are five ways I can be compassionate with myself today…
Do I know anyone else who is grieving? How can I try to make them feel better today?
You don’t need to write something for every one of these prompts, just pick one or two that speak to you and start there. You don’t have to write anything profound or perfect - just write what comes to you and try not to judge yourself too harshly. If a lot of complicated feelings come up while you do this, know that that’s okay. Journaling is a fantastic tool for self-reflection, but it can be an emotional process, especially when you’re journaling about something as emotionally fraught as grief, so be gentle with yourself. Remember, you’re doing this to help yourself feel better, so don’t make yourself feel worse during the process.
If you need more ideas for journaling prompts or questions to ask yourself as you go through the grieving process, our counselors can help you reflect + work through your grief in a way that works for you.
therapists in falls church, mclean, tysons corner, merrifield, arlington and vienna, va
Hope+Wellness is a therapy practice serving the Falls Church, McLean, Great Falls, Vienna, Arlington, Alexandria, and the greater Washington DC region. We provide compassionate care to children, teens, and adults with stress, anxiety, and depression. Our practice is in-network with BCBS and provides Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), mindfulness and acceptance based therapies, and other top, premier evidence-based treatments. Call, email, or schedule an appointment with us online today. We’re happy to help!
Hope+Wellness is a mental health practice specializing in the treatment of depression, mood, stress, and anxiety in kids, teens, and adults. This is a blog about living well and finding meaning and purpose in the face of difficult challenges. This is a blog about finding hope.
-
October 2024
- Oct 31, 2024 I Want to Start Therapy: What Do I Need to Know? Oct 31, 2024
- Oct 23, 2024 How Therapy Can Help Entrepreneurs Thrive Instead of Survive Oct 23, 2024
- Oct 15, 2024 What Parents Should Know About Teen Depression: A Compassionate Guide for Supporting Your Teen Oct 15, 2024
-
September 2024
- Sep 30, 2024 Understanding Your Attachment Style to Improve Your Relationships Sep 30, 2024
- Sep 23, 2024 The Mental Health Benefits of Having Pets Sep 23, 2024
- Sep 17, 2024 IMPROVE the Moment: Coping with Distress with DBT Sep 17, 2024
- Sep 3, 2024 Supporting Your Mental Health During Your Freshman Year of College Sep 3, 2024
-
August 2024
- Aug 22, 2024 What is Spiritually Integrated Therapy? Aug 22, 2024
- Aug 12, 2024 Getting To Know Your Inner Child Aug 12, 2024
- Aug 1, 2024 5 Tips to Connect with Your Child Using Love Languages Aug 1, 2024
-
July 2024
- Jul 22, 2024 5 Ways Nature Can Help Your Mental Health Jul 22, 2024
- Jul 15, 2024 What You Should Know About Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy Jul 15, 2024
-
June 2024
- Jun 27, 2024 How to Practice Reaching Out After Self Isolating Jun 27, 2024
- Jun 19, 2024 How to Ask for Help When You Need It Jun 19, 2024
- Jun 10, 2024 6 Ways to Build Self-Respect Jun 10, 2024
-
May 2024
- May 31, 2024 6 Ways to Support Mental Health After Pregnancy Loss May 31, 2024
- May 28, 2024 Self Kindness: Why it Matters & How to Cultivate It May 28, 2024
- May 20, 2024 Finding a Psychologist: What to Consider May 20, 2024
- May 10, 2024 Coping Strategies for Managing Grief and Loss May 10, 2024
-
April 2024
