June 6, 2015

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

Seventy-one years.  Entire lifetimes.  June 6, 1944.  Does it matter anymore?  Even those who survived the day are mainly gone now.  Fewer and fewer to tell their stories.  The world has changed and the news is more about the Middle East or Ukraine or Africa.  Europe, it seems has settled.  Mainly.

So what does it matter 71 years later?  I’m sure you’ve seen the films of the Americans, the British, the Canadians, the Australians, the New Zealanders stepping out of those boats, moving towards the land.  Many, ever so many killed before they even made it there. But they kept on coming.  And they established themselves on the beaches.  They moved inland. I have never stopped being awed, truly awed by the courage of those young men. 

When they came home—those that did—people didn’t keep thanking them for their service.  I think the reason is because pretty much any able-bodied American served in the war.  No one had to try to assuage feelings of what?  Guilt?  Inadequacy?  No one had to hide behind bloviated gratitude.  No one had to hold forth about heroism because everyone accepted the heroism.  The women who worked in the factories were heroes, too.  There was a social contract that held people together.

So twice this weekend I watched teens in groups of adults hide in electronics, in phones, in video games, texts, instagrams.  And I ask myself:  If they are called upon, will they/would they be up to the task?  Can they come out of their own tiny (for it is tiny) world long enough to behold true heroism and imitate it in real life?  To know they must stand on the side of right? 

Could they rise to the occasion or have we so disadvantaged them—yes, disadvantaged them by entitlement, by rescue, by creating a child and teen centered world?  Have we kept them from knowing how to do what is right simply because it is right? 

Have we rescued a generation to the point they do not have the ability to be heroic?

Fewer and fewer remain to tell their stories of D-Day…and would anyone be listening?

The Brady Poll

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D

        

Lots and lots of talk about the “punishment” meted out to Patriots’ QB Tom Brady.  Lots and lots of opinions on whether the “punishment” is just, unjust, too terrible, not terrible enough.  

This morning’s TV news was conducting a poll on watchers’ opinion on the appropriateness of the “punishment.”  I just have to put the word into quotation marks because I can’t see how missing four games is a punishment for potentially lying, manipulating, and disappointing people who believed in him, teaching kids covertly if not overtly that winning is more important than honor… But then, that’s just my opinion.

And there’s the problem.  Opinions.  I am going to say something outlandish.  We have too many opinions these days.  Too many opinions based on very little or false data.  There is an opinion poll out every day on everything from punishments for Quarterbacks to Global Warming to favorite candidate.

Opinions, per se are a part of our democracy.  Well and good.  But shouldn’t one take the trouble to be well informed before forming an opinion?  Shouldn’t one need to be able to support one’s opinion beyond “I just feel that way”?

During the news broadcast I watched this morning, in the course of the reporting—maybe five minutes but probably only about three minutes—opinions changed and more people were saying that Brady’s “punishment” was unfair than at the beginning of the segment.  So, reporting from one reporter for a minute or so changed people’s opinions.

Here’s a question to consider:  If there had been an opinion poll about D-Day on June 1, 1944,, how many people would have thought it a good idea? 24 hours into it, what percentage of people would have thought it well planned or likely to succeed?  Fortunately, no data exists for those fantasy opinion polls because none were taken.

Things have changed.  A lot.  Now one is expected to have and say opinions about just about everything—with very little data to support those opinions.  We all know that we seek to hear the “facts” that we like, whether they be facts or not, and we form opinions based upon…well, other people’s opinions masquerading as facts but presented as truth.

So what does this have to do with raising kids?  A lot, I think, because kids growing up in a world where having an ill-informed or un-informed opinion begin to think that’s normal, ok, intelligent, expected.  Let’s take that a step further.  Kids are taught very little in school these days about the difference between fact and opinion.  My experience is that kids hardly know the difference.

So, what to think about?  Well, am I wrong or right or almost right or mainly wrong but sort of right?  How are you forming your opinion?  What opinions have your children expressed to you in the last day or two?  Are they supported by facts or just by wanting things to be so?  In school is your child being taught the difference between fact and opinion.  What do you think:  Is it more important for your child to learn the difference between fact and opinion or to learn about “self-esteem”?  Think about it.

ENOUGH!

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

ENOUGH!

Enough of the articles and news reports like this one, http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/lufthansa-not-required-to-report-lubitz-s-depression-company-says-1.3022632. 

....and this one,http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3026640/Lufthansa-did-not-tell-aviation-regulator-Germanwings-pilot-Andreas-Lubitz-previously-struggled-depression.html

I’ve refrained from commenting about the purported psychological basis to the tragic decision of a German Wings pilot.  And now I just can’t be silent any longer.  Enough!  Enough of this gabble about depression.  Three points are really clear:

1.    Depression was not what made the co-pilot make the decision he did to crash the plane into a mountainside.

2.    We will never, ever, ever know what made the co-pilot make the decision he made.

3.    There is absolutely no way ever to make certain that someone doesn't do something horrible and evil and cruel to other people again.

Therefore, let’s stop the nonsense speculation.  Let’s look at this frenzy of silliness masquerading as psychology, psychotherapy, psychiatry and see it for what it most certainly is.  Silliness.  Silliness that mainly just sounds like a pharm rep trying to sell his new pill to a psychiatrist, nurse practitioner or other person who can sell (ooops, prescribe) pills.  Silliness because it perverts the discussion of the human mind, the human spirit, human emotions into a pseudo crossword puzzle of pretend psychological knowledge and understanding.  This is NOT what psychology is about.

I mean why are we speculating about depression instead of evil ? 

The narrative seems to go sort of this way:  Andreas Lubitz once “had” depression and therefore somehow his depression had something to do with/was his motive for his decision to murder a plane load of innocent people.

However, we are also told that depression is “treatable,” and that we mustn’t stigmatize the mentally ill (are depressed people mentally ill or are they depressed?  At what point does “depression” become mental illness?  Ooops.  Mental refers to cognitive processes of the mind and depression is emotional—it’s a long standing verbal problem with trying to talk thoughtfully about these issues.

