The Counsellor

How do we choose the people we fall in love with? The Romantic answer is that our instincts naturally guide us to individuals who are kind and good for us.

Love is a sort of ecstasy that descends when we feel ourselves in the presence of a benign and nourishing soul, who will answer our emotional needs, understand our sadness and strengthen us for the hard tasks of our lives. In order to locate our lover, we must let our instincts carry us along, taking care never to impede them through pedantic psychological analysis and introspection or else considerations of status, wealth or lineage. Our feelings will tell us clearly enough when we have reached our destiny. To ask someone with any degree of rigour why exactly they have chosen a particular partner is – in the Romantic world-view – simply an unnecessary and offensive misunderstanding of love: true love is an instinct that accurately and naturally settles on those with a capacity to make us happy. The Romantic attitude sounds warm and kind. Its originators certainly imagined that it would bring an end to the sort of unhappy relationships previously brokered by parents and society. The only difficulty is that our obedience to instinct has, very often, proved to be a disaster of its own. Respecting the special feelings we get around certain people in nightclubs and train stations, parties and websites and that Romanticism so ably celebrated in art appears not to have led us to be any happier in our unions than a Medieval couple shackled into marriage by two royal courts keen to preserve the sovereignty of a slice of ancestral land. ‘Instinct’ has been little better than ‘calculation’ in underwriting the quality of our love stories.

Romanticism would not at this point, however, give up the argument quite so easily. It would simply ascribe the difficulties we often have in love to not having looked hard enough for that central fixture of Romantic reverie: the right person. This being is inevitably still out there (every soul must have its soulmate, Romanticism assures us), it is just that we haven’t managed to track them down – yet. So we must continue the search, with all the technology and tenacity necessary, and maybe, once the divorce has come through and the house has been sold, we’ll get it right. But there’s another school of thought, this one influenced by psychoanalysis, which challenges the notion that instinct invariably draws us to those who will make us happy. The theory insists that we don’t fall in love first and foremost with those who care for us in ideal ways, we fall in love with those who care for us in familiar ways. Adult love emerges from a template of how we should be loved that was created in childhood and is likely to be entwined with a range of problematic compulsions that militate in key ways against our chances of growth.

We may believe we are seeking happiness in love, but what we are really after is familiarity. We are looking to re-create, within our adult relationships, the very feelings we knew so well in childhood – and which were rarely limited to just tenderness and care. The love most of us will have tasted early on was confused with other, more destructive dynamics: feelings of wanting to help an adult who was out of control, of being deprived of a parent’s warmth or scared of his or her anger, or of not feeling secure enough to communicate our trickier wishes. How logical, then, that we should as adults find ourselves rejecting certain candidates not because they are wrong but because they are a little too right – in the sense of seeming somehow excessively balanced, mature, understanding and reliable – given that in our hearts, such rightness feels foreign and unearned. We chase after more exciting others, not in the belief that life with them will be more harmonious, but out of an unconscious sense that it will be reassuringly familiar in its patterns of frustration. Psychoanalysis calls the process whereby we identify our partners ‘object choice’ – and recommends that we try to understand the factors semi-consciously governing our attractions in order to interrupt the unhealthier patterns that might be at play. Our instincts – our strong undercurrents of attraction and revulsion – stem from complicated experiences we had when we were far too young to understand them, and which linger in the antechambers of our minds.

Psychoanalysis doesn’t wish to suggest that everything about our attractions will be deformed. We may have quite legitimate aspirations to positive qualities: intelligence, charm, generosity… But we are also liable to be fatefully drawn towards trickier tendencies: someone who is often absent, or treats us with a little disdain, or needs to be surrounded all the time by friends, or cannot master their finances. However paradoxical it can sound, without these tricky behaviours, we may simply not be able to feel passionate or tender with someone. Alternatively, we may have been so traumatised by a parental figure, we cannot approach any partner who shares qualities with them of any kind, even ones disconnected from their negative sides. We might in love be rigidly intolerant of anyone who is intelligent, or punctual or interested in science, simply because these were the traits of someone who caused us a great deal of difficulty early on.