- Apr 23, 2024 9 Blogs to Help You Navigate Difficult Parenting Moments Apr 23, 2024
- Apr 16, 2024 Parenting with Chronic Pain Apr 16, 2024
- Apr 9, 2024 6 Signs It's Time for Couples Counseling Apr 9, 2024
- Apr 1, 2024 What You Should Know About Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) Apr 1, 2024
-
March 2024
- Mar 25, 2024 Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: 5 Things You Should Know About It Mar 25, 2024
- Mar 18, 2024 What You Should Know About EMDR Mar 18, 2024
- Mar 11, 2024 Don't Know What You're Feeling? Try This. Mar 11, 2024
- Mar 1, 2024 7 Tips for Coping with Parenting Stress Mar 1, 2024
-
February 2024
- Feb 26, 2024 How Mindful Communication Can Improve Your Relationships Feb 26, 2024
- Feb 16, 2024 How Can My Therapist Help with My Chronic Pain? Feb 16, 2024
- Feb 8, 2024 Why Is It So Hard to Build New Habits? Feb 8, 2024
-
January 2024
- Jan 31, 2024 Five Tools For Managing Loneliness and Building Connection Jan 31, 2024
- Jan 25, 2024 How Can Therapy Help Me Navigate Big Life Changes? Jan 25, 2024
- Jan 19, 2024 How to Improve Sleep When You Deal With Chronic Pain Jan 19, 2024
- Jan 10, 2024 9 Commonly Asked Questions About The Therapeutic Process Jan 10, 2024
-
December 2023
- Dec 29, 2023 The Psychology of Fresh Starts: Embracing Change in the New Year Dec 29, 2023
- Dec 22, 2023 Managing Racing Thoughts That Keep You Awake Dec 22, 2023
- Dec 15, 2023 I'm Dreading My Next Therapy Session, What Now Dec 15, 2023
- Dec 4, 2023 End of the Year Toolkit: 9 Blogs to Help You Make It to January Dec 4, 2023
-
November 2023
- Nov 30, 2023 5 Myths to Unpack About Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Nov 30, 2023
- Nov 27, 2023 How Routines Can Support You in Tough Times Nov 27, 2023
- Nov 20, 2023 5 Strategies for Overcoming Social Anxiety at Holiday Gatherings Nov 20, 2023
- Nov 12, 2023 Masking: What It Is and How It Shows Up Nov 12, 2023
- Nov 1, 2023 Dealing With Negative Emotions: 7 Blogs to read When You’re Feeling Something Uncomfortable Nov 1, 2023
-
October 2023
- Oct 26, 2023 4 Best Practices for Fact Checking #InstaTherapy Content Oct 26, 2023
- Oct 24, 2023 How to Be Okay With Saying No Oct 24, 2023
- Oct 11, 2023 I Hurt My Friend's Feelings, What Do I Do Now? Oct 11, 2023
- Oct 3, 2023 Why is Making Friends as an Adult so Hard? + What to Do About It Oct 3, 2023
-
September 2023
- Sep 29, 2023 Strengthen Your Relationship with Your Body With These Six Blogs Sep 29, 2023
- Sep 18, 2023 What to Do When Life Feels Meaningless Sep 18, 2023
- Sep 11, 2023 What is High Functioning Anxiety? Sep 11, 2023
-
August 2023
- Aug 31, 2023 6 Ways to Deal With Intrusive Thoughts Aug 31, 2023
- Aug 31, 2023 What Does it Mean to Engage in Self Care When You’re Chronically Ill? Aug 31, 2023
- Aug 21, 2023 6 Ways Hobbies Benefit Your Mental Health Aug 21, 2023
- Aug 10, 2023 What Do I Need to Know Before my First Therapy Session? Aug 10, 2023
-
July 2023
- Jul 28, 2023 4 Tips to Become a Better Listener Jul 28, 2023
- Jul 19, 2023 Healing through Relationships: Why the Therapeutic Relationship Matters Jul 19, 2023
- Jul 12, 2023 What to Do When You’re Burned Out Jul 12, 2023
- Jul 5, 2023 How to Make a Coping Skills Toolbox Jul 5, 2023
-
June 2023
- Jun 27, 2023 3 Tips for Telling Your Therapist They Upset You Jun 27, 2023
- Jun 19, 2023 7 Blogs to Read if You’re Dealing with Chronic Illness Jun 19, 2023
- Jun 12, 2023 Tending to Plants for Better Mental Health Jun 12, 2023
-
May 2023
- May 31, 2023 3 Ways to Build Trust With Your Body May 31, 2023
