Depression – Page 4 – Stone Cottage Counseling

A More Realistic (and Hilarious) Pain Scale

Posted on December 6, 2016 by Dana Goldman

I always laugh a lot at the hilarious pain scale (and explanation that creator Allie Brosh gives) on her now-inactive blog Hyperbole and a Half. Brosh is a depression survivor and her blog (and book of the same name) are often gut-splittingly on target. While our society often is more quick to recognize physical pain than emotional pain, cool neuroscience shows that emotional pain often registers in the same brain regions as when we, say, stub a toe or break a leg. In other words, emotional pain is still real. And painful. picture-22

Beyond Upset? 8 Small Things To Do Right Now

Posted on November 13, 2016November 13, 2016 by Dana Goldman

First: Don’t make major life decisions in the middle of a crisis. If you’re feeling an impulse to make a big change right now, notice that impulse and then do yo
ur best to sit on it for a few weeks.
Undercommit. During times of challenge, you’re allowed to be a little flaky. I recommend sentences like “I’m a tentative yes for this” or “I’d like to, but I need to think about whether I can do this.”
Limit your exposure to information you may find upsetting. Set a timer to remind you to stop compulsively reading whatever is making you panic. There will be plenty of time to read and learn later on. It’s not selfish to choose to opt out for a while.
Get outside. Once there, move your body. Slowly is fine. Less slowly is also fine.
Eat. At regular intervals. The best you can.
Sleep. At regular intervals. The best you can.
Find comfort. Take comfort. Give comfort. Cookies, TV, books, friends, and food are all good starts.
Figure out a small way to use the power you have in a tangible way. That may mean doing something kind for someone else. That may mean volunteering. That may mean writing a letter to the editor. Be careful not to overextend yourself! Refer back to #2.

Preparing for the S.A.D. Time of Year

Posted on October 24, 2016October 24, 2016 by Dana Goldman

Each fall, clients come into my office saying, “I know it’s getting to be the holiday season but…” or “It’s just so dark all the time and it’s getting to me.” They’re noticing their moods darkening, their energy lagging, and their interest in life waning. It’s usually not that life is suddenly harder and more full of challenges than usual. Instead, what they’re describing is just – SAD. Seasonal Affective Disorder, a subset of depression.

If you don’t know about SAD, the mood changes you experience during the darker months may feel inexplicable, confusing and maddening. But there is a reason so many people–an estimated 5 percent of us–feel lower and slower in the winter. SAD is real. As human creatures, we’re impacted by the environment, including darkness and light, in ways that scientists are just beginning to fully comprehend.

I want to write about this right now, in October, because so often SAD gets worse the less light there is and the further into winter we come. If you’ve dealt with SAD in the past, it’s likely not in full force right now, though you may notice uneasy apprehension, wondering how bad this winter will be. This is the time of year to be proactive and prepare. The good news is that phototherapy (the use of specific lights), talk therapy, physical movement, and all sorts of other strategies can help. You don’t have to feel SAD all winter long.

“Not Rich, Not White, and Seeking Therapy”

Posted on June 30, 2016 by Dana Goldman

I was concerned but not incredibly surprised to read the findings of the article “Not Rich, Not White, and Seeking Therapy” in The Atlantic. It’s a quick read, but gets into how hard it can be to access counseling if you don’t sound rich and white when you call therapists to make an appointment. In other words, it shows how much the odds are stacked against people of color and people who sound working class — even with therapy. Here’s a quick quote:

“If [the researcher’s] experiment were to play out in the real world, an identifiably black, working-class man would have to call 80 therapists before he was offered a weekday evening appointment. A middle-class white woman would only have to call five.”

As a white woman who’s anti-racist, I’m appalled. The field of therapy has to do better. We have to do better. Everyone deserves access to high-quality healthcare for physical and emotional concerns.

When Clients Cry, I Think…

Posted on March 3, 2016October 5, 2017 by Dana Goldman

Unlike pop culture’s idea of therapy, I do not exist to make people cry. I don’t get excited when someone sheds tears. I don’t think, ‘Hurrah, now this is therapy!’

Instead, I feel compassion for the pain I see before me. After all, tears are one way we show our suffering.

But there’s something else to remember, too, next time you cry. Neuroscience is teaching us that we have the best chance of being happy when we can easily go into and out of our thoughts, our physical sensations, and our emotions.