To choose our partners wisely, we need to tease out how our compulsions to suffering or our rigid flights from trauma may be playing themselves out in our feelings of attraction. A useful starting place is to ask ourselves (perhaps in the company of a large sheet of paper, a pen and a free afternoon) what sort of people really put us off. Revulsion and disgust are useful first guides because we are likely to recognise that some of the traits that make us shiver are not objectively negative and yet feel to us distinctly off-putting. We might, for example, sense that someone who asks us too much about ourselves, or is very tender or dependable, will seem extremely eerie and frightening. And we might equally well, along the way, recognise that a degree of cruelty or distance belong to an odd list of the things we appear genuinely to need in order to love. It can be tricky to avoid self-censorship here, but the point isn’t to represent ourselves as reassuring, predictable people, but to get to know the curious quirks of our own psyches. We’ll tend to find that some ostensibly pretty nice things are getting caught in our love filters: people who are eloquent, clever, reliable, sunny can set off loud alarms. This is vital knowledge. We should pause and try to fathom where the aversions come from, what aspects of our past have made it so hard for us to accept certain sorts of emotional nourishment.

Each time we recognise a negative, we’re discovering a crucial association in our own minds: we’re alighting on an impossibility of love based on associations from the past projected onto the present. An additional way we can get at the associations which circulate powerfully in the less noticed corners of our brains is to finish stub-sentences, that invite us to respond to things that might charm or repel us about someone. We get to see our own reactions more clearly when we write things down without thinking too much about our answers, catching the mind’s unconscious at work.

For instance, we can deliberately jot the first things that come into our heads when we read the following:
• If I tell a partner how much I need them, they will…
• When someone tells me they really need me, I…
• If someone can’t cope, I…
• When someone tells me to get my act together, I …
• If I were to be frank about my anxieties …
• If my partner told me not to worry, I’d…
• When someone blames me unfairly, I …

Our honestly described reactions are legacies. They are revealing underlying assumptions we have acquired about what love can look like. We may start to get a clearer picture that our vision of what we are looking for in another person might not be an especially good guide to our personal or mutual happiness.

Examining our emotional histories, we see that we can’t be attracted to just anyone. Getting to know the past, we come to recognise our earlier associations for what they are: generalisations we formed – entirely understandably – on the basis of just one or, hugely impressive, examples. We’ve unknowingly turned some local associations into strict rules for relationships. Even if we can’t radically shift the pattern, it’s useful to know that we are carrying a ball and chain. It can make us more careful of ourselves when we feel overwhelmed by a certainty that we’ve met the one, after a few minutes chatting at the bar. Ultimately, we stand to be liberated to love different people to our initial ‘types’, because we find that the qualities we like, and the ones we very much fear, are found in different constellations from those we encountered in the people who first taught us about affection, long ago in a childhood we are starting at last to understand and free ourselves from.

Copyright The Counsellor

Su***de Warning Signs

Talking about su***de can be a scary subject. But the more people that are willing to talk with a friend or family member about suicidal thoughts, the more likely they can help someone take positive steps towards healing.

Many people assume that if you ask someone if they have suicidal thoughts, you can put the idea into their head. This is a myth, and mental health professionals encourage people to ask important questions and gather facts to help someone who is depressed or feels hopeless. When someone is contemplating su***de, their words and actions can give you clues that they are at risk of hurting themselves.

People can become suicidal when they feel overwhelmed by life’s challenges. They lack hope for the future, and they see su***de as the only solution. It’s sort of a tunnel vision where other options seem useless. Having a family history of su***de or impulsive behavior is also believed to increase the risk of suicidality.

