Read excerpts from Psychology Today below, and click to see full articles!
Need Comfort From Family After a Death? Follow This Rule)
In a family hit with a crisis—a terminal illness, a death, or other significant loss—family members may feel overwhelmed not only with the gravity of the loss but also the responsibility to support each other in their pain. And while it is normal and healthy to turn to family members for support and comfort, often those individuals closest to the loss are put in the role of comforter to others.
How "I Should" and "By Now" Trap Us in Pain
No matter how many Pinterest quotes encourage us to follow our own path in our own time, the illusion of the perfect timeline remains. By 25, careers should be solidified and pointed in a focused direction with consistent, incremental growth.
Is Your Family Dysfunctional? Your Partner Sees It
Bringing a romantic partner home for the first time is a right of passage for many. In that act, a person decides to merge the family that created them with the family they are creating for themselves. But bringing together those two realities can be messy.
Why Don't My Kids Call Me More?!
How often should adult children call their parents? The question crosses racial, ethnic, and cultural boundaries and sits at the heart of many heated family arguments and hurt feelings.
Family Grief: Five Keys to Grieving Well Together
Grief shows up in families in different ways—including conflict, discomfort, and frustration. The various iterations of grief experienced by a family can lead to feelings of frustration at different styles of grieving, fears that they are not “doing grief” correctly, and feeling overwhelmed at the sheer amount of emotional need.
Don't Shoot the Messenger? No, Don't Be the Messenger
Nobody revels in the prospect of having difficult conversations. Confronting a friend or family member about a rude comment feels deeply uncomfortable. Disagreements with an ex-spouse can feel excruciating.
Four Hidden Reasons for Family Drama During Wedding Planning
Complicating matters, during arguments, each partner may feel loyal both to their future spouse and their family. When a future spouse and a parent disagree about the religious nature of the ceremony, for example, the partner may feel compelled to both defend their parents and defend their partner. In that process, somebody’s feelings can get hurt. Weddings force couples to draw lines in the sand and declare their loyalty to one another while managing delicate family ties.
Why We Grieve During Life’s Happiest Moments
While life’s losses provoke a grief response, many will find themselves also counterintuitively experiencing a sense of loss during moments of joy and growth. When people experience growth and transition, moments that garner pride, excitement, and a sense of accomplishment, a sense of loss can creep in. I call these moments the “grief of growth.”
4 Types of Grief Nobody Told You About
The word grief has come to be understood solely as a reaction to a death. But that narrow understanding fails to encompass the range of human experiences that create and trigger grief. Read more to learn about the four types of grief that we experience which have nothing to do with death.
If My Parents Are Divorced, Is My Marriage Doomed to Fail?
The statistics can feel disheartening and leave children of divorce feeling helpless. But before you throw up your hands, let’s examine this phenomenon more closely to understand the why behind the statistics. It is not enough to say that divorce begets divorce; statistics alone fail to address the mechanisms of transition and ultimately tell couples how they can insulate themselves against this risk.
3 Types of Family Secrets and How They Drive Families Apart
Relationships with family members come not only from biological bonds but also from the bonds of maintained connection. When secrets enter a family, they can either enhance or undermine that connection. Benign family secrets that can increase closeness include things like children sharing a “secret” language from their parents or family units sharing inside jokes and traditions. The secrets are rooted in joy and intimate sharing of knowledge.
Why Your New Year's Resolution Is Failing
Contrary to what weight loss and productivity software commercials would have you believe, deep-rooted, sustainable change will not take place simply because you buy a product or make a resolution. No, full-fledged change involves a panoply of small shifts that eventually lead to a different version of yourself. Here are five ingredients of sustainable change.
5 Ways to Improve Exhausting Family Visits
For some, going home to visit family means signing up for a string of difficult family dinners, events, and conversations encounters that replay old family dynamics and arguments. Rather than joy, comfort, and connectedness, feelings of anxiety, frustration, and helplessness prevail as you step back into your childhood home. But preparation, the proper mindset, and support systems can ease and even entirely change the tenor of your family experience.