Then we get back to that one pesky [of 155 known] neurotransmitter (Serotonin) that somehow drives us all to smiley or frowny faces on a daily basis—or a disorder basis.. But I’m not clear about the stigmatizing of “mentally ill” people because they are just like us (with 14% of the population diagnosed as depressed and that supposedly is under-reported) they are certainly like many of us.  By the way, have you ever felt depressed? 

So then we must get to noticing that this looks like the worst epidemic of illness since the Spanish Flu outbreak in 1918-19 that killed more people than World War 1 and is the worst recorded epidemic in recorded history.  And if 14%+ of the population has depression and depression (though treatable but apparently not completely or not over a long period of time), then what about bus drivers, train engineers, taxi drivers, cooks, ship captains—other people in their cars who could act from their not fully treated depression and do something evil.  I mean, mustn’t we check to see that they never had or were treated for depression?  Or treated for evilness?  Because any one of these people could choose to do an act similar to Andreas Lubitz.  Maybe we need to screen everyone everyday, just to be very, very sure. 

Maybe we need to consider the possibility that his man was insane and/or evil.

What about the shooting at the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado?  Maybe he was depressed?  Now you know that sounds ridiculous because it is.  Why is that ridiculous but opining on and on about the possible, once-treated [but not successfully] depression of Andreas Lubitz makes sense?

I go back to my professor in graduate school who used to say, “Since no one claims to be a physicist because they know that gravity is why an apple falls from a tree, why does everyone think they understand psychology?  Listen, pilots:  I don’t tell you how to fly a plane; please stop talking pseudo-psychology.

Now all this muddle about depression and mental illness and stigmatization and treatable depression and once having taken medication…it really makes you want to think about it and notice how absurd we are [well, the media] as we try to understand that which will always and necessarily exceed the horizons of our imagination.

OpEd in Response to The Atlantic's "The Irrationality of AA" by Gabrielle Glaser

By: Robert Schmidt, M.A.

Published in The Atlantic today, http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/03/the-irrationality-of-alcoholics-anonymous/386255/?utm_source=SFFB.

A few thoughts: 

1. Why does it matter whether or not addiction is a disease? Labeling it as such only serves to leverage payment (rightly so) from health insurance providers for treatment. 

The use of the word “disease” should be a non-factor in the treatment of individuals who are tasked with creating unique personal narratives on their alcohol use in the evidence based psychological treatment models that Gabrielle Glaser correctly references here.  

Although, it is also clear that Glaser is a big supporter of the use of medication treatments for alcohol and substance use disorders, a topic which deserves consideration in long form on another day. 

2. Glaser argues that AA takes a cookie cutter approach, recommending complete abstinence for those who might be better served by “moderation” styled approaches.  However, there is another side to that coin... Yes, there is a danger that complete abstinence is an overreaction for some and that this approach is really meant for those on the “severe” end of the bell curve, but so is harm reduction! The whole idea of moderating one's use and limiting harms is based on the precedents set by the needle exchange programs and the legislating of prostitution in Amsterdam.  So, it is the same thing all over again: we are basing our treatment recommendations on evidence collected at the “severe” end of the spectrum, only this time we are taking the risk of under prescribing instead of over prescribing levels of abstinence.

3. To say that AA is unscientific is a lazy criticism. After having successfully met the standards of certain prescribed phases of scientific rigor, treatment approaches are labeled as “evidence based.” There are several factors that are considered in this process, including the efficacy of the treatment as well as the cost and the ease with which it can be dispersed. 

Efficacy is in interesting term which the Ms. Glaser uses several times: either incorrectly, or misleadingly. Treatment efficacy refers to either the statistical significance or (preferably) the statistical effect size of a treatment in a controlled setting. To be clear: efficacy studies are conducted in laboratories. So to say that there is no proven efficacy for AA is misleading because it cannot be conducted in a controlled setting. AA has long been implemented in the public sphere, so to bring it into a laboratory setting would be to alter it fundamentally. It is impossible to measure the efficacy of AA, because there is no way to design an experiment for it.

Scientific investigations of treatments outside of the lab (ie, real world applications of treatments) are known as “effectiveness studies.” This is an important distinction because in order for a treatment to be labeled with an “evidence based” endorsement it must first have been validated for efficacy and then for effectiveness.

This is important because of all the qualities that should be celebrated about AA (and there are many), perhaps the most heroic is the fact that AA is widely available and accessible: even to those who subsist on the lowest rungs of our socio-economic ladder. The value of that quality cannot be overstated. 

Note: I strongly believe that the average individual in our culture does not fully appreciate or even understand exactly how rigorous the scientific process actually is. Science moves at a much slower pace than most people think. And, when considering the science of psychology, we are talking about something that is so complex and difficult to control for that it has only really been in existence for about 60 years (give or take).

And, even that doesn't distinguish it from medicine very much. A prominent neurologist recently told me that 90% of the treatments he recommends for his patients are not evidence based: these are treatments like acupuncture, physical therapy, dieting etc… 

Glasser also references several studies comparing the long term outcomes of AA to evidence based treatments saying that AA's success rate is likely in the single digits. Three things to to keep in mind here: A) "success" is a loosely defined term, B) follow up's rarely go past six months, and C) outcome measurements are inevitably based on self reports, (ie. asking the alcoholics how much they have been drinking: ie, asking them to lie).

4. Glaser’s criticism of alcohol use disorder treatments as having been corrupted for years by the ubiquity of AA, fails to acknowledge the importance of that ubiquity. She is solely talking about the implementation of alcohol and substance use disorder treatment in centers and practices which actually collect money for their services. And undoubtedly, she has a strong argument in her call for quality assurance here. 

However; when one decides to use their finger to plug a hole in the dyke, there is always a good chance that a new leak may spring elsewhere. 

