Anxiety and Stress

In today’s busy world many people are finding themselves overscheduled and stressed out. Not all stress is bad. It can be invigorating, pushing us to achieve our goals. Even happy events can create stress such as a new job, a new marriage, a new baby, children going off to college, or retiring. These situations create change and require that we adapt or adjust which can temporarily create stress or feelings of anxiety.

Stress to some degree keeps life interesting. It is when it becomes unmanageable, when we feel overwhelmed versus challenged that it can become detrimental to our health. Chronic stress can have an impact on our physical, psychological and behavioral health, which in turn can affect the quality of our lives.

Anxiety differs from stress in that often people can’t pinpoint what they are anxious about. It can be experienced as a vague, unrecognized sense of danger or dread. People experience anxiety in many different ways. A person may feel keyed up, like they just can’t relax, and may have difficulty sleeping. Excessive worrying or feeling out of control emotionally are common symptoms of anxiety. Avoiding social situations or public settings may develop in an attempt to avoid feeling anxious.

Therapy helps by addressing the thought processes that are often fueling the anxiety / stress symptoms. Learning how to control one’s anxious or fearful self-talk as it occurs and changing it to more supportive / calming self-talk is an important skill learned in therapy. Therapy helps an individual recognize and alter any unreasonable beliefs that one may have about oneself or others that contribute to feelings of anxiety / stress. Therapy teaches an individual how to manage / eliminate the physical symptoms of anxiety through relaxation training techniques and other coping strategies.

Areas of specialization:

• Stress Management
• Panic Attacks
• Excessive Worry / Anxiety
• Social Discomfort

04.02.2007. 15:08

Eating Disorders

If you have an eating disorder, you are not alone. Eating disorders are common. They occur in children, teens, and adults, both males and females. It is important to seek treatment as eating disorders can have serious physical and emotional implications. Successful treatment addresses the physical, emotional, relational, behavioral, and cognitive (thought process) aspects of an eating disorder.

Eating and one’s relationship with food can become disordered for many reasons. Whether one is eating too little or too much, food may become a way of avoiding one’s feelings, problems in relationships, or reflect self-esteem issues. Eating disorders may be accompanied by excessive fear of gaining weight, strict food rules (good / bad foods), weighing oneself frequently, compulsive overeating, or excessive exercising. Therapy is beneficial because it helps an individual to gain insight into what may have caused their eating disorder, as well as creating an opportunity to gain greater selfawareness, healthier coping strategies, assertion skills, healthier body image, and exploring how relationships can be more supportive and rewarding.

Families with children or teenagers with an eating disorder benefit from family therapy which addresses relationship stress within the family. Family sessions encourage all family members to make productive changes in the way they relate so that all members benefit. Sessions focus on increasing communication skills between family members a developing strategies for successful conflict resolution.

Areas of specialization:

• Anorexia
• Bulimia
• Binge Eating

04.02.2007. 15:07

Weight Issues

Do you eat when you are not hungry?

Distract yourself with food in order not to have to deal with your feelings or uncomfortable thoughts?

Do you eat a large amount of food in a short period of time?

Do you eat in secret?

If you answered yes to one of more of these questions, you may be an emotional eater. Many people find themselves struggling with the effects of emotional eating. A person may struggle for years with attempts to lose weight only to gain it back again. They know that they use food to meet some emotional need, but have difficulty breaking out of the cycle. It is common to feel distressed about one’s weight and then eat to manage the distress which then leads to more distress about one’s weight. This can lead to feelings of guilt / shame or decreased self-esteem and self-confidence. It can be difficult to believe that you can break out of this cycle.

Research has shown that diets don’t work. Most people gain the weight back within a short period of time after finishing a diet. One reason is due to the sense of deprivation that most dieters feel while on a diet, and another is failure to address the emotional issues that led to the weight gain. Therapy helps an individual understand how their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are contributing to their weight problems. It teaches individuals how to gain a greater sense of control over their emotions and their eating behavior which leads to healthy weight management.

Therapy focuses on improving attitudes about weight / shape / body image, changing behaviors related to eating, and recognizing how feelings such as boredom, anxiety, depression, anger, self-doubt, and loneliness are often managed with food. Therapy can be very empowering in that an individual can learn how to recognize and manage their emotional needs, and not numb themselves to their feelings or avoid them by eating.

Therapy not only provides an opportunity to gain greater self-awareness regarding one’s relationship to food, but also a greater understanding of how one’s social relationships may be helping or hindering healthy weight maintenance.

Areas of specialization:

• Weight Management
• Obesity
• Gastric Bypass Counseling (pre / post surgery)

04.02.2007. 15:06