 By: Dr. Erica WollermanAround this time of year, the idea of being thankful and grateful seem to be pretty popular. While I am definitely a believer in practicing gratitude and even developing family practices around gratitude, I think there is an area we can all practice gratitude in that is often missed. This is with our children. Like I said, I do think that practicing gratitude with our children is incredibly helpful for them and for us. But what I want to talk about today in this blog is practicing gratitude FOR our children. Often, I find that by the time parents have reached out to me for support either for themselves in parenting or for their child(ren) or teen(s), they have become quite overwhelmed, frustrated, and sometimes even kind of fed up with their kids. Similar to couples therapy, where often couples call when it is seeming to be “too late” for their marriage, parents call when they feel there is nowhere else to turn for their child or teen to get help. Then, they call us with a HUGE list of things that they would like their child/teen to work on. They need to eat better, show better behavior, clean up after themselves, do their homework, be respectful, work on their social relationships, work on their family relationships, play video games less, play outside more – and the lists go on and on sometimes. While I think this is a totally relatable and understandable situation to find yourself in, I think that we do not necessarily talk about how to shift the dynamic that can happen in a family when it seems that parents are focused more on what their child/teen needs to work on and less on who they are and how great they are already. Practicing gratitude for our children and who they are in an active way each day can certainly help shift that attitude and somewhat negative dynamic. I would encourage any parent who is feeling frustrated with their child or teen to consider trying this out. Take aside 10 minutes a day to make a list of 10 different things they are grateful for about their child. Perhaps try this out for 21 days (as that is the number of days research shows to be habit forming) and see if it shifts your perspective and even your relationship with your child. It would be even better if you keep going after the 21 days and if you share your list with your child/teen! What I find is that often, a child who is struggling KNOWS they are struggling and difficult to be around even if they won’t admit it to their families. The more parents focus on the challenges a child is having, the more the child feels like the “problem” child. Expressing and showing gratitude for the things they do well but also who they are as a person helps to teach them that they have worth outside of their accomplishments and that they are more than their areas of difficulty. This is valuable beyond measure in our world so focused on what we do and accomplish! We at Thrive wish you and your families a very happy holiday season! Our blogs will be posted less frequently this time of year but we will do our best to keep them coming as much as we can! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.
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 By: Dr. Erica Wollerman In my work with parents and their children and teens, I offer families a lot of advice and tips. The most important one though is pretty simple (at least in my eyes). Learn who your child is and embrace them for that. Okay, I should really elaborate more! I think it is so important for parents to know that they are going to go into the parenting experience with certain ideals and ideas of who they will be as parents and who their child/children will be as people. For example, if they were strong students, they might assume that their child will be too. Or, if they were very athletic and interested in sports, they might assume that this will be something they will be able to share with their child/children. As a therapist, I can’t tell you how often I hear children and teens feeling misunderstood by their parents. Sadly, it is really often. And children and teens do not assume that this is because the parent has not processed their unconscious expectations… They assume it is because they are a failure, or not good enough, or stupid, or a disappointment, or that they really should do better but just can’t. Children and most teens just blame themselves and end up feeling inadequate when they know they are letting their parents down. Rarely do they understand that their parent is just struggling to release their own thoughts about parenting and who their child would/should/could be. I believe that it is not only important to acknowledge whatever your thoughts, hopes, dreams might be about who your child is, but to also really try to get in touch with who your child actually is.Learn their strengths and try to foster them but also, learn about their challenges and love them through it. The more you can help your children accept themselves and treat themselves with love and kindness, the better adjusted emotionally they will be for whatever comes next in their lives. Of particular concern in this topic area are the kids who struggle in school. Maybe they struggle with a learning disorder or inattention. Or maybe they struggle with motivation around academics or just desire other things in their future than college. This group of kids struggles significantly with self-acceptance, shame, and feelings of failure. I can only encourage their parents to embrace them and encourage them but also to let them know that they are more than their grades or academic performance. Every person has something to offer our world and not all of those offerings fit neatly in an academic box or pursuit. As parents, it is our job to break through the pressure to perform academically and help kids find their innate strengths, interests, and future. At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanAs many of you may know, around this time of year I like to set a word as an intention for the coming year. It is a practice that I have been following for about 5 years and have come to really enjoy and look forward to. I personally find it much more helpful than setting New Year’s Resolutions as I try to find a word that represents things that I would like to cultivate in my life. The most interesting part of the past five years in following this practice has been that, even on years where I didn’t think again about the word that I chose, I definitely grew in that area during that year. Not to get too “woo woo” about this, but I definitely think that there is something to the idea of setting an intention as long as you are listening to yourself and what you need when doing so. Plus, my intention is never something super concrete or demanding like buying a house or having a baby. I always choose something that is really in my control and is more about how I approach situations and the world. So, I wanted to share about the word I am choosing for the coming year as well as write a post encouraging those of you who follow our blog to also consider choosing a word. From what many of my clients tell me, this is a practice they really enjoy as well. So hopefully you will too! Anyways, my word this year is going to be “Enough.” I wanted to have a guidepost to help remind me that not only am I enough (as a mother, a boss, a friend, a wife, person, therapist, etc.) but my life is enough. My teeny tiny rental house is enough. My three person family is enough. My life is not just enough, but it is really overflowing with joy and love and I wanted to remember that. Another way that I plan to use this word is to help rein in my ambitions a bit. I am someone that is always thinking of the next thing… the next trip, adventure, business opportunity or goal. This sometimes leads me to struggle to feel that enough is enough. I worry if I am doing enough for my clients, my employees, my business, my family, myself, and the list goes on and on. So, I am going to work towards saying no just a little bit more and minimizing the demands I place on myself. Honestly, this year feels more exciting than ever. Only after having my previous years of balance, strength, faith, gratitude, and abundance can I now have my year of “enough.” So, I encourage anyone reading this to give some thought to developing your own tradition each year of choosing a phrase, word, or some sort of guiding intention for your coming year. If you would like to read past blogs about this topic as well – please check them out here and here! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n  By: Lauren Spinelli, LCSWIt’s important to remember that every day can be meaningful. It’s truly a new chance to reflect, grow, and make small changes as we navigate through life. Over the years, I have jotted down little reminders, affirmations, quotes, and expressions that I've heard, read, or made up. They seem to really help me when I'm looking for more strength. I wanted to share them with you in the hopes that they will help you, too.
Lauren is welcoming new referrals and enjoys working with children, teens, and adults of all ages! For more information about her approach to therapy, check out her bio here! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanWith Thanksgiving coming up next week, I thought it might be interesting to reflect in a blog about all the buzz around gratitude. I find that practicing gratitude is both personally and professionally very important, but also “all the rage” these days. It’s hard to find a self-care article that does not include practicing gratitude or to find a person that does not think they “should” practice gratitude. So, what’s the deal with gratitude? Why is it so important? Here are some of my thoughts on the topic…
One of the ways I think about practicing gratitude is as another way to bring awareness to the great things, while also holding space for the unpleasant things in life. A good metaphor for this is thinking about your life like a slightly cloudy sky. If you only focus on the clouds and rain, that is all you see but you miss the sunny parts and interesting cloud shapes! Gratitude can be the attention you give to the whole sky, instead of just the unpleasant patches of clouds and rain. So, I encourage you to try out a gratitude practice this holiday season. Particularly if you are feeling stressed and tired by all the holiday events and activities! It’s honestly pretty simple… All you need to do is pick a time of day to focus on thinking of 3-5 things you are grateful for that day. You could write them in a formal gratitude journal or just reflect on those things, either way works and will help shift your perspective! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. By: Dr. Erica Wollerman As a new-ish mom and owner of a small business, I am far busier than I ever really have been in my life. Seriously, I’m even busier now than in grad school, completing a dissertation, and working three jobs in undergrad. The challenge for me now though is that my busy life is filled with a lot of things that I feel I have to do so that I can be the best me I can be in all the areas of my life. I really want to bring my best version of myself to my work for my clients and Thrive team members as well as to my family and friends! I especially want to be my best self for my little man Luca. I was chatting with another new-ish mom friend of mine recently and we were talking about our to-do lists. We had a lot of complaints you would expect – they are so long and never feel done. The interesting part is that on our to do lists are things like, well, I need to read a chapter in my book at night so that I can sleep well, or, I need to go for a walk and stretch so that my back does not hurt. The conclusion that we drew was that even self-care feels like another item on our to-do list! For women who are already overwhelmed, this is even more overwhelming and makes the activities we are “supposed” to enjoy, feel like tasks to check off rather than “self-care.” I started thinking about the idea of self-care and how it has become such a buzz word in our culture, especially therapist culture. While I think self-care is obviously important, I also think there might be a better way than the way I am doing it. Which is essentially, a mad, moderately perfectionistic dash towards wellness. Here’s a snapshot of my brain: Luca goes to bed at 7pm so I am going to rush home as soon as possible from work to spend time with him until 7, do all the household things that need to get done in that time while I spend quality time with him so that at 7, I can maximize my time and either go for a walk or do some work leftover from the day, or spend time with my husband, or do my nails, or watch a show, or take a bath, etc. Even better if I can do multiple things at once, right? Some of my mentality and tendency towards a frenzy of productivity comes from having an appreciation for time that only comes after not having any while you have a newborn. Some of this comes from having a deep appreciation for what ingredients I know help me be a better functioning person. I tend to do really well when things in my life are balanced and I have some time alone reading, some time to exercise, some time with work, and some time with my family each day. Oh and I like a clean house with things seeming somewhat orderly. While I have been mulling this over, I have realized that the crucial ingredient to my self-care is for it to feel like a choice and to be something I take the time to enjoy. While maybe I still rush home to see Luca, spend time with him while also cleaning up the house and dinner, so that I have time to do more things that fuel me in the evening… the key is to be more mindful of the choices I am making and present focused during all of the tasks. The key is to truly appreciate whatever I am doing at any given moment and to find it something to enjoy, rather than to just check off a list. Sometimes it helps me to remember to tell myself, I “get” to do this, rather than I “have” to do this. Small changes in our self-talk really can influence the way we feel about our lives! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanSo, as you probably noticed in my first blog in this series, I have a lot of concerns with positive thinking and its’ attempts to tell us not to feel our unpleasant emotions or think our unpleasant thoughts. However, there are parts of “positive thinking” that I think are truly helpful and worth mentioning here and are traits of someone with resilience and more of a positive mindset. Check out the first two blogs in this series here and here!