Other risk factors can include:

History of substance abuse
Access to fi****ms
Difficult life events
Isolation from others
History of mental illness
History of physical or sexual abuse
Having a terminal or chronic illness
Past su***de attempts

The more signs you see, the higher the risk there is for su***de. Though talking about dying is an obvious sign, there are many others that can indicate risk. There are emotional, verbal, and behavioral clues you can observe.

Need to chat? WhatsApp The Counsellor for an appointment, or subscribe to our content for quick advice —> https://g.co/kgs/VCjPjVY

Emotional Markers can include:

Feeling depressed
Lack of interest in activities once enjoyed
Irritability
Anger
Anxiety
Shame or humiliation
Mood swings

Verbal Markers include talking about:

Killing themselves
Their life have no purpose
Feeling like a burden
Feeling stuck
Not wanting to exist

There are two types of suicidal statements or thoughts. An active statement might be something like, “I’m going to kill myself.” A passive statement might include, “I wish I could go to sleep and not wake up,” or, “I wouldn’t mind if I got hit by a bus.” People often ignore passive statements, but they should be taken just as seriously.

Behavioral Markers can include:

Isolating from others
Not communicating with friends or family
Giving away possessions or writing a will
Driving recklessly
Increased aggression
Increased drug and alcohol use
Searching about su***de on the Internet
Gathering materials (pills or a weapon)

Older adults are also at increased risk for su***de, and they complete su***de at a higher rate than any other age group. They also are especially at risk because they do not usually seek counseling for depression and other mental illnesses. If you see an older adult who stops taking care of their hygiene, is eating poorly, and/or starts giving away their possessions, then you should help them talk to a mental health professional as soon as possible.

Need to chat? WhatsApp The Counsellor for an appointment, or subscribe to our content for quick advice —> https://g.co/kgs/VCjPjVY

Warning Signs For Kids

Many people do not assume that children and teens can be at risk for su***de, but they can exhibit warning signs as well. If a child is talking about su***de or wanting to die, always take them seriously. An event or problem that might not seem like a big deal to an adult can be extremely stressful for a child or teenager.

Children and teens might be at risk for su***de if they:

Experience bullying
Lose someone close to them
Experience physical, emotional, or sexual abuse
Abuse of drugs or alcohol
Have a history of mental illness
Feel uncertain about their sexual orientation

What You Can Do Today?

If you see a loved one or even an acquaintance or colleague exhibiting any of these signs, you are not powerless to help them. Don’t hesitate to use specific language, such as asking, “Are you thinking about killing yourself?” If the answer is yes or maybe, ask them what they feel most comfortable doing, whether it’s calling a crisis hotline or scheduling a counseling or doctor’s appointment.

If a person is thinking of su***de, it’s also important to ask them if they have a plan. If they say yes, assist them in seeking immediate help. They can simply walk into an emergency room or urgent care clinic, or they can call their local su***de prevention line.

0800 567 567 South Africa

America 911 or 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

Australian numbers are
Lifeline: 13 11 14
Beyond Blue:1300 224 626

art - Amanda Oleander Art

This is the sign you’ve been asking for. 👇🏽

How do we choose the people we fall in love with?

The Romantic answer is that our instincts naturally guide us to individuals who are kind and good for us.

Love is a sort of ecstasy that descends when we feel ourselves in the presence of a benign and nourishing soul, who will answer our emotional needs, understand our sadness and strengthen us for the hard tasks of our lives. In order to locate our lover, we must let our instincts carry us along, taking care never to impede them through pedantic psychological analysis and introspection or else considerations of status, wealth or lineage. Our feelings will tell us clearly enough when we have reached our destiny. To ask someone with any degree of rigour why exactly they have chosen a particular partner is, in the Romantic world-view, simply an unnecessary and offensive misunderstanding of love: true love is an instinct that accurately and naturally settles on those with a capacity to make us happy.