Does the promotion of medication treatments not serve to further empower the greedy pharmaceutical companies that make up so many of the top Fortune 500's already? The same companies that so mishandled the AIDS epidemic in the 80’s and 90’s that they are responsible for the deaths of tens of millions in Africa http://fireintheblood.com/ . The same pharmaceutical companies that produce Oxycontin, Percocet, Vicodin, and Xanax...

Does the promotion of evidence based psychological treatments such as CBT and Motivational Interviewing ensure that those techniques will be carried out with any more standardization than the current approach? 

I will tell you that it does not, because I have studied these techniques in depth and I have worked in centers which utilize them. In my experience it is just as easy for someone to say they are doing CBT and actually do nothing, as it is for them to say they are doing AA and do the same. 

What is the current approach anyway? I have traveled the country visiting treatment centers and I have taken courses on the treatment of substance use disorders in multiple settings at the graduate and the undergraduate levels. It seems like everywhere I go my colleagues are speaking in the same voice as Glaser in this Atlantic article. I rarely hear professionals say that they are using AA or the 12 steps anymore. Mostly everyone is using “evidence based” treatments now, and mostly everyone who actually works in the field (unlike Ms. Glasser who is a journalist) is aware of the changing trends towards evidence based treatments and harm reduction. As a matter of fact, I doubt there is any one who would really argue against the need to be more scientific. 

Yet, we are still fighting an uphill battle. It would be naive to think that we only need to do X,Y, and Z in order to reduce the impact of alcohol and substance use on individuals and on our society. It is a gigantic problem because it is not simply solved. Let’s not be so reductionist about this and let’s make sure that before we go ahead and decide that AA (something that is widespread and free and already functioning well) is no good, let’s make sure we really mean it.  

The Help that Helps

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

After four inquiries from prospective clients last week, each of whom had a long story of turmoil where the help hadn’t helped, I thought it time to address the issue of what really does help kids and families.  I get that that sounds arrogant; I really do.  Still when one hears of kids or young adults who are hospitalized again and again with little to no amelioration of their symptoms,  diagnosed with made-up disorders, prescribed medications for which the data supporting their efficacy is mainly MIA, it seems to me that the obvious next step is to remember the second most common finding in research regarding what works in psychotherapy.  

That finding?  

What hasn’t worked up till now won’t start working by doing more of the same. 

Simple.  Obvious.  Generally ignored. 

I do not take suicide or suicidal thoughts lightly.  Ever.  However, redefining hopelessness as depression or even the more ominous Clinical Depression and prescribing medications (whose side effects absolutely include suicidality and/or suicidal ideation) doesn’t seem to be very sensible.

The help that helps is very likely to be sensible.

When kids are hopeless, it is the reasons for those feelings which are important and require help, guidance, love, direction, understanding, boundaries, and hope from adults.  When kids are feeling “weird” (to quote Graham Moore who won an Academy Award on Sunday), it is the context of their lives which screams for scrutiny. 

Kids who can’t/don’t find meaning in life and who cannot or just aren’t seduced by lots and lots of  expensive designer stuff and  facebook friends they’ve never met, aren’t disordered.  They aren’t sick.  They aren’t anomalies.  Adolescence is a time of seeking, questioning, wondering, exploring.  When all that is pathologized, we leave kids in a worse place than before.  Holden Caulfield jumps to my mind.  And Young Werther.  David Copperfield (Dickens)…Oh, and Hamlet.  This is not a new problem; only our ways of helping kids to move through the problem is new—and apparently not that much better.

“Life is not as easy as walking through a field” (Pasternak) and yet we keep on walking.

The help that helps is very much based in understanding people—kids, young adults, and adults as well.  By understanding I mean accepting the human condition and that life isn’t a long series of smiley faces.  Understanding is connecting, empathizing, noticing context—and holding to moral and ethical standards.  Understanding is about meaning, the lifelong endeavor to find meaning.  The help that helps is about talking to the person in front of you with no thoughts at all about a “diagnosis.” 

In all the 500+ pages of the latest DSM, there is nothing about feeling weird or hopeless or wondering what is the meaning of life or this child’s life at this moment and beyond.

The help that helps must look beyond the prevailing template [paradigm] which has morphed and degraded the human experience into something that is as often as not a mischaracterized as a “disorder.”

Bipolarized Life

By Carol Maxym Ph.D.

This morning (well, and for much of the day) the news was filled with the story of the Jordanian pilot murdered—executed---cruelly, viciously, by ISIS.  A deed, I suppose, committed by those for whom shock value is equal to a man’s life.  I cannot pretend to understand what makes someone think that burning another man alive is a worthwhile deed.

But here’s something else I don’t really get and that is a part of our everyday lives.  I watched coverage of the murder–it was on for a good 6 or more minutes uninterrupted..  Then came commercials.  So, suddenly I hear soft clincky music and I learn about a medication for a made-up disease.  Then comes the sexy lady with the Viagra pitch.  Then come the kids dressed like adults throwing phones trying to sell me I have no idea what because I’ve muted them.  Then comes the car insurance…Then, back to the news.

What about feelings?  What about the complete disruption of feelings?  The honest, authentic reaction to the vile, evil deed done by ISIS, then silly, manipulative, deceptive froth to make me buy stuff.  What does that do to feelings?

After the ads we return to more commentary, a bit of detail about the murder, and a few photos of the murdered pilot.  And feelings…once again justified outrage, disgust, horror.  And then, again, back to the manipulation, the manipulative music.  Murder.  Fluff.  Horror.  Silliness.  Whatever you may think of ads, compared to the reality of the execution by burning alive of the Jordanian pilot, it is fluff and silliness.  I am not saying we should grieve endlessly, but can’t we show some respect???

Is it really any wonder that kids (and adults) feel mood swings?  We are being programmed into constant, violent mood swings on a minute-by-minute basis.  How are we supposed to process those emotional swings? 

I think the answer is that mainly we don’t/can’t process that rapidity of mood change,  We don’t even exactly acknowledge them because they are a part of daily life.  It isn’t much different on the Internet.  Information stimulates this emotion then that one—horror to hope in 23 seconds or less. 

