Inside Info

Recently, I was engaging in a deep dive with a patient in my care about the discussion of boundaries. She had started a new romantic relationship and was expressing concerns about how to discuss “hard topics” in her burgeoning romance. In referring to content from Elizabeth Earnshaw’s (2021) book I Want This to Work: An…

Over the last several months, I have been working with a patient (‘Bert’) on his unresolved parent wound, specifically his mother wound. Parent wounds are seldom discussed in psychotherapy but their potential for psychoemotional impact upon the patient is profound. The parent wound can occur for any patient when there has been a significant attachment…

Recently, I realized I was feeling hurt, alone, and isolated because I could not connect with an important person in my life. Admittedly, feeling an emotional response to the absence of connection is not an unexpected reaction; Often, when we stub a toe, we want to hold it. However, in the absence of my ability…

You made it! After all the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, it’s time to sit back, take a breath, and enjoy the dawn of a new year with all its opportunity for new beginnings, fundamental change, living your best life… And then, it starts. Do you feel it? The self-questioning, the self-doubt, the…

Financial abuse. A seldom acknowledged and frequently overlooked aspect of interpersonal (especially romantic) relationships that leaves significant scars above just those which are monetary. It is a form of control and manipulation that manifests through various means, impacting victims in profound and lasting ways. Defined simply by the exertion of control and power through money,…

A recent study by Smith S, Charach A, To T, Toulany A, et al. (2023), on the prevalence of eating disorders in Ontario, reported a staggering 139% increase in children and teens hospitalized with an eating disorder between 2002 and 2019. Another study by Agostino H, Burstein B, Moubayed D, et al. (2021) reported hospitalizations of children and adolescents,…

A frequent discussion point in clinical work is interpersonal communication. I recall one intake session when I asked a patient about his history of familial conflict and interpersonal communication: In essence, dysfunctional conflict can create serious relationship problems, including anxiety, emotional strains and schism, lasting resentment, and personal pain.” As is often the case, this…

Everyday, we make decisions – big and small, significant and insignificant. And how we make these decisions has a tremendous impact on the outcome; often without our conscious awareness. If we consider one of the fundamental ways we make decisions, we would recognize how they are made from a “positive”, or goal-oriented perspective, or a…