- May 25, 2023 Developing Self Compassion While Living with Chronic Illness May 25, 2023
- May 15, 2023 Why “Should” Statements Make You Feel Worse May 15, 2023
- May 11, 2023 What Does it Mean to Take Care of Yourself? 7 Blogs to Help You Practice May 11, 2023
-
April 2023
- Apr 28, 2023 7 Things to Do When You’re Lonely Apr 28, 2023
- Apr 24, 2023 Managing Conflict in Friendships Apr 24, 2023
- Apr 17, 2023 Are Your Boundaries Too Firm? Apr 17, 2023
- Apr 10, 2023 Understanding Grief and Chronic Illness Apr 10, 2023
- Apr 3, 2023 How to Overcome People Pleasing Apr 3, 2023
-
March 2023
- Mar 27, 2023 Mindfulness Tips for When You’re Having a Bad Day Mar 27, 2023
- Mar 20, 2023 10 Blogs to Read for More Intimate Friendships Mar 20, 2023
- Mar 13, 2023 Why Being Bored Is Good for Your Mental Health Mar 13, 2023
-
February 2023
- Feb 28, 2023 3 Tips for Working Through Shame Feb 28, 2023
- Feb 27, 2023 Balancing Self and Community Care Feb 27, 2023
- Feb 20, 2023 4 Ways Mindful Breathing Can Help You Feel Better Feb 20, 2023
- Feb 7, 2023 Breaking up With a Friend Feb 7, 2023
-
January 2023
- Jan 31, 2023 5 Ways to Deal with Rumination Jan 31, 2023
- Jan 23, 2023 What Are Repair Attempts in Conflict (and How to Use Them) Jan 23, 2023
- Jan 16, 2023 5 Reasons Why Crying is Good For You Jan 16, 2023
- Jan 11, 2023 5 Practices for When You Feel Off and Don't Know Why Jan 11, 2023
-
December 2022
- Dec 28, 2022 4 Ways to Deal with New Year Overwhelm Dec 28, 2022
- Dec 23, 2022 4 Ways to Accept a Slower Pace in the Winter Season Dec 23, 2022
- Dec 19, 2022 Cultivating Strong Community Ties for Better Mental Health Dec 19, 2022
- Dec 12, 2022 Separating Healing from Healthism Dec 12, 2022
-
November 2022
- Nov 30, 2022 6 Safe Ways to Express Anger Nov 30, 2022
- Nov 28, 2022 Exploring & Expressing Anger Safely Nov 28, 2022
- Nov 18, 2022 3 Tips for Cultivating A More Positive Relationship With Yourself Nov 18, 2022
- Nov 10, 2022 Learning How to Connect Emotions and Body Sensations Nov 10, 2022
-
October 2022
- Oct 31, 2022 What is a Glimmer? Finding the Opposite of a Trigger Oct 31, 2022
- Oct 24, 2022 4 Ways to Cope with Being Disliked Oct 24, 2022
- Oct 11, 2022 8 Blogs to Help You Manage Your Emotions Oct 11, 2022
- Oct 3, 2022 4 Practical Ways to Build New Habits Oct 3, 2022
-
September 2022
- Sep 27, 2022 Spending Time with Your Inner Child this Autumn Sep 27, 2022
- Sep 20, 2022 3 Ways to Build Interoceptive Awareness Sep 20, 2022
- Sep 14, 2022 Getting Started with Hiking for Mental Health Sep 14, 2022
-
August 2022
- Aug 31, 2022 How to Tell the Difference Between Avoidance and Self-Care Aug 31, 2022
- Aug 22, 2022 5 Mental Health Benefits of Spending Time in Nature Aug 22, 2022
- Aug 16, 2022 How Well Can You Predict What Will Make You Happy? Aug 16, 2022
- Aug 8, 2022 What is a Trauma Response? Aug 8, 2022
- Aug 1, 2022 4 Ways to Practice Accountability in Your Relationships Aug 1, 2022
-
July 2022
- Jul 25, 2022 What is Emotional Regulation? Jul 25, 2022
- Jul 18, 2022 5 Ideas for Soothing Your Nervous System in Tough Times Jul 18, 2022
- Jul 13, 2022 3 Tips to Manage Regret More Mindfully Jul 13, 2022
-
June 2022
- Jun 30, 2022 5 Ways to Improve Your Self-Worth Jun 30, 2022
- Jun 29, 2022 Codependence vs Interdependence in Relationships Jun 29, 2022
- Jun 21, 2022 What Internalized Messages Do Your Still Believe About Yourself? Jun 21, 2022
- Jun 16, 2022 Can I Have a Healthy Relationship with My Body Without Loving It? Jun 16, 2022