The Romantic attitude sounds warm and kind. Its originators certainly imagined that it would bring an end to the sort of unhappy relationships previously brokered by parents and society. The only difficulty is that our obedience to instinct has, very often, proved to be a disaster of its own. Respecting the special feelings we get around certain people in nightclubs and train stations, parties and websites and that Romanticism so ably celebrated in art appears not to have led us to be any happier in our unions than a Medieval couple shackled into marriage by two royal courts keen to preserve the sovereignty of a slice of ancestral land. ‘Instinct’ has been little better than ‘calculation’ in underwriting the quality of our love stories.

Romanticism would not at this point, however, give up the argument quite so easily. It would simply ascribe the difficulties we often have in love to not having looked hard enough for that central fixture of Romantic reverie: the right person. This being is inevitably still out there (every soul must have its soulmate, Romanticism assures us), it is just that we haven’t managed to track them down – yet.

So we must continue the search, with all the technology and tenacity necessary, and maybe, once the divorce has come through and the house has been sold, we’ll get it right. But there’s another school of thought, this one influenced by psychoanalysis, which challenges the notion that instinct invariably draws us to those who will make us happy. The theory insists that we don’t fall in love first and foremost with those who care for us in ideal ways, we fall in love with those who care for us in familiar ways. Adult love emerges from a template of how we should be loved that was created in childhood and is likely to be entwined with a range of problematic compulsions that militate in key ways against our chances of growth.

We may believe we are seeking happiness in love, but what we are really after is familiarity. We are looking to re-create, within our adult relationships, the very feelings we knew so well in childhood – and which were rarely limited to just tenderness and care. The love most of us will have tasted early on was confused with other, more destructive dynamics: feelings of wanting to help an adult who was out of control, of being deprived of a parent’s warmth or scared of his or her anger, or of not feeling secure enough to communicate our trickier wishes. How logical, then, that we should as adults find ourselves rejecting certain candidates not because they are wrong but because they are a little too right – in the sense of seeming somehow excessively balanced, mature, understanding and reliable – given that in our hearts, such rightness feels foreign and unearned. We chase after more exciting others, not in the belief that life with them will be more harmonious, but out of an unconscious sense that it will be reassuringly familiar in its patterns of frustration. Psychoanalysis calls the process whereby we identify our partners ‘object choice’ – and recommends that we try to understand the factors semi-consciously governing our attractions in order to interrupt the unhealthier patterns that might be at play. Our instincts – our strong undercurrents of attraction and revulsion – stem from complicated experiences we had when we were far too young to understand them, and which linger in the antechambers of our minds.

Psychoanalysis doesn’t wish to suggest that everything about our attractions will be deformed. We may have quite legitimate aspirations to positive qualities: intelligence, charm, generosity…

But we are also liable to be fatefully drawn towards trickier tendencies: someone who is often absent, or treats us with a little disdain, or needs to be surrounded all the time by friends, or cannot master their finances. However paradoxical it can sound, without these tricky behaviours, we may simply not be able to feel passionate or tender with someone. Alternatively, we may have been so traumatised by a parental figure, we cannot approach any partner who shares qualities with them of any kind, even ones disconnected from their negative sides. We might in love be rigidly intolerant of anyone who is intelligent, or punctual or interested in science, simply because these were the traits of someone who caused us a great deal of difficulty early on.

To choose our partners wisely, we need to tease out how our compulsions to suffering or our rigid flights from trauma may be playing themselves out in our feelings of attraction. A useful starting place is to ask ourselves (perhaps in the company of a large sheet of paper, a pen and a free afternoon) what sort of people really put us off. Revulsion and disgust are useful first guides because we are likely to recognise that some of the traits that make us shiver are not objectively negative and yet feel to us distinctly off-putting. We might, for example, sense that someone who asks us too much about ourselves, or is very tender or dependable, will seem extremely eerie and frightening. And we might equally well, along the way, recognise that a degree of cruelty or distance belong to an odd list of the things we appear genuinely to need in order to love. It can be tricky to avoid self-censorship here, but the point isn’t to represent ourselves as reassuring, predictable people, but to get to know the curious quirks of our own psyches. We’ll tend to find that some ostensibly pretty nice things are getting caught in our love filters: people who are eloquent, clever, reliable, sunny can set off loud alarms. This is vital knowledge. We should pause and try to fathom where the aversions come from, what aspects of our past have made it so hard for us to accept certain sorts of emotional nourishment.