Honestly, I don’t think humans are really meant to be able to process emotions that way.  I don’t think that kids have a chance to be emotionally stable when they are being taken from hideous to cute in the blink of an eye.  And that is also true of lots of other parts of kids lives.  Think about it.

What to do?  Well, neither you nor I can change the world situation.  Nor can we change or influence the ads that come your way, your children’s way.  I think, however, being aware—acutely aware—is the key.  If you are aware of the way your emotions are being swung, tampered with, manipulated, it is much easier to avoid the swing.  Teaching your children about the swings and how not to become involved is a life lesson like teaching how to fish instead of giving a fish.

Happy Helicoptering

By Carol Maxym Ph.D.

Or, what do you get out of helicoptering?

I've just asked you a really hard question.  What do you get out of helicoptering?  Probably your first reaction will be to begin to list all the reasons why you must helicopter.  Slow down, please.  Read on and give yourself a chance to think it through in a different way.

Professional Mothering is the term I've coined to describe one of the main ways modern moms get caught in helicoptering  

In your job anticipating problems is a good thing.  Solving problems immediately is a very good thing.  Preventing problems adds real value to you as an employee or as a professional.  Having things well organized—another plus in the working world.  Tying up all the lose ends—another asset.  Rescuing your boss from a giant gaffe—big time good in the professional world.
Here’s the rub:  Doing all those things as a mother?  Yeah, no.  Not helpful.  Really.

There are so many “soccer moms” today who have a great education, many years of professional success before deciding to become moms.  Please don’t take this the wrong way, moms, but there are certainly ways, times when being a mom is very boring.  Very unstimulating.  You wonder what that great education was for.  I remember that very well from my days as a young mother.  Mothering just isn't always intellectually stimulating,  Mothering often isn't exciting.  Mothering rarely provides a sense of immediate success or reward—the kind that does occur in the work world.  Frankly, it’s seldom that anyone really thanks you (certainly not your toddler who cannot understand) or pays real and authentic tribute to what you do all day.

There is no respite from mothering.  You are on duty 24/7 for years and years.
So, mothers, let’s face it:  You look for something to do, something stimulating, something you can really sink your teeth into.  You are trying to bring into your mothering world the parts of your professional world that you really liked, that kept you stimulated.  Understandable.  The question is more if it is useful.

Helicoptering is one of the ways to feel busy, useful, important.  The more you helicopter, the more your child [appears to] needs you, so the more you have to do.  I mean, if he’s forgotten his lunch, well, you must take it to him.  Same goes for homework.  And what about the project for science?  Getting her ready for camp—certainly she can’t pack her own things.  She wouldn't know how.
Here’s the deal:  Your child will never learn how to be independent and highly functional if you helicopter.  As you child feels less than competent because he/she isn't as competent as you are (well, of course—you are an adult, you child is…well, a child), anxiety can take hold because your child cannot feel competent to do whatever the task, remember what needs to be remembered, take care of whatever needs to be taken care of.

So, I’ll be really blunt:  Helicoptering is selfish and it isn't good mothering (or fathering).

Think about it.

Plain Speak

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

Please, please read this article. It’s short and well-written and really important.

Last week I caught just part of a radio discussion about “new research” that demonstrates how the context of one’s life matters in how one acts, reacts, etc., that connections among people and communities effects how one lives in the world. Well, my first reaction was a sort of “duh?”  I mean who didn’t know that. Then I thought for a moment more and realized that as we have created a [false] idea that behavior problems, “mental health” issues, depression, anxiety, bi-polar “disorder” –well, really all the so-called disorders, are intrinsic to the individual, we have created an illusion that we all act and react in the vacuum of ourselves and some rather loosely defined neurotransmitters that create a so-called chemical imbalance (for which there is zero real data, but it’s been a fabulously successful marketing tool) and that drive our feelings, emotions, attitudes, behavior, social behavior, and our being in the world.

Ok, so, really, let’s get serious.  Do you really—from your own life experience—believe that life, situations in life have no effect on how you feel emotionally, how you act and react?  I mean, anecdotally from your life and the lives of those you know (and forgetting all the advertising hype you’ve heard), do you really believe that what happens in your life is less important than neurotransmitters in how you feel.  I mean does this make sense?  One day your lover tells you he doesn’t ever want to hear from you and somehow simultaneously your chemical imbalance takes over and you feel depressed?  Or your son brings home a report card full of Fs, but it’s all about chemical imbalance?  And, your reaction is also just those neurotransmitters? 

Life happens, and we all act and react in ways we’ve learned.  If you come from a family where difficulties were met with anxiety, probably you learned to react with anxiety.  It isn’t about genetic material that makes your neurotransmitters fire, blah, blah, blah.  Think of this:  Schools have cultures.  In some schools, being “cool” means that you work really hard academically. In others it means being particularly kind.  Etc., etc.  Corporate cultures are exactly the same. So, yes and obviously, we do mimic the culture in which we live. It isn’t your neurotransmitters that are deciding to be kind or smart or snarky or depressed or anxious. It’s your life, your world, your experience and how you interpret your life and world and experience. 

Let’s not pretend that the brain has nothing to do with how we feel and emote and act and react. Let’s also not pretend that very much is known about that. Let’s free ourselves from the tiny, simplistic, false world or diagnosis of disorders. 

Think about it. Think how much richer your life could be minus disorders. Think about starting the discussion about your feelings not stopping it with a foolish disorder diagnosis.

     

Pivoting Round Y2K

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

One of my first thoughts this morning upon really going back to work after the long holiday break was that we are equidistant in time from 2000 as we were in 1986.  I am quite certain I didn’t think about that on January 5, 1986.  Reagan was President, no one had a computer or cell phone.  No one had imagined the Internet, Blogs, e-mail…. Kids abused drugs but not really prescription drugs.  Kids weren’t really being diagnosed with all sorts of diseases, disorders, and disabilities.  Hardly anyone took psychotropic medications.  Life was slower, different, more thoughtful—or am I just becoming old and nostalgic?  “Back in the good old days…”  We had less communication but perhaps better communication. We dressed with more care, eating habits had not deteriorated as much as they have now.   People wrote letters to each other, and letters were more thoughtful than e-mails.