1. Focusing more on gratitude In my eyes, focusing on gratitude and intentionally seeking ways to show or experience gratitude is so important. We can often become habitual problem finders who just focus on problems or challenges, rather than all we do have to feel grateful for. In contrast to positive thinking though, I mention gratitude more as a daily practice or habit and not a response to feeling something unpleasant. Generally trying to cultivate a mindset of gratitude looks like noticing things you are grateful for at the end of a day or week – NOT trying to focus on gratitude in moments where you are really upset or struggling. That would be just like the whole, “think positive” suggestion and likely only make you feel worse. 2. Confidence that you can manage difficult situations, experiences, struggles I believe that having a positive mindset about your life could include the confidence that you are going to be okay. That yes, life has its’ struggles, but they really do make us stronger and lead us in new and different directions which can be exciting and scary. In order to have this perspective, you have to not only remember struggles you have had, but remember that you got through them and that there were lessons learned along the way. This part of having a positive mindset involves allowing yourself to remember and process your challenges, not to feel worse about them, but to see what you have endured and how resilient you are. Yes, difficult things are going to happen. But yes, you can get through it. 3. Cultivating memories of pleasant moments, experiences, even during times of struggle This is so incredibly difficult, but so important. We need to remember that all emotions are temporary, the pleasant and the unpleasant. As such, even when we are in deep pain and struggle, we need to have the deeper knowledge that we will not always feel this way. For example, when you are grieving a loss, perhaps of a relationship, pet, loved one, life path, etc. it is important to know that grief marks the importance of that relationship in your life. That when we love, because everything is temporary, we will know loss and need to feel that loss because our feelings and grief honors the relationship or experience. Hopefully this blog rounds out our series on Positive Thinking! While I am not a positive thinking proponent, there are definitely some assets of learning to cultivate a positive mindset and work on becoming a realistic thinker. At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica Wollerman So many things are nudging me towards contemplating gratitude right now that I just felt pulled to put some of my thoughts together in a blog post. Hopefully it is interesting and helpful to some of you who read our blog!
Thanksgiving is a time that I usually try to focus on gratitude in general. This year, the timing is interesting for me as I have a 3 month old at home and just returned to work two weeks ago… But I’ll talk more about that later! Thinking back on my year, I remember finding out I was pregnant a few weeks after Thanksgiving last year when I had already set in motion so many big, exciting, and pretty scary things professionally. A new office… Not just new, but also bigger! Expanding to a corporation and hiring more team members! Eek! I remember the overwhelm of just considering what this next year would be like balancing pregnancy, motherhood, and these new obligations. So much to adjust to and so much to feel overwhelmed by. In January, I always take time to consider a word to focus my energy towards in the coming year. It is a guidepost of sorts, something to try to create more of usually. I remember sorting through thoughts about the year and coming up with words like, overwhelm, stress, chaos, too much and intentionally choosing to focus on the abundance side of my feelings of overwhelm. So I found my word to be gratitude this year. As I have mentioned in previous blogs, this has been a tough word for me. Often I have found myself swept up in the to do lists and feelings of stress and exhaustion and needed to remind myself to focus on the gratitude I feel for so many wonderful things happening in my life. Currently, people have asked how I am adjusting to motherhood and even more, working motherhood. And I answer honestly with, “I’m just running. All the time. Everywhere. There’s never enough time or enough of me to go around!” Or some variation of sleep deprived sentences that are communicating that (maybe, hopefully in some way that makes sense!). Today, as I work from home during naps and savor one of my last weekdays home with my little man… I have chosen to put the “running” feeling aside and just lean into my gratitude and savor, really just enjoy, the moments of snuggles, kisses, giggles, and of course cries, whines, and tears that are inevitable at 12 weeks apparently. The thought that keeps coming back to me is that everything is temporary. The lack of sleep – yup, it’s temporary. Hopefully some of the crying is temporary too. But the snuggles, baby smell, little hands and feet, and oh the sweet smiles and newness of it all. That’s temporary too… so through my sleep deprived and overwhelmed days… I am going to choose to enjoy this time and be grateful for all the things I am blessed to have. Interestingly, this experience of gratitude applies not just to my family but also to having a whole different side of me that is fulfilled through my work and the fact that people come and share their deepest moments, feelings, fears, and pain with me. Because the truth is, I love what I do and I missed it. The baby snuggles have been amazing but I have acknowledged and accepted that I need both. Both the mother part of me that is still developing and the therapist part of me that I have nurtured for years. I need both and because of that, I most likely will never stop running. But at least for now, I am running gratefully. Most of the time ;) So, as the holidays approach, I urge all of you to consider how can you focus on abundance and gratitude rather than the hustle and bustle, which is really just a nice phrase for stress. Here are some tips I came up with:
