Love yourself on Valentine's Day!

It's Valentine's day, so many of us are thinking about the people in our lives we love. My question for you is, do you love yourself? As cliche as it may sound, if you don't love yourself, you can't love and care for those in your life who need, want, and deserve you and your love. While it is appropriate to hold ourselves to reasonable standards, and we all get frustrated with ourselves at times (because, you know, we're all human) if you can't love yourself first in spite of your shortcomings, you won't be capable of compassionate love for others. If you are struggling in this area, please talk to someone. Your family and friends deserve it. You deserve it.

Couples Counseling

Couples counseling. Couples start counseling for different reasons and at different times in their relationships. Often, they wait until things get really bad before they start counseling, and that reduces the chances that counseling will be effective. It is far better to start therapy before things get too bad for the best chance of working things through.

Sometimes couples start therapy as more of a preventative measure. They start therapy when there aren't any significant concerns, and so use it to deal with things as soon as they come up. That way issues don't usually get too serious before they are working through them. This is a really nice way to stay on track with your partner.

A third option is pre-marital therapy. This is counseling done prior to getting married during which potential issues can be identified and discussed. The state of Tennessee offers a significant discount on the fee for the marriage license to couples who have done acceptable pre-marital counseling, and I am able to do this work. It requires at least four hours of therapy, so isn't a huge commitment, and can be a really nice way to be prepared for some of the challenges that often arise in marriages. Good relationships do take work, but doing that work can help us maintain healthy and fulfilling relationships.

Folks in therapy are brave!

It takes courage to do therapy. There is such a stigma around it, some people view it as something only weak or sick people do. Fact is, you have to be really brave to admit you need help and then be willing to look hard at yourself with someone you might not know very well, at least at first. When I do therapy with someone, I know I am working with someone strong enough to do it, even if they don't always feel it.

Pets make us happier!

Prescription: Pet your cat and call me in the morning.

Just like me, many of you have and love pets. We love our pets for lots of different reasons, but one thing that has been consistently demonstrated through research is that folks with pets tend to have better mental health. This is true for people struggling with mental illness, as well as folks who aren't. Across the board, pets make us happier.

These benefits come about in a number of ways. Having pets may increase our activity levels, which is a good thing. Caring for pets reduces anxiety; just sitting and petting a cat or dog (or any other pet you might prefer) reduces the experience of stress. Pets give us something to focus on outside of ourselves, and can actually give more purpose to our lives. They are a great source of physical contact and companionship, which decreases loneliness and depression. Finally, they are absolutely adorable and can be quite entertaining!

I use cats and a dog during my therapy sessions, and virtually all of the folks have commented on how much it helps to have them there. I know my pets have been a part of my own coping with depression throughout my life. Pets are now being used as therapy animals and emotional support animals, including being allowed in some college dormitories. The benefits are significant and firmly rooted in research. So all of you pet owners, go thank your animal companions for improving your mental health!

Never give up on someone with a mental illness...

Never give up on someone with a mental illness. When "i" is replaced by "we", illness becomes wellness.
-Shannon L. Alder

Can Politics and Hope coexist for LGBT Americans?

Politics. I tend to not discuss politics too much. Well, that used to be the case, but recently politics have become much more important and personal to many of us. I know that many of us are really struggling with things that have been done (immigration, healthcare) and things that we are afraid might be done. I'm with many of you in worrying about what steps might be taken that will prove harmful to us as LGBT folks. I want to be comforted knowing that the executive order preventing discrimination in government is going to be left in place. However, I am very aware that so many other things could - and very well will - happen.

I wish I could tell you that things are going to be okay. I do believe that our lives are going to be made more difficult, both by the federal government and by the Tennessee legislature. Even so, I know that our community is far more organized than we have ever been before. I know that we have more allies than we have ever had before. I know that the majority of the general population approves of gay marriage. I believe that they can make our lives harder for a while, but I don't believe they take back the progress we have made, not permanently anyway. In the past I haven't been especially politically active, but I am planning to go to Nashville to speak out as a psychologist against any bills they try to pass against us. I'm not the only person who is now far more politically aware and active than I used to be. Together we will fight back against whatever they try to put in place, and even if it takes a little time, I truly believe that we will prevail.
Like many of us sometimes I feel very afraid, very uncertain about our futures as LGBT Americans. There are days it is harder for me to hold onto this hope, but I have seen what we have accomplished so far so I know we will continue to overcome. I'm not telling you not to worry. I am telling you to be ready to stand up and fight, and if we do this, we will reclaim any progress lost and continue to march ahead. That is what we will do as LGBT Americans.

