Take a Stupid Walk for Your Stupid Mental Health

  – Carolyn Moriarty, LCPC   The title of this blog will not make sense to everyone, so let me explain. The phrase “going on a stupid walk for my stupid mental health” went viral a few years ago thanks to this TikTok video made by creator @ninalaevski. The video in question shows a girl bundling up, charging out the door … Read More

Coping with Change

Preparing and Managing Transitions Have you noticed the shift? A subtle change that marks the departure of summer? Is it the breeze being slightly cooler or is the absence of children playing outside as they resumed their scholastic obligations? For better or worse, school is back in session. For students, this can be a big change compared to laxer curfews … Read More

Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD)

Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD) Sexual Orientation Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (SO-OCD) is a sub-type of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). When OCD is mentioned, most people think of excessive hand-washing due to fear of germs and counting prior to completing an action to prevent a dreadful situation (usually irrational). However, OCD does not discriminate; it latches onto anything the individual values. Women are slightly … Read More

Practicing Acceptance

How often is it actually helpful for someone to advise you to accept a certain set of circumstances when you are still attempting to grasp what is happening? It can be very off putting, frustrating as well as invalidating. You have to let it go! Just accept and move on! Throughout my years as a therapist, when even broaching the topic of … Read More

The Biological Stance of Trauma

  Have you ever wondered, ‘what would I do if I were to ever be in a terrifying situation? Would I fight the threat, flee, or shut down?’ If you’ve ever gathered around your friends to theorize about this, or even watched the show “What Would YOU Do?”, it’s easy to say, “Well I would do XYZ and definitely not … Read More

A Summer of Success: A Guide to Behavioral Activation

It has been around two and half years since COVID-19 has dominated our lives within society, and while at the moment we are not locked away in our homes out of necessity, integrating back into the community can feel tricky and stressful. Along with the past two years, many of us have experienced challenges specifically with our mental health. It … Read More

Negative Thinking Traps… Part 3

Finishing up our in-depth review of negative thinking traps, there are another five common traps that can hijack us into negative feedback loops if we are not prepared. Taking us to places that are unproductive and skewing the truth when in reality, the situation may be easily resolvable. Rounding up the last of the prominent negative thinking traps we can … Read More

Thought Fusion: How to Adapt

Our brains quite simply put are impressive. Billons of neurons firing, keeping our bodies functioning automatically while our minds are freed up to do any additional heavy lifting. Such as planning, predicting, categorizing, basically preparing for a plethora of situations that may or may not arise. The power of the brain is an effective tool, but not totally infallible. We’re … Read More

Negative Thinking Traps… Part 2

In our previous post, we gave a brief outline on the concept of negative thinking traps and how they have a nasty habit of taking us away from the present moment, exacerbating our negative emotions and distorting reality. These thoughts tend to just pop into our heads but are prone to stay within our thinking process if we buy into … Read More

The Nature of Intrusive Thoughts

Intrusive Thoughts - Chicago Counseling Center

As human beings we experience thousands of thoughts a day. Some are intentional, such as when we are planning for something or trying to remember something, and some are unintentional, such as a worry about something going wrong or a memory of someone being triggered by something. Thoughts can also be pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral, though most often they are … Read More