Each time we recognise a negative, we’re discovering a crucial association in our own minds: we’re alighting on an impossibility of love based on associations from the past projected onto the present. An additional way we can get at the associations which circulate powerfully in the less noticed corners of our brains is to finish stub-sentences, that invite us to respond to things that might charm or repel us about someone. We get to see our own reactions more clearly when we write things down without thinking too much about our answers, catching the mind’s unconscious at work.

For instance, we can deliberately jot the first things that come into our heads when we read the following:

If I tell a partner how much I need them, they will…

When someone tells me they really need me, I…

If someone can’t cope, I…

When someone tells me to get my act together, I …

If I were to be frank about my anxieties …

If my partner told me not to worry, I’d…

When someone blames me unfairly, I …

Our honestly described reactions are legacies. They are revealing underlying assumptions we have acquired about what love can look like. We may start to get a clearer picture that our vision of what we are looking for in another person might not be an especially good guide to our personal or mutual happiness.

Examining our emotional histories, we see that we can’t be attracted to just anyone.

Getting to know the past, we come to recognise our earlier associations for what they are: generalisations we formed, entirely understandably, on the basis of just one or, hugely impressive, examples.

We’ve unknowingly turned some local associations into strict rules for relationships. Even if we can’t radically shift the pattern, it’s useful to know that we are carrying a ball and chain. It can make us more careful of ourselves when we feel overwhelmed by a certainty that we’ve met the one, after a few minutes chatting at the bar. Ultimately, we stand to be liberated to love different people to our initial ‘types’, because we find that the qualities we like, and the ones we very much fear, are found in different constellations from those we encountered in the people who first taught us about affection, long ago in a childhood we are starting at last to understand and free ourselves from. ©️

Copyright The Counsellor

Need to talk? WhatsApp The Counsellor for an appointment, or subscribe to our content for quick advice —> https://g.co/kgs/VCjPjVY

As we celebrate , let’s address mental well-being of young people.

Mental health problems affect about 1 in 10 children and young people. They include depression, anxiety and conduct disorder, and are often a direct response to what is happening in their lives.

Alarmingly, however, 70% of children and young people who experience a mental health problem have not had appropriate interventions at a sufficiently early age.

The emotional wellbeing of children is just as important as their physical health. Good mental health allows children and young people to develop the resilience to cope with whatever life throws at them and grow into well-rounded, healthy adults.

Things that can help keep children and young people mentally well include:

being in good physical health, eating a balanced diet and getting regular exercise having time and the freedom to play, indoors and outdoors being part of a family that gets along well most of the time going to a school that looks after the wellbeing of all its pupils taking part in local activities for young people.

Other factors are also important, including:

feeling loved, trusted, understood, valued and safe
being interested in life and having opportunities to enjoy themselves
being hopeful and optimistic
being able to learn and having opportunities to succeed
accepting who they are and recognising what they are good at having a sense of belonging in their family, school and community feeling they have some control over their own life
having the strength to cope when something is wrong (resilience) and the ability to solve problems.

Most children grow up mentally healthy, but surveys suggest that more children and young people have problems with their mental health today than 30 years ago. That’s probably because of changes in the way we live now and how that affects the experience of growing up.

Dealing with change

Mostly things that happen to children don’t lead to mental health problems on their own, but traumatic events can trigger problems for children and young people who are already vulnerable.

Changes often act as triggers: moving home or school or the birth of a new brother or sister, for example. Some children who start school feel excited about making new friends and doing new activities, but there may also be some who feel anxious about entering a new environment.