My ad on Psych Today

You can visit my page at Psychology Today:
https://therapists.psychologytoday.com/rms/prof_detail.php?profid=311392&sid=1485113618.6495_10129&name=Hiestand&search=Hiestand&ref=1&tr=ResultsName

Butch-Femme research

When I was in graduate school at the University of Memphis, I was fortunate to be able to do some research in the area of the lesbian gender identities butch and femme. I am posting the titles here if anyone is interested in checking any of them out. If you are but are unable to access a copy, let me know and I'll try to set you up.

Hiestand, K. R., Horne, S.G., & Levitt, H. M. (2007). Effects of gender identity on experiences of healthcare for sexual minority women. Journal of LGBT Health Research, 3(4), 15-27.

Hiestand, K. R., & Levitt, H. M. (2005). Butch identity development: The formation of an authentic gender. Feminism & Psychology, 15, 61-85.

Levitt, H. M., & Hiestand, K. R. (2005). Gender within lesbian sexuality: Butch and femme perspectives. Journal of Constructivist Psychology, 18, 39-51.

Levitt, H. M., & Hiestand, K. R. (2004). A quest for authenticity: Contemporary butch gender. Sex Roles, 50, 605-621.

Levitt, H. M., Gerrish, E. A., & Hiestand, K. R. (2003). The misunderstood gender: A model of modern femme identity. Sex Roles, 48, 99-113.

Also, although it was never published, the title of my dissertation was The role of butch identity in a model of self-esteem among sexual minority women.
 

Emotions: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly...

Emotions. Some of us are all in tune with our emotions while others avoid emotions like the plague. Sometimes in therapy we focus on them while other times we focus on other things. When we think about emotions, we know there are lots of them...

Lots of times one of the things people want when they go to therapy is to stop feeling certain emotions. Frequently clients tell me they don't want to feel sad, anxious, depressed, angry, lonely, or scared. But is it a good goal to want to eradicate these feelings from our lives?

Most of the time, emotions serve a useful purpose (note I didn't say a pleasant purpose). Negative emotions alert us that there is something in our environment we need to attend to. Anxiety tells us there is something we need to attend to, to fix. If we are anxious about money, we need to take steps to improve our financial situations. When we are frustrated, perhaps we need to work something out with our spouse, co-workers, or friends, to alleviate the frustration. Fear lets us respond to keep ourselves safe. Sadness is a normal response to loss in our lives.

There are certainly times that emotions are too extreme. People may experience anxiety that is bad enough that it actually prevents them from responding. Depression may be so crippling that it is almost impossible to function. When emotions are this extreme, it is certainly reasonable to want them to go away, because in these cases they aren't being helpful.

None of us likes to feel bad, but emotions - the good, the bad, and the ugly - normally do serve a purpose. Therapy can help us reduce the extreme emotions, and it can help us learn to cope with emotions so that we can work through them. As nice as it might be to never experience the negative stuff, they are important and we need to learn from them and react in appropriate ways. When we actively address them, we can learn and grow, and that's a pretty great goal.

Breathe in, breathe out...

Breathing. We all do it, but are we doing it right? I'm going to keep this short, because this is going to be an ongoing dialogue for me. I've been learning biofeedback, which I referenced in a previous post. It is a technique that allows us to reset neural connections in a beneficial way, and we do it by breathing a certain way. Most of us have heard of meditation, and we know it is based in breathing, and some claim it is extremely beneficial. Some folks do yoga, and breathing is an important part of that. Breathing is utilized in hypnotherapy and progressive muscle relaxation. I am sure there are other techniques and such that utilize breathing in a therapeutic way that I'm not thinking of at the moment.

My recent research on and personal use of biofeedback has convinced me of the definite benefits of that technique specifically, and I think it makes the other techniques I mentioned likely more valid. At this point my focus is biofeedback, and I may incorporate a bit of hypnotherapy into my work. I'm also seriously considering trying yoga myself to see how that works for me. As I learn new things about breathing, I plan to share them here. Regular "talk therapy" like cognitive behavioral therapy, are still definitely very effective treatment methods, and I'm not going to stop doing CBT. I will be incorporating more of some of the other techniques into my work though, and I really think a lot of folks I am working with are going to benefit greatly from it.