Relationship Center of Loudoun

This page is devoted to providing a place for sharing ideas about emotional wellness, to update you about something interesting I have read or seen or to write about an issue or problem that you submit.  

Julie Sayre 

• When family members don't want therapy

  You are ready to call a therapist: you sense trouble in your relationship, or your child is showing behavioral or academic problems at school. You do the research, and work hard to find a therapist who seems like a good fit, who is close by, who can address the issues you are describing. You are ready to schedule, more than ready to finally talk to someone, make the investment of your time and resouces and ---- your partner or your teen refuses to come with you! It seems next to impossible to change their mind. Your partner believes outsiders shouldn't know your personal business, or your teen challenges you: "You can't make me go!" In fact, it's this kind of communication that got you to this point and being at this point, no one is listening to anyone else - a negative spiral. It just seems impossible to change their minds. And you are out of ideas. You're tired.

  Enter systems thinking: if one part of the system changes, by definition, the whole system will change.

  This means that as you use therapy to address the issues - even if you are addressing them individually - you are likely to see change in your relationship or family. How can this be? Therapy helps people look at situations and themselves differently. Once you have a different view of the same "old" issue, and an evolving self-view, new ideas begin to emerge. Your responses may change. And systems theory says If you do one thing differently, your partner's or family's responses will tend to change.

  I always encourage couples or families to come to therapy together. Change in systems is easier and smoother when all members are conscious that change is possible and desirable. But for times that just is not possible, consider that your work in therapy will reverberate just as surely as ripples in a pond after the stone is tossed - emerging ideas and new ways to proceed will create waves of change in your current relationships.      

Square Breathing

Did you remember to breathe today? Let me ask that a different way: When was the last time you gave yourself time to B-R-E-A-T-H-E? Oxygen makes our mental faculties fully available to us, and deeply breathing S-L-O-W-S us down in emotionally helpful ways. Then you can proceed with your day - with greater calm. Try breathing in a "square":

Take a deep breath to the count of 4

Hold it for 4 counts

Breathe out for 4 counts

Hold it (again!) for 4 counts

Repeat so that you breathe at least 3 squares. 

This works very well in traffic and long lines!

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