Teenagers often experience emotional turmoil as their minds and bodies develop. An important part of growing up is working out and accepting who you are. Some young people find it hard to make this transition to adulthood and may experiment with alcohol, drugs or other substances that can affect mental health.

Risk factors

There are certain risk factors that make some children and young people more likely to experience problems than other children, but they don’t necessarily mean difficulties are bound to come up or are even probable.

Some of these factors include:

having a long-term physical illness
having a parent who has had mental health problems, problems with alcohol or has been in trouble with the law
experiencing the death of someone close to them having parents who separate or divorce having been severely bullied or physically or sexually abused
living in poverty or being homeless
experiencing discrimination, perhaps because of their race, sexuality or religion
acting as a carer for a relative, taking on adult responsibilities having long-standing educational difficulties.

What mental health problems commonly occur in children?

These are some of the mental health problems that can affect children and young people.

Depression affects more children and young people today than in the last few decades, but it is still more common in adults. Teenagers are more likely to experience depression than young children.

Self-harm is a very common problem among young people. Some people find it helps them manage intense emotional pain if they harm themselves, through cutting or burning, for example. They may not wish to take their own life.

Generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) can cause young people to become extremely worried. Very young children or children starting or moving school may have separation anxiety.

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can follow physical or sexual abuse, witnessing something extremely frightening of traumatising, being the victim of violence or severe bullying or surviving a disaster.

Children who are consistently overactive ('hyperactive'), behave impulsively and have difficulty paying attention may have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Many more boys than girls are affected, but the cause of ADHD aren't fully understood.

Eating disorders usually start in the teenage years and are more common in girls than boys. The number of young people who develop an eating disorder is small, but eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa can have serious consequences for their physical health and development.

Need to talk? WhatsApp The Counsellor for an appointment, or subscribe to our content for quick advice —> https://g.co/kgs/VCjPjVY

What help is available?

Parental help

If they have a warm, open relationship with their parents, children will usually feel able to tell them if they are troubled. One of the most important ways parents can help is to listen to them and take their feelings seriously. They may want a hug, they may want you to help them change something or they may want practical help.

Children and young people’s negative feelings usually pass. However, it’s a good idea to get help if your child is distressed for a long time, if their negative feelings are stopping them from getting on with their lives, if their distress is disrupting family life or if they are repeatedly behaving in ways you would not expect at their age.

Professional help

If your child is having problems at school, a teacher, school nurse, school counsellor or educational psychologist may be able to help. Otherwise, go to your GP or speak to a health visitor.

These professionals are able to refer a child to further help. Different professionals often work together in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS).

Most support for troubled children and young people is provided free by the NHS, your child’s school or your local council’s social services department.

Talking it through

Assessments and treatments for children and young people with mental health problems put a lot of emphasis on talking and on understanding the problem in order to work out the best way to tackle it. For young children, this may be done through play.

Most of the time, the action that professionals recommend is not complex. and it often involves the rest of the family. Your child may be referred to a specialist who is trained to help them explore their feelings and behaviour. This kind of treatment is called a talking therapy, psychological therapy or counselling.

Medication

Most research into medications for mental health problems has focused on adults, rather than children. Children and young people need to be assessed by a specialist before they are prescribed any drugs. There is a lot of evidence that talking therapies can be effective for children and young people, but drugs may be also help in some cases.

Confidentiality

The professionals supporting your child will keep information about them and your family confidential. Young people can seek help on their own, either by ringing a helpline or by approaching a professional directly, but your consent is usually needed for them to get medical care if they are under 16.

Young people have a right to privacy if they do not want to talk to you about their conversations with professionals, but you should still respond sensitively if they seem to be upset.

☎️ Need to chat? WhatsApp The Counsellor for an appointment, or subscribe to our content for quick advice —> https://g.co/kgs/VCjPjVY