By Rhiannon Ueberholz (B.A) September 30th, 2021, marks the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation (NDTR), a day to reflect on Canada’s colonial past and the legacy of residential schools. Established as a statutory holiday in July of this year, this day serves to hold Canadian’s accountable for upholding the process of reparation for […]
Tips to Help Cope With Returning Back to In-Person Class
By: Andre De Bartolo As we come to the end of the first full week of school across Ontario, we see the challenge students and teachers face with coming back to in-person classes. In addition to concerns surrounding the pandemic, students are fearful of their mental health since the past year has caused extreme burnout […]
Building a Food Neutral Mentality
By Alissa Vieth, RD As humans we must eat and consume a variety of foods to help us live and thrive. Yet in our food culture you may have been conditioned to label the foods you eat as: good or bad, right or wrong, healthy or unhealthy, low or high calorie, clean or dirty, etc. […]
Continuing the Discussion about Mental Health
By Alyson Dudley, MSW, RSW The Tokyo Olympics prompted many worldwide discussions, most notably about Covid-19 and whether the Olympics should be happening at all due to health and safety concerns. Unexpectedly, another topic came up during the Olympics: mental health. I must admit I didn’t watch as much of the competition as I wanted, […]
Befriending Ourselves: Observing and Identifying Self-Relational Needs
By Agustina Jorquera, M.Ed. RP Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (2014) teaches us that in any interpersonal interaction (i.e., family relationships, friendships, romantic relationships, work-relationships, etc.), three aspects must be balanced. These three aspects are: Clarifying a need we have while… Maintaining the type of relationship that we are hoping to keep without… Jeopardizing our self-respect Let’s […]
Defusing Harmful Thoughts
By Sharon Chan, MA We often focus on noticing and changing unhelpful/dysfunctional thought patterns in therapy, sometimes known as cognitive restructuring. In Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) we may use strategies such as putting on one’s detective hat to check the facts and search for evidence to the contrary, or to think in terms of realistic […]
Digging into DBT
By Therese Kenny, MA For the first time ever, I am growing a garden (with help from my partner who knows much more about gardening and does not forget to water plants). In the process, I have noticed myself softening and opening up to different experiences. I have gained patience while waiting for the tomatoes […]
Sparking Joy: Marie Kondo on Accessing Wise Mind
By Marlyse Bergstra, MSW RSW “Does this spark joy?” This simple question is Marie Kondo’s widely-recognized contribution to the world of tidying, self-improvement, and to some extent, minimalism. You might be wondering how someone could build a multi-million dollar tidying empire based on such a fluffy rule. If so, go and try it. Start with […]
Overcoming that “Languishing” Feeling
By Brittany Almeida, B.A. We are halfway through 2021, over a year into the pandemic and countless restrictions. Have you been feeling like there is nothing to look forward to? Do you have little motivation to do the things that get you through the day? Feeling aimless? You’re not unhappy, but not jumping for joy […]
The Rhythm of Life
By Jenny Gomez, MA As the world begins to open up, I have reflected on some of the highest and lowest moments of the past year and a half. There have been moments when sadness and fear were so strong it felt as though things might never be ok again, and then, there were moments […]
3 Mindfulness Practices for The Summer
By: Andrea De Bartolo, HBSc The school year is almost ending and I think it is safe to say that students, teachers, and parents are more than happy to put these past 9 months behind us. With changes in administration policies and personal health safety, elementary and high school students have endured chaotic semesters in […]
Attachment Styles: How to Form Secure Connections
By Imogen Sloss We learn so much during our early years on this planet. We begin as helpless newborns and quickly develop cognitively, physically and socially. We develop the building blocks for our lives as we interact with the world around us through eating, sleeping, observing, interacting, and playing. During this stage, we also create […]
Appreciation and Coping during Transition Periods
By Rhiannon Ueberholz, B.A. Transitions are the awkward in-between periods that come with closing one life chapter and beginning another. These can be exciting times, for example, graduations, marriages, or moving into a new home all involve change and subsequent adjustment. However, once the excitement is over, they force us to face the anxiety-inducing question […]
International No Diet Day
By Therese Kenny, MSc, PhD Student Every year on May 6th, organizations around the world work to dismantle diet culture. International No Diet Day is an initiative that aims to increase awareness about the misconceptions of dieting, push back against the diet industry which robs us of hundreds of millions of dollars every year, and […]
TV Therapists: Fiction vs Reality
By Marlyse Bergstra, MSW RSW I’m guessing most people cringe when they see their job portrayed on TV. Nurses and servers especially come to mind as two professions that seem incredibly fun and simple until you actually set foot in a hospital or sit in a crowded restaurant! When I watch therapist characters, I typically […]
“Getting Up and Doing Things” When You Don’t Feel Like It
By Dr. Aranda Wingsiong, PhD, C.Psych There is this misconception that we need to be motivated before we can engage in an activity. But actually, increasing our level of activity even when you do not feel like itis an evidence-based approach for treating depression. This is called Behaviour Activation; and it helps to break the cycle […]
‘Bodied’ – How the Nervous System Responds to Cues of Stress & Ways to Attend to it
By Adanna Anucha, MSW RSW “There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.” – Friedrich Nietzsche When Socrates exclaimed his now famous words, “know thyself”, I’ll venture a guess that he probably was not referring to knowing the body’s autonomic nervous system! Nonetheless, the invitation to “know thyself” (typically used in association for […]
Working, Learning, Sleeping From Home
By Amanda Ferguson, MA, Ph.D. Candidate Much has changed in the last year. Many of us have started spending more time at home – working from home, learning from home, and socializing (virtually) from home. You’ve likely always slept at home, but take a moment to reflect – has your sleep routine changed alongside these […]
The Art of ‘Mindfully’ Relating
By Agustina Jorquera, M.Ed., Registered Psychotherapist When I was first introduced to mindfulness, I held onto a lot of judgment. I had mistakenly held on to the idea that to be mindful, was to be QUIET in the mind, to have my mind go BLANK and to be able to achieve an internal state of […]
Parenting is Hard. Pandemic Parenting is Harder.
Parenting stress: What is it and six tips to manage its impact By Tamara Meixner, MA, Ph.D. Candidate One year has passed since the World Health Organization classified COVID-19 as a global pandemic. With this, families began distancing from everything familiar, and the ensuing effects on parents have been – to put it mildly – […]