I hope this helps some of you enjoy the season a bit more! Please let me know any thoughts you may want to share or things you may be grateful for in the comments. We would love to hear from you. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about parent counseling or therapy for yourself, your child, or teen, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. By: Dr. Erica Wollerman As those of you who read the Thrive blog may know, I am a big advocate for setting an intention for the year rather than a resolution. If you are interested in reading my blog on the topic, please check it out here!
As the year has been just flying by, I thought it might be nice to check in on that intention and see how we are all doing. My word for the year is “gratitude.” I picked this word very carefully as I had realized at the beginning of the year just how much I have on my plate this year. Not only have we expanded our practice location, but we have also hired on two amazing and wonderful new therapists. In addition to that, as many of you know, I am also pregnant with our first child. So, when I thought about words for the year, things like “chaos,” “busy,” “overwhelmed” came to mind. Though I might feel all of those things pretty routinely, I chose to focus on gratitude even during the chaos this year. Doesn’t that sound so nice? Of course it did in theory, which is what brought me to the blog topic for today, which is a check-in about our words of the year. I really feel that the beginning of the year was not a time you would hear much gratitude from me but in the past month or so, I am really working on cultivating it. The most interesting thing that has happened since I am rededicating myself to finding gratitude even in the chaos, is that I am seeing it all around me so much more. Just the other day, I was coming into our lovely new office location and was overwhelmed with this feeling of gratitude for everything that is happening. For my growing family both at work and at home and just felt this sense of peace. It was a really great moment. And in the interest of creating more moments like that, I am focusing on those moments more than the headaches, heartburn, and other fun pregnancy symptoms! So, I created a little list of questions that I thought might help guide some of you in stepping back and reflecting on how we are doing with our words of the year, partway through the year. I hope this is as beneficial to you as it has been for me!
Thank you all for reading! I hope that you find this blog and brief check in helpful in cultivating the life you want, rather than just reacting to what life sends your way! If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about your child or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us either via email at ewollerman.psyd@gmail.com or phone at 858-342-1304. If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child, teen therapy and adult psychotherapy services by Psychotherapist San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanAs I contemplated what to blog about this week, I was thinking about how two years ago, I had also recently moved my office and was focusing on growing a very new private practice. I was reflecting on my blog post from that time frame, called, Top Quotes for Times of Transition, Change, and Struggle. Interestingly enough, much of what I talked about during that period also applies today! As many of you know, in the past two years what was originally just “my” practice has grown to now have three employees with the soon to be addition of two to three more! We relocated at the beginning of this year to a new, much more spacious and professional building, re-branded as Thrive Therapy Studio, and have been focused on expanding our services. It has certainly been an amazing, inspiring whirlwind. With any new beginning, even ones that we recognize as necessary and positive in our lives, all kinds of emotions are stirred up. For me, taking the leap of faith to grow and expand the business has been a challenge and stirs up a lot of my fears and vulnerabilities. Personally, I am also taking a big leap forward in that we are expecting a new addition (our first child!) to our family in August. So, it seemed like just the right time to revisit the top quotes for times of transition, change, and struggle! The below list does not include the quotes that I listed two years ago. If you would like to see those as well, please go ahead and click here for the original blog post! Here are my latest Top Quotes for Times of Transition, Change, and Struggle:
Thanks for reading as always! If you want to add to my list of quotes, please feel free to share in the comments! If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about your child or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us either via email at ewollerman.psyd@gmail.com or phone at 858-342-1304. If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child, teen therapy and adult psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. |
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