Psychology & Mental Health Blog | Dr. Michael Brustein, PsyD
Specializing in anxiety, depression relationships & self-image
Psychology & Mental Health Blog | Dr. Michael Brustein, PsyD
Specializing in anxiety, depression relationships & self-image
Managing Toxic Colleagues
Unfortunately, co-workers and colleagues that could be hazardous do not come with a warning label. For example, maybe it would have helped if you knew excessive lunch with William could lead to decreased performance, poor evaluations, and possible termination. In the...
5 Self Esteem Management Tips
There is an infinite assortment of books on how to improve self-esteem for you or for your children. Life coaching, personal trainers, and fit bit apps have also become enormously popular to help people become their ideal self. Conventional wisdom suggests that...
7 Tips for Social Phobia: The Big Bad Wolf Is You
Social phobia is excessive anxiety in social situations often triggered by fears of being negatively judged by others. People with social anxiety often feel as though they are being watched and scrutinized. They fear that they will be humiliated in a social situation...
Do Self-Affirmations Work? The Truth About Affirmations
Many people ask if self-affirmations work. What is the truth behind affirmations? Is there a type of self-affirmation that can work?
Top 5 Coping Skills to Manage Anxiety
In the mental health field, anxiety is akin to the common cold so everyone should know the top five coping skills for managing anxiety. At some point, everyone experiences anxiety and to a certain extent it is healthy. Anxiety prompts people to take action. Some anxiety about the term paper due for school, the midterm exam, the proposal for work, or the client meeting can increase motivation and a needed sense of urgency. However, when the anxiety is too great or irrational, it can be debilitating. Worries can persist for hours about health, job status a relationship or family members, effecting sleep, creating irritability and a chronic restless and edgy feeling. The anxiety can be so pronounced that one’s concentration and capacity to function or enjoy activities becomes hampered but using these coping skills for anxiety management can help.
Mindfulness vs. Psychoanalysis — Who Is Right?
The beliefs of those practicing mindfulness vs. psychoanalysis vary dramatically. Is mindfulness or psychoanalysis right?
How to Successfully Cope After a Relationship Breakup
It can be extremely difficult to successfully cope after a relationship breakup. A broken heart actually can, physically, hurt. Similar to physical pain, the somatosensory cortex (controlling sensations that may occur anywhere in the body) may be activated when processing emotional pain (Kross, Berman, Mischel, & Wagner 2011). This may explain why the ending of a relationship is often a catalyst for people to seek out psychotherapy. Ironically, instead of feeling more relief after discussing the dissolution of a relationship with a psychotherapist. many people actually feel worse. Why does this occur? How do you successfully cope after a relationship breakup.
Why We Repeat Negative Relationship Patterns and How to Break Them
Relationship breakups often are often part of a negative relationship pattern. Research suggests that a couple days after Valentine’s Day is the most popular time for relationship breakups to occur according to Facebook status changes.
This research feels accurate as I have the most website visits during the month of February (according to my Google analytics) and new client phone calls. Coincidence? Maybe. Nonetheless, during this time (February) many of my clients describe disappointment, sadness and confusion as they try to understand and mend a broken heart from a breakup.
Although it is interesting to speculate on the pattern of when breakups occur, I believe it is more relevant to understand why people keep repeating negative relationship patterns. I have some explanations drawing from clinical anecdotes, psychological theory and research.