Blog
Parenting: How to Let Go – Even When It’s Hard
As parents, you want your child to be healthy, joyful, safe, and successful. What that means to you and how you strive to support your child in these ways can have the opposite effect. It can be challenging! Sometimes when a parent attempts to direct these outcomes for their son or daughter, it’s because of…
Read MoreSelf-Care Isn’t Selfish
Self-care after 2020 has taken on new meaning and importance. Many practices before the pandemic still apply, a few others, not as much. Strict time-keeping to a workout or meditation at 5 am may not make as much sense for those of us who continue to work/school from home or do some hybrid of both.…
Read MoreProcessing Parental Grief: When the Concept of a ‘Normal’ Family is Shattered
As parents, you may have held a standard of what you want or hoped for your family. You had a pretty clear idea of how you’d like your family to grow together. Having a child or children with mental health challenges can turn your expectations on its head. There is nothing shameful about the grief…
Read MoreHow Parents Can Help Destigmatize Their Teen’s Mental Illness
Most parents of teens grew up during a time where mental illness was something to keep quiet or was considered shameful. You didn’t feel cool telling your friends about your anxiety attack or being depressed. Your parent’s generation was more likely to ask you to keep such details quiet, or they minimally acknowledged it. The…
Read MoreACE Test Aids in Depression, Suicide Awareness in Troubled Youth
Depression and suicide in the United States among troubled youth have been on the rise prior to 2020. Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) are proving to be key factors that influence these events in teens and adolescence. ACE Test Factors – A Breakdown ACE (Adverse Childhood Experiences) are those that occurred before a child’s eighteen birthday.…
Read MoreNature Immersion – The Ways and Whys It is Important to Integrate It Into Daily Life
For decades, studies spoke about the importance of our exposure to nature and the benefits. However, it seems like it took a global pandemic to magnify nature as an important essential that the general public treated mostly as a leisurely pursuit, was content to view from an office window, or considered a ‘nice to have’…
Read MoreNature is Medicine — Even for Indoors-y Types. Let Us Count the Ways.
Research has shown that nature is indeed a form of medicine and contributes to what Deschutes Wilderness Therapy is today. However, for those who are less inclined to seek nature — even during a pandemic, getting those benefits may seem out of reach. These people may have bad memories of camping/hiking expeditions gone sideways and ongoing challenges…
Read MoreWhat is Anxiety Disorder and What It’s Not. Know When Your Teen Needs Treatment.
Identifying anxiety in your troubled teen may not be a straightforward assessment.
Read MoreCanine Therapy Is Helping Youth Overcome Pandemic Events
Prior to the introduction of therapy dogs, kids weren’t sharing their emotions. Now, with canines they are talking about their feelings.
Read MoreIn Their Words
The most frustrating thing is getting people to understand where you are at. Physical disease is much easier for people to empathize with.
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