But I do sound like an aging complainer….or do I?  I worry about that often because there is so much in the growing-up world that frightens me, disturbs me.  Sometimes I think the main value of residential treatment for kids is taking them out of their modern, highly-stimulated world.  What do you think?  Am I being simplistic?  Are we, as individuals, parents, Americans better off now than in 1986?

Well, obviously there is no one and certain answer (or maybe there is—that’s even scarier…).  More importantly, there is no going back.   So what can we learn?  How to move forward?

I think the main point is that more is not better.  More is simply more which doesn’t make it better. I think that pivoting around that millennial moment (remember Y2K? and all the horror that was to ensue that didn’t happen?) provides a window to observe where we are and where we want to be.  I’m not suggesting that we engage in Soviet-style five-year plans, but I am wondering about thinking more about how we want the world to be for our children.

And yes, I know the politicians accuse each other of stealing our children’s future (usually referring either to the National Debt or to Climate Change), but I don’t mean that.  I mean do we wish to provide our children with so electronic a world that they are using iPads before they can talk?  What about constant music everywhere providing emotional indications of how to feel just in case you don’t know yourself?  What about diagnosis of purported disorders?  Do we prefer a world of medication or a world of understanding the wealth of human emotions? 

I think the 28 years around the fulcrum 2000 have been years where we became more quickly reactive but not more helpfully reactive, or proactive.  Public figures apologize ad infinitum, So that the whole concept of apology no longer has any meaning (and I do remember beginning to notice that in the ‘80s).  Accountability is a word and one we don’t really even expect to have meaning.  There are so many words like that.  Depression is another one.

We have the opportunity to become more thoughtful, more deliberate, more reflective as we re-think the growing up world we present to our children.  Or not. 

It’s Not A Competition

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

When I was a kid, I remember noticing that my parents used my brother’s many successes as what I then called to myself “Parent Badges”.  He was very smart, so that meant they were smart also.  He won all sorts of competitions, so, in effect, they did, too.  They bragged about him whenever they could (particularly when they could seem not to be bragging).   For any of you who know I Love Lucy (and if you don’t know that TV comedy series, I urge you to have a look at it.  If you can watch one episode and not laugh gleefully, please do let me know), you may remember the episodes where Lucy and Ricky get into (or try to avoid) bragging competitions with their best friends about which son is cuter and smarter and learning more things earlier.

I didn’t have so many overt successes as my brother, so I didn’t provide much in the Parent Badge department.  However when I did, I kept my triumphs to myself because I couldn’t bear the thought of my parents using my successes as their Parent Badges.  Somehow it seemed to me to take away from my hard work if they took it as their own.  Was I too sensitive?  What do you think?

As a mom, I shied away from talking about my kids very much or carrying their photos because I couldn’t bear the idea that someone might think I was bragging.  I never even kept photos in my office because I didn’t want to be asked questions that would lead me to have to talk about my daughters who accomplished much.  Perhaps I carried it all a bit too far.

Being a mom or a dad is about guiding and teaching and loving and connecting, not getting or seeking validation for yourself.  Perhaps ‘parenting’ has become something of a competition—thinking back to I Love Lucy, I guess it always was.  Perhaps that is a part of the reason I have never liked the verb “to parent.’  Your child desires your good opinion, your praise—even if he/she doesn’t want to show it.  If you use your child’s success as your Parent Badge, you take away from the connection, the relationship becomes it takes on a hint of contingency.

And then there is yet another aspect to the competition: things, buying things.  What happens to a child’s self-respect, to his/her soul when your ability to provide more and more things for status becomes a part of your child’s actual belief in his/her self worth?  Is any child better or better off for having more things than other kids—or even for being able to keep up with what other kids have or can get.  And, yes, I acknowledge that I am writing this in the midst of the Christmas/Channukah buying season/frenzy. 

When I talk to parents whose child is not doing well, they often want to know if they are to blame for the problems.  That is such a complex and complicated question.  Parents always make mistakes—that’s jus a part of the deal.  Making mistakes is not the same as “causing” your child’s problems.  And the opposite is also true.  When your child succeeds at school or sports or in the school play or the marching band, you’ve certainly helped but you haven’t done it. 

Being a parent is never about the parent.  It’s always about the child.  However that very specifically does not mean that your child should become the center of your world or that you should teach your child the false and dangerous belief that he/she is the center of the world.

So, what’s the point here?  Perspective mainly,  and the same old thing I’ve written about so many times.  Being a mother or a father is about teaching, guiding, loving, connecting.  Being a parent isn’t about the bragging rights but about helping your child learn to be a productive, caring, generous, honest citizen (which is the best recipe for happiness I know).  However much you can help your child to become that person, you gain [silent] bragging rights—and a little peace and quiet in your later years.

Intimidation

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

I was in Walmart today.  Waiting to check out, I heard the following conversation between a mom and her about 8-year-old son.

“I’ve already bought you…” and then she listed off about 10 toys she had purchased, she said,              in the last week.  “Isn’t that enough?” she asked.

 “No,” her son responded simply and pointedly.

Again she was on the defensive. 

“I just can’t afford it today.”

Her son walked over to a toy counter, from a marketing standpoint judiciously placed right there by the check out lines for kids to examine while their parents wait in line to pay.  The youngster found another toy (I think it was a Lego set) and placed it into the basket.

 “I don’t have the money for it,” the mother responded plaintively as her son turned the box   over to see the other side.

I don’t actually know for sure how that event turned out because it became my turn to check out and pay.  I so much wanted to say to the mom, “Don’t let him put you on the defensive.  Your goodness as a mom isn’t measured by how much you purchase.  In fact, your son will be better off if you teach him restraint, self-discipline, thoughtful instead of impulse purchasing.  Instant gratification isn’t helpful.”