For most of us, our thoughts are easy to go into but can be hard to shift away from. (“I can’t stop thinking about…”) When we bring our attention to our bodies when we’re stressed, we may notice a clenching or tightness in our chest or gut.

And then there are emotions. Most of us try to avoid our emotions – especially the ones that are painful and confusing. We’d rather do just about anything else to avoid them, including overeating, numbing out through alcohol or drugs or TV, or getting really, really busy with work or family or friends.

But we can’t block some emotions without also potentially blocking out others. We can’t decide to just feel happiness, joy, and gratitude without also allowing ourselves to experience sadness, grief and anger. I wish it was different, but the brain doesn’t work like that.

So when I see a client cry, I don’t think Hurrah! But I do feel glad for that particular person that they are allowing themselves to feel what needs to be felt. It’s only when we can be with all of life – the painful and the pleasurable and everything in between – that we have the best chance of health and happiness.

Five Ways to Feel Better Right Now

Posted on January 5, 2016 by Dana Goldman

I often tell new clients that I wish I could offer a magic pill that would completely take away anxiety, depression and suffering, even if that means I’d be out of a job I love. While there’s no quick cure-all for the challenges and messiness that come with being human, there are quick right-here-right-now ways to increase your sense of inner calm and stability no matter wh There ain't no magic pill at’s going on around you.

Take a walk, ideally outside. More and more research is showing the benefits of physical activity for reducing stress – especially when you’re outside, not on a treadmill. This doesn’t need to be a long walk in Atlanta’s Piedmont Park, or a fast walk in midtown, or the sort of walk you’d consider “exercise” and therefore never want to do again. Just a walk. Outside.

Turn off the news. Studies show that lots of exposure to news – especially negative news – makes us feel more negative about ourselves and the world around us.

Call someone who cares about you and have a real conversation. One big antidote to the isolation that comes with depression and anxiety is connection.

Do something interesting that will get your mind off of, well, your mind. In other words, do something that’s not about you. This can be as simple as working on a crossword puzzle or listening to an interesting podcast (I recommend RadioLab , StartUp, and Intelligence Squared among others).

Practice guided breathing for ten minutes. There’s massive amounts of research about how intentional breathing can reduce our reactivity and increase our sense of well-being.

Got a great tip? Feel free to email me about what relaxation techniques work best for you to feel happy and peaceful.

Surviving Our Families Over the Holidays

Posted on December 8, 2015 by Dana Goldman

“If you think you’re enlightened go spend a week with your family.”

-Ram Dass

It’s that busy few weeks right now between Thanksgiving and Christmas, when many of us have barely had time to recover from one family gathering before the next one looms. We don’t need to have deep, dark family histories in order to find extended time with family challenging. Stick us in a house with anyone, add in lots of expectations for how Thanksgiving or Hanukah or Christmas or Kwanzaa “should” be, and we’re bound to feel challenged.

Holiday survival with family Too often, these holidays are also a reminder of loss – who isn’t here with us, how these holidays used to be, and what may be missing right now from our lives. Underneath the cheer is often a layer of sadness or worry or regret tinged with some self-recrimination. Shouldn’t we be enjoying ourselves right now?

My wonderful colleague Tara Lozano reminds me that sometimes the only thing to say in these moments is “This too.” It’s the exciting holiday season – and we feel sad. We love our extended families – and they drive us crazy. Saying “This too” makes room for the fact that our lives often have elements of wonder and despair at the exact same point. Saying “This too” makes space for the facts we can want to hug and kill our relatives, sometimes at the exact same time. This is normal. It doesn’t make us bad people that we hold such a wide range of emotions – it just makes us human.

Don’t Believe Facebook! Comparison, Judgment and What’s Not to Like

Posted on September 20, 2015 by Dana Goldman

Y’all, it’s time to talk about Facebook, that addictive, terrible-wonderful black-hole of photos and words from friends and “friends” that makes about 90% of us feel like our lives are crap, at least occasionally. How do I know this? I was on Facebook for ten minutes up until about 10 seconds ago, and in that time I came to believe that all of my friends and “friends” are all unambivalently happy about everything in their own lives — kids and jobs and partners and the like — and all having a terrific ball in their abundant free time. Just like all of our lives really are, right?