- Jun 6, 2022 4 Ways To Widen Your Window Of Tolerance Jun 6, 2022
-
May 2022
- May 25, 2022 Quieting Your Inner Critic by Living your Values May 25, 2022
- May 17, 2022 Understanding Your Window of Tolerance May 17, 2022
- May 12, 2022 How to Make the Most of Your Time Between Sessions May 12, 2022
- May 2, 2022 5 Ideas for Starting a Self-Development Practice May 2, 2022
-
April 2022
- Apr 25, 2022 7 Ways to Spend Your Time for Better Mental Health Apr 25, 2022
- Apr 18, 2022 6 Things to Do When You Make a Mistake Apr 18, 2022
- Apr 12, 2022 Emotional Exhaustion: What Is It & What Can You Do About It? Apr 12, 2022
-
March 2022
- Mar 28, 2022 5 Ways to Deal With Being Ghosted Mar 28, 2022
- Mar 23, 2022 Gentle Movement Tips for A Healthier Relationship with Exercise Mar 23, 2022
- Mar 15, 2022 5 Things to Do When You Feel Triggered Mar 15, 2022
- Mar 7, 2022 How to Be There for A Friend with Chronic Pain Mar 7, 2022
-
February 2022
- Feb 28, 2022 8 Tips for Hard Conversations in Your Relationship Feb 28, 2022
- Feb 21, 2022 How (& Why) You Should Get Clear on Your Values Feb 21, 2022
- Feb 15, 2022 6 Tips To Help You Feel Your Feelings Feb 15, 2022
- Feb 8, 2022 6 Ways Cooking Together Builds Intimacy Feb 8, 2022
-
January 2022
- Jan 31, 2022 3 Ways to Celebrate Platonic Relationships This February Jan 31, 2022
- Jan 25, 2022 6 Tips for Having Difficult Conversations with Your Partner Jan 25, 2022
- Jan 19, 2022 5 Tips to Start Journaling for the First Time Jan 19, 2022
- Jan 11, 2022 Reaffirming Your Covid Boundaries Jan 11, 2022
-
December 2021
- Dec 23, 2021 8 Ways to Upgrade Your Self-Care Routine in 2022 Dec 23, 2021
- Dec 20, 2021 Making Big Life Decisions In Scary Times Dec 20, 2021
- Dec 13, 2021 6 Little Ways to Improve Your Romantic Relationship Dec 13, 2021
- Dec 6, 2021 Keeping Peace with Your Body During the Holiday Season Dec 6, 2021
-
November 2021
- Nov 29, 2021 How to Gently Set Boundaries With Your Family Nov 29, 2021
- Nov 22, 2021 How to Motivate Yourself to Do Boring Life Tasks Nov 22, 2021
- Nov 15, 2021 How to Tell if You’re in a Codependent Relationship Nov 15, 2021
- Nov 1, 2021 Listening to Your Intuition After Trauma Nov 1, 2021
-
October 2021
- Oct 25, 2021 What Forgiveness Is and Isn’t Oct 25, 2021
- Oct 19, 2021 Who Can Benefit from Inner Child Work? Oct 19, 2021
- Oct 15, 2021 What are Coping Skills and Why Do I Have Them? Oct 15, 2021
- Oct 11, 2021 How to Move Through Grief with Kindness and Self-Compassion Oct 11, 2021
-
September 2021
- Sep 27, 2021 Finding Meaning When Life Is Scary or Confusing Sep 27, 2021
- Sep 17, 2021 Self Care for Days You Can't Get Out of Bed Sep 17, 2021
- Sep 10, 2021 How Affirmations Can Help You Be Kinder To Yourself Sep 10, 2021
- Sep 3, 2021 Helpful Tools for Managing Adult ADHD Sep 3, 2021
-
August 2021
- Aug 30, 2021 7 Ways to Get To Know Yourself Better Aug 30, 2021
- Aug 23, 2021 3 Tips for More Effective Communication with Your Teen Aug 23, 2021
- Aug 16, 2021 5 Ways to Cultivate Creativity Aug 16, 2021
- Aug 9, 2021 3 Coping Skills for Managing Depression Aug 9, 2021
- Aug 3, 2021 5 Tips for Overcoming Perfectionism Aug 3, 2021
-
July 2021
- Jul 27, 2021 How to Tell Someone They've Hurt Your Feelings Jul 27, 2021
- Jul 19, 2021 How ADHD Presents In Adult Women Jul 19, 2021
- Jul 13, 2021 5 Coping Strategies to Try When You’re Feeling Anxious Jul 13, 2021
- Jul 6, 2021 4 Tips for Dealing With a Friend Breakup Jul 6, 2021
-
June 2021
- Jun 28, 2021 Naming Your Emotions Jun 28, 2021