I didn’t say any of that.  What do you think?  Should I have said something?  Would you have wanted someone to say something to you?

Is this Helping?

 By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

A Very Simple Question:

Unlike just about everything else in life, I find that moms don’t tend to ask the “Is this helping?” as the primary and decisive question when looking for, continuing with, or thinking about, seeking or changing types or providers of help (therapists, psychologists, counselors, psychiatrists, tutors, coaches, etc..) 

Keep in mind, if the plumber doesn’t do a good job or the tailor or the car mechanic or the lawn guy, you change.  That’s what you should do if the therapy, counseling, coaching, medication isn’t helping. 

Simple, right?

Well, only if you have created criteria by means of which to evaluate.  You do know if the plumber fixed the leaky faucet, if your clothes fit better or the car is running.  

Can you know if the help is helping?  Yes, you can. 

I can’t tell you how many moms I’ve spoken with over the years who tell me they are seeing “the best therapist.  I really like him.  Morgan has been seeing him for years.”  My first question is always, “And have you seen improvement?”  Often, oh!  all too very often, the answer is, “Well, no....”  And I hear the confusion at the other end of the line because this mom, like so many other moms had never really allowed herself to ask the question, “Is this helping?”

Think about it:  If it isn’t helping either the professional isn’t whom you need or the problem has been oversimplified, jargonized, simply not been understood.  

We’ll be providing more and more information on how to do better to find your child the help each of you needs.

How To Boil A Frog

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

HOW TO BOIL A FROG:  RECIPE:

1.         Place frog in large pot of cool water.  Place pot on stove.

2.         Continue to heat slowly, being careful not to increase heat too rapidly.  Frog will acclimate 

            itself to the temperature and does not seek to escape to save itself.

3.         Continue cooking over slowly increasing heat until thoroughly cooked.

CAUTION:  Dropping the frog directly into boiling water, will cause it to

       jump right out to save itself.

HOW A TEEN BOILS A FAMILY:  RECIPE 

Using low but constant tension, agitating continuously:

1.         Intimidate and bully parents. 

2.         Making certain not to bring to a quick boil, carefully combine lies

with manipulations.  Add a pinch of need to be rescued.  

3.         Making sure to keep parents unaware of the increasing confusion,

pit parents against each other until they explode.  Be sure to allow

parents to justify, excuse, and rationalize the increasing chaos,

unhappiness, and failure.

CAUTION: If you act too precipitously, your family may realize what you

     are doing and react.

Don't "Like" Facebook

By: Carol Maxym Ph.D.

I wrote this two months ago when the scandal regarding Facebook’s non-disclosed reasarch was making news.  Like most news, it disappeared quickly enough.  I found myself taking an unplanned sabbatical from writing and just now rediscover this not-a-blog.  I think the points are still important, so we’ll post it.

***********************

It’s all over the Internet today. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-28051930    Facebook manipulating the news feed to see if they can manipulate you.  Oh, shame, shame, shame.  Facebook has shown its true colors today.  So, I’ve read some of the commentary, and most of it is thoughtful as well as thought provoking.

However, I will simplify.  There is absolutely no way to justify Facebook’s ethical lapse.  It just can’t be justified.  Twist yourself into a pretzel three times over, and there remains no way that any agreement to the Terms of Use or Privacy Policy can include attempting to manipulate user’s emotions.  I mean, for those of you who haven’t studied psychology, there is a long and nasty history of lying to people to engage them surreptitiously into research.  Ethical psychologists don’t do that anymore.  There just isn’t anything else that needs to be said about it.

Even more important, however, is the whole point of psychologists wanting to do this sort of research to prove….what, exactly.  To prove that if people hear happy things they tend to be happier.  I mean really.  When I see stuff like that I think of the definition I have sometimes been forced to offer for psychology:  The study of the bleeding obvious.

Unless (??) Facebook is hiding something else (and that surely might be the case,,,) there is no revelation at all in the research,  If they are hiding other intrusions into their member’s emotions, then again and again shame and more shame. 

Is it worse than the emotional manipulation of advertising and its accompanying music?

Several clients sent me links to two “studies” that were commented on in Sunday’s New York Times. 

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/06/23/cool-at-13-adrift-at-23/?_php=true&_type=blogs&emc=edit_hh_20140624&nl=health&nlid=60565538&_r=0

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/29/opinion/sunday/why-teenagers-act-crazy.html?_r=0

The most important point to notice in each of the articles is how silly they are.  Have you ever heard the adage that the coolest people in high school reached their pinnacle in high school?  Well, here is “research” to substantiate it.  Yippee??? 

And the other article about teens “acting crazy.”  Oh, come on!  Could someone please inform the author that teens in different times and places have acted (and do act) quite differently, so the facile conclusions about brain development don’t really hit the mark. Perhaps that research would benefit from a look at the context of US adolescence living in their world before making neurological assertions.  Perhaps someone might want to consider if the soldiers who landed on Normandy Beach only did so because they were neurologically not yet developed.  Character, courage, duty, patriotism, caring…

So, today is a day to remember that Facebook isn’t really your friend at all.  And to notice how empty so much psychological research really is.

There is such a thing as important psychological research.  I would hope to see more of it discussed in the media—and discussed intelligently not as though we’ve suddenly found a new way to slice bread.

And YAY for the mom I met while walking today who reminded her four-year-old daughter that she must be aware of other people as she is walking.  Well done, Mom!

What are you thinking about today?

This Is Not A Blog!

By Carol Maxym, Ph. D.

A kind friend gave me a lesson in blogging.  I am grateful.  However, the result is the clear knowledge that I am not writing a blog.  I thought I was which is why I decided what I wrote should be hosted on Blogspot.  I was wrong  Oh, well.

I understand that to do a blog properly, I am supposed to tell you the point of whatever I’m saying in the first paragraph.  Well, sometimes I will; other times I won’t because it won’t make sense.  I will always try to make sense.

