North Shore Mental Health Blog
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Therapy is often described as a place to talk about your feelings. That description is not wrong, but it is incomplete. Talking matters. Putting an experience into words can reduce isolation, clarify emotions, and help you feel understood. However, effective therapy involves more than describing what happened during your week while someone listens. Therapy can…
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Starting therapy can feel strangely personal and completely unfamiliar at the same time. You may know that you want support but have no idea what you are supposed to say once you sit down with a therapist. You might wonder whether you will be expected to discuss your childhood immediately, answer deeply personal questions, or…
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People often imagine that there will be one clear moment when they know it is time to start therapy. They may expect a crisis, a diagnosis, or an experience that feels serious enough to justify reaching out. Sometimes that moment does happen. More often, the decision is quieter. You may notice that you have not…
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Starting therapy can feel like a big step, especially if it’s your first time or if you’ve had past experiences that didn’t feel like the right fit. It’s completely normal to feel nervous, uncertain, or unsure of what to expect. At North Shore Mental Health Services, we want your first appointment to feel as comfortable…
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I recently listened to Oprah’s Super Soul Conversation podcast with Gretchen Rubin, author of the best-selling book “The Happiness Project.” In the talk she highlights the eight guidelines she has come up with to increase happiness in her own life and she shares tons of great insights and reminders of practices we could all adopt…
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Here’s today’s featured article: Boundaries For Empaths at the Huffington Post Oftentimes when I bring up “boundaries” for the first time with someone they noticeably flinch. Many people tend to hold a negative view of the word and may think that boundaries keep our loved ones at arms length or could lead to rejection. I…
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As a practicum student a wise supervisor of mine shared the following story with me, a story that she regularly shared with her own clients to illustrate the internal battles we all struggle with. Not only does it normalize the internal battle we all struggle with but it also gives us the empowerment to choose…
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I’ve always loved the idea of looking for the function of our emotions, a common skill taught in Dialectal Behavioral Therapy (DBT). If we can better understand our emotions and their motivators the more insight and management we can exercise within ourselves. I came across an article which declares that some researchers now believe depression serves a higher…
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“How to Land Your Kid in Therapy” published by The Atlantic My clients (and their parents) often get stuck on the question of “Why.” For example, “Why am I so depressed?” or “Why can’t I just be happy?” And the unsatisfactory answer is that we don’t always find the key to why someone has the…
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I believe that the therapy process requires us to be open and vulnerable with our therapist, but I know for most of us this doesn’t come naturally and can be intimidating, maybe even to the point of backing out of the process or perhaps not starting at all. To get the most out of your…