By Sheila O’Shea There’s a New Yorker cartoon from a long time ago that depicts a sculptor at work. The statue is the stylized figure of a woman with her gaze fixed upward, and it is large enough that the sculptor needs a ladder to work on it. Just below where he holds his hammer…
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As part of the 2022 Dorothy C. Fuqua Lecture, mental health experts discuss the teen mental health crisis and what people, schools, and systems can do to protect youth mental health.
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By Sheila O’Shea Everybody has a story. People who have been through trauma and difficult times especially. They’ll often have a story that helps them make sense of what happened. Mine was the one I told about “The Unpleasantness.” It started with a beautiful morning where I felt absolutely miserable and ended with my parents…
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By Sheila O’Shea I have a lot of mindfulness techniques in my mental toolbox that I use to handle my bipolar disorder, particularly the depressive ends of it. I refined my knowledge of mindfulness meditation at Skyland Trail, and I have a few methods that I came up with on my own. Mindfulness In Hearing…
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As a family therapist for the adolescent treatment program, Brandon Baird, LMSW, MPH, has helped many families reconnect and find new ways to support one another.
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Discover the effects of caffeine on the diagnosis and treatment of mental health disorders like anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorders.
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By Sheila O’Shea “To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.” – Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband Valentine’s Day is known as a day to express love to one’s romantic partner with cards, flowers, candy, and gifts. But you don’t need a partner to have someone to express love to. I’m not in…
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By Sheila O’Shea [Trigger warning: suicidal ideation] I knew it wasn’t Attention Deficit Disorder. I went through a battery of tests for ADD—pointing at pictures of aliens and reciting their names, holding a metal rod steady so it wouldn’t touch the inside of a metal ring, filling out questionnaires—and the doctor concluded that I didn’t…
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By Sheila O’Shea It’s time again to make resolutions for the new year so we can break them in February and feel disgusted with ourselves. Whee! If that’s how your resolutions end up going, there are other ways to approach the new year that may work better for you. How To Phrase Your New Year…
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Teen avoidant behaviors—even if they are driven by depression or anxiety—make many mental health problems worse. There can be a “snowball effect.” Avoiding one situation leads to avoiding another, and another, until the teen effectively shuts down.
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