- Jun 14, 2021 How to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others Jun 14, 2021
- Jun 7, 2021 How to Unlink Your Self-Worth From Your Job Status Jun 7, 2021
- Jun 1, 2021 4 Myths About Grief Jun 1, 2021
-
May 2021
- May 24, 2021 5 Reasons You Might Consider Ending a Friendship May 24, 2021
- May 18, 2021 Setting Boundaries: Why You Should & What to Say May 18, 2021
- May 10, 2021 6 Ways to Cultivate Self-Compassion May 10, 2021
-
April 2021
- Apr 30, 2021 Exploring Perfectionism and Being Ok With ‘Good Enough’ Apr 30, 2021
- Apr 26, 2021 3 Things Your Inner Child Needs to Hear from You Apr 26, 2021
- Apr 12, 2021 What to Teach Your Child About Worry Apr 12, 2021
- Apr 6, 2021 6 Tips to Help Improve Your Sleep Apr 6, 2021
-
March 2021
- Mar 26, 2021 7 Lesser Known Signs of ADHD Mar 26, 2021
- Mar 18, 2021 Managing Cognitive Distortions Mar 18, 2021
- Mar 15, 2021 10 More Cognitive Distortions to Be Aware Of Mar 15, 2021
- Mar 4, 2021 What is All or Nothing Thinking? Mar 4, 2021
- Mar 1, 2021 8 Common Cognitive Distortions to Watch Out For Mar 1, 2021
-
February 2021
- Feb 15, 2021 4 Signs That Your Funk Could Be the Result of Depression Feb 15, 2021
-
January 2021
- Jan 28, 2021 6 Things Not to Say to Someone Struggling with Infertility Jan 28, 2021
- Jan 7, 2021 Managing Covid Anxiety in the New Year Jan 7, 2021
-
August 2020
- Aug 21, 2020 7 Ways to Remember Your Lost Loved One Aug 21, 2020
- Aug 17, 2020 6 Ways People Have Described What Depression Feels Like Aug 17, 2020
- Aug 10, 2020 4 Ways to Support Someone Struggling With Infertility Aug 10, 2020
-
July 2020
- Jul 31, 2020 Mindfulness To Help Anxiety Jul 31, 2020
- Jul 30, 2020 Learning to Reparent Your Inner Child Jul 30, 2020
- Jul 17, 2020 Daily Habits to Help Manage Anxiety in a Healthy Way Jul 17, 2020
- Jul 1, 2020 Racial Justice Resources Jul 1, 2020
-
June 2020
- Jun 19, 2020 Processing Non-Death Related Grief Jun 19, 2020
- Jun 5, 2020 How Creativity Helps Mental Health Jun 5, 2020
-
May 2020
- May 29, 2020 20 Journal Prompts for Grief + Loss May 29, 2020
- May 22, 2020 4 Ways to Add Mindfulness to Your Daily Routine May 22, 2020
- May 15, 2020 How Grounding Techniques Can Help With Anxiety May 15, 2020
- May 3, 2020 6 Journaling Prompts to Help You Examine Your Relationships May 3, 2020
-
April 2020
- Apr 18, 2020 5 Ways to Show Some Self-Compassion Apr 18, 2020
- Apr 5, 2020 Why Conflict In Your Relationship Can Be A Good Thing Apr 5, 2020
- Apr 5, 2020 4 Tips to Help You Cultivate Optimism Apr 5, 2020
- Apr 1, 2020 How to Craft a Joyful Daily Routine Apr 1, 2020
-
March 2020
- Mar 6, 2020 Feeling Stuck? Try These 6 Things Mar 6, 2020
- Mar 5, 2020 How to Figure Out What You Want in a Partner Mar 5, 2020
-
February 2020
- Feb 23, 2020 How to Cope With Losing Relationships as a Result of Your Chronic Illness Feb 23, 2020
- Feb 7, 2020 Well Rounded Wellness: Exploring the Health Benefits of Spirituality Feb 7, 2020
-
January 2020
- Jan 28, 2020 Ways to Cope with Depression After Pregnancy Loss Jan 28, 2020
- Jan 16, 2020 Is Perfectionism Holding You Back? Jan 16, 2020
-
December 2019
- Dec 28, 2019 5 Ways Chronic Illness can Affect Your Mental Health Dec 28, 2019
- Dec 20, 2019 How to stop social media from making you feel bad about yourself Dec 20, 2019
- Dec 6, 2019 How to Tap Into and Listen to Your Intuition Dec 6, 2019
-
November 2019
- Nov 26, 2019 7 Ways to Communicate More Effectively in Your Relationship Nov 26, 2019
- Nov 15, 2019 What parents of anxious children should know about anxiety Nov 15, 2019