I am told that blogwisdom states that if I expect you to spend five minutes reading here and think about what is being written, I am just plain old fashioned.  Ok.  I have more respect and trust in parents than that!  AND, although I recognize that we all have a bit less focus than we used to, I do not accept the premise that people are stupider than they used to be and can only mentally digest pablum.

If I am wrong and no one has the patience to stay on this page for more than 30 seconds, then I know you and I will never really communicate.  I wish you well.

I’ve been a parent for a really long time now, and I’ve worked professionally with parents for a long time.  When I published Teens in Turmoil, I broke the rule of ‘write vanilla, pretend to have all the answers (even though you know you don’t)’.  Indeed, had I followed that advice, more copies might have sold and perhaps I would be a TV pundit now.  I have no regrets.  I’ve had too many parents tell me that Teens in Turmoil was the only book they had read that actually helped them.  That’s more than enough for me.  I’ve no wish and no need to be the pundit who offers empty words every time there is a teen tragedy. 

So, this isn’t a blog.  This is a place on the Internet where you can come often to find thoughtful and thought-provoking articles.  It shouldn’t take you more than about five minutes to read any day’s article.  How long you spend thinking about it is your choice.

I hope you’ll leave comments, polite comments, even if you violently disagree.  I hope you’ll leave thoughtful comments that will help another parent or grandparent.

The help that helps (THTH—try saying it, just for fun). is what it is.  Perhaps one day I’ll come up with a new word like blarticle to give it a type casting. THTH is for thoughtful parents and grandparents, teachers, therapists.  If you are looking for the one magic bullet, this isn’t the right place for you.  (Well, if you think there is one, good luck finding it!) 

Most important changes start with the thinkers.  That’s because they’re thinking.  Their thoughts are transformed by others who actualize the thoughts.  I hope both groups will read here on a regular basis, pass it on to others whom they know to be thoughtful or to those who are the actualizers of thought. 

More than twenty years ago when I left one life and set out upon another, a dear lady, long since deceased, bade me good-bye and good wishes for my journey with this word:  “Godspeed.”

Selfies, Take Two

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

“Teens Post Selfies At Auschwitz In Controversial Facebook Group”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/07/selfies-at-auschwitz_n_5564106.html?m=true

Narcissism run rampant.  Historical context absent.   Kids taking selfies at Auschwitz.  This receives and deserves no further commentary.

Think about it.

Explanations

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

I know that lots of experts tell you to explain to your child what you are doing to prove that it makes sense, is better, smarter, more efficient...  I know that there is a belief that if kids only understand, they’ll be okay with what you say.  Sadly that is just plain wrong. 

This does make adult sense.  Kids don’t think like adults.  Kids need and actually want for you to know what is right and good and helpful and just teach it to them.  Guide, direct, teach. Explaining and explaining, clarifying, saying in other words has many downsides.

Firstly, kids turn off quite rapidly when you are doing it (often because they just get lost in the rational explanation) and secondly (this is really important for the future!), you teach your kids that if you use a lot of words and explain and explain, whatever it is becomes okay (because that is the kid understanding of your long explanation).   

You may be thinking how much you would have appreciated explanations when you were a kid.  If only my parents had told me why I should do this or not do that…But again, you are thinking this as an adult and like an adult.    

Kids need and want direction.  Really.  They are kids.  They don’t know stuff.  They depend on YOU to tell them what to do, when to do, how to do.  You are the parent.  It’s what is expected.

Here’s a little anecdote:  On a cold March day in New York city, a very intelligent and educated mother asked her daughter of 2.5 if she would like to put on her coat.  The little girl said no.  So the mom explained and explained articulately, thoughtfully, explaining the advantages of wearing a coat in the cold weather, the disadvantages of not wearing a coat in cold weather… and the girl kept on saying NO.  This was going nowhere.  I must admit to having intervened to tell the little girl she was wearing a coat, it was put on, and off we went.  Later I talked with the mother who told me that he daughter was two and a half and had opinions.  I told her that her daughter needed her to know things, to guide, direct, teach.  I explained that the burden to the child of expecting her know and decide that which she cannot know or decide is unfair and creates anxiety.  The mom understood.  I hope she has changed her way of dealing with her daughter.

Long, detailed, thoughtful, cogent explanations confuse little kids…and bigger kids.  

Say 50% of what you were planning to say, and you will have said twice as much.

What I Learned From the Keynote Speaker

By: Robert Schmidt, M.A.

I was at a mental health agency event in Massachusetts last week where I heard a wonderful keynote speaker who really got my mind thinking about how therapy is supposed to work. This guy shared a really heartfelt story about his difficult childhood in Chicago and his process of change through treatment. 

He’s now working in the mental health field and making a pretty significant impact on his community. He’s is also starting on his doctoral work in the fall. He provided a great example of how therapy can make all the difference for people. When he was done sharing the story someone asked him to describe his therapist, and his reaction was funny: he kind of froze. All he could say about her was that she was very short. He made a joke about it and it seemed to satisfy the person who asked the question but I thought that was really amazing. Here’s this guy who is without question a different/better person because of treatment experience he had when he was young, and yet it was almost impossible for him to talk about the person who helped him make that change or what they did with him to make that change happen.

I think this is a fairly common phenomenon. People don’t always know what it is that their therapists do for them even though they want to give the therapists credit for the positive changes they experience. I think in the case of this keynote speaker, his inability to put a finger on his therapist’s approach was because his treatment process was fairly extensive and he could not have given a sincere answer to a question like “what was the one thing your therapist did that made you?... 

Those sorts of questions are built on false premises. To think that recovery comes from a single moment or a single relationship or a single critical realization is in most cases an oversimplification. We hear all kinds of stories like that on tv or in books but I don’t think they’re genuine. 

I don’t think many people have their minds changed forever by a single moment. Instead, I think that mental health/recovery/change comes from when major realizations get piled on top of one another and tested out in lived experience over time. I think that’s why 28 day rehabs rarely help people, they just don’t allow enough time for recovery to take root.