Facebook comes up in my counseling office fairly regularly, since in addition to connecting friends and “friends” it also provides constant opportunities for us to compare ourselves and our lives to all the people we know. Since Facebook has us comparing our own inner experiences with curated external experiences, we’re usually doomed to feel bad. There is research to back this up.

Here is what I want to tell friends and clients: What people post on Facebook does not reflect the entirety of their inner and outer experiences. Since people rarely post, “Oh, hey, I feel really depressed today” it can be easy to think that nobody else ever feels depressed. Since people rarely post, “Oh, hey, I spent Friday night alone eating marshmallows and binge-watching American Ninja Warrior” it can be easy to think that everyone except you is always out having ridiculous amounts of fun with their amazing, hilarious friends.

But it’s important to remember that people only post on Facebook what they want you to know about their lives. And it’s the rare person who wants all our friends and “friends” to know about our deep sorrows, big regrets, chronic worries, or loneliness. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t all have deep sorrows, big regrets, chronic worries, or occasional loneliness. We are all human; we all feel all the human emotions, even the difficult ones. We just don’t always share them with others.

Most of my clients do have Facebook accounts. And if you met most of them, you would never think that they struggle in the way that almost all of us do at some point in our lives. My clients are good at putting on happy faces, just like most of the rest of us, and my guess is that they only post positive things on Facebook. And until the Facebook Revolution or Be Honest On Facebook Day, it’s up to us to remember that what’s visible on the surface is rarely the full truth of what exists deeper down.

Serving as Our Own Judge and Jury

Posted on September 8, 2015 by Dana Goldman

figure-with-a-gavel-7523 “I know you’ll judge me for this, but…” my client starts. She tells me what’s happened the previous week, and I keep waiting for the moment in which I will feel like condemning her to the ends of the earth. But… that moment never comes.

Oftentimes the depressed or anxious people who show up in counseling believe that I, or any other therapist, will judge them as much as they judge themselves. They feel so embarrassed or humiliated, so they assume we will laugh or humiliate them further. They look critically at themselves and their choices, and fear that I and others will too. This is why people dealing with depression and anxiety often isolate themselves and shut down. It can be terrifying to spend time with people if we believe that if they really know us they will judge us.

A big part of the work I do is helping clients look clearly at their own judgments of themselves, instead of simply staying immersed in the judgements themselves. Sometimes self-criticism can be a useful tool, but sometimes we can use it as a weapon against ourselves. Here are the sorts of questions I invite you ask yourself right now:

How would my life be different if I was less self-critical?
What stops me from being as critical or judgmental of my friends?
How self-critical would I want any children in my life to be?

Dealing with our worst moments

Posted on July 3, 2015 by Dana Goldman

“What would happen,” the attorney asked, “if everyone around you judged you for the worst moments of your life?”

The room fell silent. I was with a group at Atlanta’s Southern Center for Human Rights listening to a lawyer speak about his work against the death penalty. And while I haven’t ended up in prison for any of my worst moments, the attorney’s words have stayed with me.

At some point in our lives all of us act in ways that go against our values, principles and beliefs. We lie, or cheat, or cut someone off in traffic when we’re really mad at our boss or child. As kids, and then as teens and adults, we behave in ways we later want to forget because these moments stir up such guilt and embarrassment and shame. We get nervous someone will find out, and this anxiety can pave the way for depression or panic attacks.

So many of my counseling clients worry terribly about what I and others will think of them when one of their worst moments is revealed. They worry they will be judged as harshly as they have judged themselves. They worry that others won’t forgive them, especially since it has been so difficult to find forgiveness in themselves. They worry that others will write them off as bad, since they see themselves as bad.

I know these truths for two reasons: One is because I’ve listened to many of these worst moments in my therapy sessions with clients. Second is because I’m a human with my own worst moments.

Coming to therapy is a brave act. It takes courage to begin to speak about these worst moments and what we fear they say about us. When we speak them out loud, we often fear being judged as harshly as we have judged ourselves.

But there is more to us than our worst moments — much, much more. In counseling, we look at our worst moments and best moments from a place of compassion and curiosity, because we can learn from them both. It’s important to put both in a larger context, trying to make sense of them so we can let go of debilitating shame, depression and anxiety, and truly move on.

So please remember: There is more to all of us than our worst moments. There is more to you than your worst moments.