- Nov 9, 2019 5 Signs CBT is Right for You Nov 9, 2019
-
October 2019
- Oct 30, 2019 Mindfulness for Stress Relief Oct 30, 2019
- Oct 22, 2019 10 Mindfulness Apps to Improve Your Life Right Now Oct 22, 2019
-
September 2019
- Sep 2, 2019 Live with Happiness by Identifying Your Values Sep 2, 2019
-
July 2019
- Jul 21, 2019 11 Mindful Quotes for Serenity and Clarity Jul 21, 2019
-
June 2019
- Jun 18, 2019 A Blessing for Career and Work Struggles Jun 18, 2019
- Jun 2, 2019 Accepting Yourself Unconditionally, As You Are Jun 2, 2019
-
May 2019
- May 26, 2019 5 Things to Know if Your Teen is Dealing with Depression May 26, 2019
-
February 2019
- Feb 24, 2019 17 Quotes on Love and Letting Go That'll Help You Move Forward and Heal Again Feb 24, 2019
- Feb 17, 2019 25 Inspiring Quotes That'll Help You Cultivate More Peace, Presence, and Joy in Your Life Feb 17, 2019
- Feb 10, 2019 35 Positive Affirmations for Anxiety and Depression That Will Transform Your Life Feb 10, 2019
- Feb 3, 2019 18 Beautiful Quotes About Intimacy and Love Feb 3, 2019
-
January 2019
- Jan 28, 2019 18 Quotes to Inspire Self-Kindness and Self-Compassion Jan 28, 2019
- Jan 20, 2019 4 Tips for Coping with Depression Jan 20, 2019
- Jan 14, 2019 19 Powerful Brene Brown Quotes on Embracing Vulnerability, Love, and Belonging Jan 14, 2019
- Jan 6, 2019 16 Calming Quotes to Relieve Stress and Anxiety Jan 6, 2019
- Jan 3, 2019 7 Ways to Cope When Life is Hard: DBT IMPROVE the moment Jan 3, 2019
-
December 2018
- Dec 27, 2018 4 Ways to Train Your Brain for Greater Happiness and Success Dec 27, 2018
- Dec 18, 2018 19 Inspiring Acceptance Quotes on Moving Forward and Letting Go Dec 18, 2018
- Dec 3, 2018 3 Simple Ways to Cultivate Kindness and Self-Compassion Dec 3, 2018
- Dec 2, 2018 29 Life Changing Quotes from Eckhart Tolle to Help You Cultivate Peace and Awaken to Your Life's Purpose Dec 2, 2018
-
November 2018
- Nov 22, 2018 12 Quotes to Inspire You to Focus on Yourself Instead of Others Nov 22, 2018
- Nov 20, 2018 15 Beautiful Quotes to Inspire Gratitude Nov 20, 2018
- Nov 18, 2018 3 Ways to Find Meaning and Purpose in Your Life Nov 18, 2018
- Nov 14, 2018 7 Amazing Ways to Practice Gratitude Nov 14, 2018
-
October 2018
- Oct 30, 2018 3 Life Changing Poems That You Need to Read Oct 30, 2018
- Oct 28, 2018 5 Things You Need to Know About Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Oct 28, 2018
- Oct 16, 2018 15 Inspirational Mental Health Quotes That Will Help You Feel Less Alone Oct 16, 2018
- Oct 10, 2018 24 Resources for Children and Teens with Anxiety and Their Families Oct 10, 2018
- Oct 5, 2018 3 Tips for Parenting a Child with Chronic Pain Oct 5, 2018
- Oct 4, 2018 12 Quotes That Describe What It's Like to Live with Bipolar Disorder Oct 4, 2018
-
September 2018
- Sep 29, 2018 27 Inspirational Quotes That Will Give You Hope and Strength During Hard Times Sep 29, 2018
- Sep 26, 2018 List of Emotions Sep 26, 2018
- Sep 24, 2018 21 Mindfulness Quotes Sep 24, 2018
- Sep 19, 2018 26 Depression Resources for Kids, Teens, and Parents Sep 19, 2018
- Sep 18, 2018 28 Anxiety Resources for Adults Sep 18, 2018
- Sep 16, 2018 15 Quotes That Describe What Depression Feels Like Sep 16, 2018
- Sep 13, 2018 How to Find the Right Psychologist for You Sep 13, 2018
-
August 2018
- Aug 8, 2018 3 Ways to Grow from Pain Aug 8, 2018
The period after pregnancy loss can be complicated, emotional, and intense. If you’ve experienced a miscarriage, here are some ways to support your mental health in the aftermath.