I like to think of my own recovery as the sum total of the contributions made by many people over a long period of time, and I enjoy thinking about the contributions that each of them made.  I have a file cabinet in my mind of people who were instrumental in my early recovery. It seems to me like each of them just showed up at different times and added different ingredients to the stew that I am now. I’m so glad that I met all of them and that I was given enough time in treatment for each of them to pass through it with me. 

I would encourage anybody who has a loved one in treatment to have as much patience as possible and to encourage their loved one to commit some time to the process, because it doesn’t really get better all at once, that’s not realistic. 

Defining Recovery

By: Robert Schmidt, M.A.

What do we mean when we use the word “recovery” in regards to substance abuse rehabilitation? Generally speaking, this word suggests something different than words like “sobriety” or “abstinence” do. Saying that an individual is in recovery usually implies that he or she is actively working some solution based program to help them heal. This underscores an important distinction between those who abstain and create new lives as a result and those who abstain and become “dry drunks.”

There are dry drunks in AA. These are people who quit using alcohol, yet continue to behave as if they are still actively drinking. Alcoholic behavior includes more than just drinking alcohol. It includes: lying, stealing, cheating, moodiness, laziness and various sundry other forms of overall nastiness. 

My tennis coach in college always used to shout “recover back to the middle” after I or a teammate would be forced by an opponent to chase a ball out wide.  I think this use of the word really gets at the heart of what is meant by “recovery” in substance abuse parlance. To recover back to the center of the court is to regain a previously held position of strength: and for our purposes, recovery from addiction is the same. An individual who is recovering from addiction is working to regain the things that have been lost or sacrificed in their selfish (hopeless) pursuit of satiation during their time as an active addict.   

So, what is it that addicts must recover? Relationships come to mind immediately. As do economic and legal viability, but that only covers the external features of addiction and recovery. What about the internal cost of addiction? What is it that needs to be recovered intrapersonally? 

As the cycles of addictive behavior become repetitive and automatic, individuals caught up inside these cycles’ losses a portion of their ability to exercise free will. In response to this they develop justifications for the behaviors, attempting to soften the impact of demoralization that comes from loss of control. Two things happen at the same time: there is a loss of governance over both behavior and thinking. 

I don’t know what an individual is beyond their thoughts and behaviors. To lose those things is to become something else; to lose your humanity. 

It is devastating for family members to look at their loved ones and see someone other than who they know and care about. This is what happens with addiction: it becomes like a shell that covers over the person. There is an individual encased inside, and that is what needs to be recovered. 

One Extra Moment

By: Carol Maxym, Ph.D.

I just finished writing a blog on boundaries.  I finished it by suggesting that when you have a moment—waiting at a red light, caught in traffic, on hold on the phone were some good times to think about your boundaries.  And I stand by that.  

But here’s what I thought next:  What I said about finding the moment in between busy-nesses probably describes a lot of your life.  And that is something to notice, perhaps an issue, maybe a problem.  Harassed people are never at their best, harassed parents are most definitely stressed, beleaguered—well, not at your best.  When your life really and truly is about finding moments in between moments to think about important matters, that makes life tough.  It makes mothering and fathering tough.

It doesn’t matter if you are a stay-at-home mom or dad or one who works or works two jobs, being rushed makes life feel chaotic because being in a constant hurry creates stress which creates chaos which creates stress.  Possibly it makes you feel that you don’t or can’t give enough thought to what your are doing as you mother or father.  And I imagine you are now thinking something like, “Well, yes.  Thanks for noticing.  I thought you were here to help, to give some tips, some advice.”  Yes, I am.  At least I try. It is the goal.  

Firstly, I think it is helpful to notice what goes on in your world.  To notice actively, not just try to keep the motion going or having it just keep going because it doesn’t stop.  Noticing is important.  Deep breath.  Notice what is going on around you.  Force yourself to slow down—even if only for a minute or two and notice.  In the rush of everyday life, it is so easy to lose track, to forget to notice with a moment’s distance.  Then there is noticing how you feel, how your day’s events, conversations, emotional collisions, emotional caresses. It isn’t necessary to analyze or interpret each and every event, conversation, collision, and caress.  Sometimes just noticing it, then running it through your mind (thinking about it) without any judgment at all.  Just noticing.  

Here is the next tip: Stop micromanaging your child(ren)’s life/lives.  You are the mom or the dad.  That does not make you in charge of providing complete happiness and satisfaction on a path to ultimate success at all times.  It does not make you the one to take care of everything in your child’s life so he/she won’t be unhappy now or later.  It doesn’t make you homework monitor.  It doesn’t make you overseer of everything your child eats or drinks or wants.  It doesn’t make you the one to prevent all bad things from happening all the time.  That is NOT the role of a parent.  Micromanaging is bad for you.  It is more dangerous for your child because he/she isn’t learning how to manage his/her own life.

There are certainly many ways in which we are all more busy than we were five years ago or a decade ago.  I’m not sure we are busier than most people were a century ago (when there were many fewer conveniences in life or in homes).  I grant that our expectations of ourselves are more.  Our expectations of our kids are more.  They have more activities, more needs, more problems to be solved…or do they?  Must they?  Are they and you benefitting from the more?

Quite possibly you are thinking something like, “But of course they must go here and do that!”  Must they?  Then you think, “Well, if she isn’t at ballet, she’s on Instagram.”  H’mmm, now that is a problem.  Greater busy-ness may help, but doesn’t solve it.

But let’s be clear about the core of the problem.  Being busy isn’t a moral value.  It’s just busy.  Being connected to some number of people isn’t an ethical statement.  It’s just busy.

Where can you intervene?  Think about real needs and created needs.  Being in contact with others all day (and night) every day and night is not a need.  It is a created need.  Having everything managed in your child’s life is not a need. It is a created need.  The more needs you create or allow to be created around you, the more you are likely to fall into micromanaging.

How will your children manage if you don’t micromanage their lives?  Perhaps the more pertinent question is how will you manage if you don’t micromanage their lives?

Think about it.