I’m conflicted about the announcement of Project ECHO’s expansion last week. The ECHO Institute was founded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the GE Foundation and the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center to help primary care physicians do a better job with common, chronic condition diagnosis and treatment via Project ECHO.

On Friday, they announced a new initiative focusing on mental health treatment. The new effort will involve having academics train primary-care physicians to strengthen and better coordinate their mental health care.

It’s the right focus, because family doctors and general practitioners prescribe the majority of antidepressants in this country, and are often the first-line professional to see a patient who may have a mental health concern.

But then the director of Project ECHO, Sanjeev Arora, spoke.

Having adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) can be frustrating.

Merely struggling with compensating for the challenges so they don’t interfere with daily functioning and learning new ways to do things can be taxing. There is a constant internal battle of symptom and strategy waging inside yourself when you are coping with ADHD.

In fact, a lot about ADHD is exhausting; however, putting up with or hearing from people who misunderstand or have misconceptions about ADHD has to top the list.

Recently I was on a social chat forum online when the question was asked: What is the most frustrating misconception about ADHD that you have heard?

Father’s Day was just this Sunday, graduation has begun and summer officially starts in a few days. During this time of parties and obligations, how are you managing your physical and mental health?

Summer seems like the time for play and relaxation. It’s easy to associate the warm weather with a more carefree lifestyle. Obligations fall away, beach and barbecues take center stage and it’s the time to indulge in light reading and sweet frozen treats. Well, that’s how commercials make it out to be. But if your reality doesn’t measure up to the image, it’s not a bad thing. In fact, you’re probably normal.

Days are broken up into seasons. Our lives too are comprised by seasons-seasons of hope, grief, happiness and difficulty. If you’re in smack dab into one of the harshest ones, don’t fret. Remember there is truth in the proverb, “This too shall pass.” Our top posts this week reflect that. You may be dealing with addiction recovery, finding ways to be more balanced, or looking to be free of a dependency on food, chemicals or tech toys. Each brings hope that eventually whatever you are going through will subside. With the right combination of knowledge, courage and awareness, you might be able to endure or even savor the season you’re currently in. Enjoy!

{Flickr photo by CJ}

Gaining Emotional Maturity is Key to Addiction Recovery
(The Impact of …

This guest article from YourTango was written by Sharon Rivkin and Nancy Lee Bentley.

Feng shui, often called the art of placement, is an ancient oriental science incorporating astronomy, geography, environment, magnetic fields, physics and natural elements. The Chinese have been using it four thousand years to optimize living and working environments, with an amazing track record of benefits in health, happiness, prosperity and relationships for those who study and use its principles.

Ask practitioner Sophia Schaul; her love life’s dry spell and failing business turned right around using Feng Sui. Now both she and her husband Chris are happy, successful feng shui, (say fung-shway) consultants.  She says even the simple placement of doors, mirrors, or a fish tank, as well as colors, textures and sounds in the house or office have significance and influence the flow of “chi” or energy in our lives.

The bedroom is especially important in this system, since it’s the key area of the house where love, intimacy, relaxation and reproduction flourish.

Save the date for our latest free webinar, to be held next Monday, June 24: Cultivate Empowering Beliefs – How to Create Personal Freedom and End Self-Sabotage.

If you tend to sabotage your plans in life, it is likely because of personally held, but conflicting beliefs.

Conflicted beliefs manifest conflicted behaviors. The problem is, many limiting beliefs operate beneath the surface. Even though they affect you deeply, you may not be aware of them or how they work against you.

In this new webinar by Psych Central blogger and life coach Mike Bundrant, you will learn the source of your negative beliefs… as well as how to let them go.

Julie A. Fast once told her dad that she disliked being single but felt like it was the best option at the time.

“I just get too anxious with dating.” He replied, “Well, no one wants to have a relationship with someone with bipolar disorder.”

Even close family can make insensitive remarks about mental illness from time to time. (We covered nine common comments here.) “I know for sure that he was not trying to be mean. He simply wasn’t thinking,” said Fast, a coach who works with loved ones of people with bipolar disorder, and author of bestselling books on the disorder, including Taking Charge of Bipolar Disorder.

But these comments still sting. And they can nick an already slim sense of self, which is likely bruised from your own biting inner critic.

10:00 a.m. Accidentally pressed “reply all” to everyone in my company, offering sincere condolences to a co-worker who lost her mom three years ago, which spurred dozens of emails companywide on who died, and whether or not the company should send flowers.

Oops.

10:50 a.m. Wrote a premature announcement on a website that I would not be blogging there anymore –which got me cut off from access to the blog.

Yikes!

12:00 p.m. Forgot my towel at the public pool. Had to air off using the hand and hair dryers.

Embarrassing.

5:30 p.m. Showed up at my daughter’s book group on time for once! The mom answers the door and tells me it’s next week.

Really?

That is an average beginning to most days.

I recently wrote of an informative NBC News article of June 2, 2013 (see part 1 here). Investigative reporter Rebecca Ruiz laid out medical research evidence pointing toward non-genetic alterations in brain chemistry — that is, organic changes in the brain’s chemistry after birth.

Specifically, Ruiz’s article was centered around the behavioral concept of resiliency. She provided medical research and testimony, as well as case study, that early formative experiences may produce structural adaptations to genes

Amazing, that early experiences can have such an impact on the developing physical brain. But what about later in life? Short of the eventual physical decline of aging in the brain structure, are there other experiences which significantly alter the actual organic brain?

Drink and drugs immediately come to mind… But these affect functioning ability, no?

Immature love says, “I love you because I need you.”

Mature love says, “I need you because I love you.”
~ Erich Fromm

One of the best things about “being in love” is that you feel really good about yourself. It’s not only that you perceive the other person as terrific; it’s that you feel terrific about who you are and what you’re about. Yes, emotions are contagious. People catch them from others. So, when your love is acting lovingly toward you, it’s natural for you to feel joyous, confident, smart and secure.

Yet, as time passes, some “loving relationships” become anything but loving — indeed, some become downright abusive. How does something like that happen? How can “love” be experienced so differently by different people?

All around us there are competent, smiling people with good hearts and good jobs. Stand-up men and women who do their best to provide for their family, friends, children, and co-workers. People who laugh easily at others’ jokes, generously offer advice and compassion, and put others’ needs before their own.

But if we look a little more closely, we might see a flicker of self-doubt in the eyes of these fine folks. If we listen with a little extra care, we may sense a subtle lack of self-worth lurking beneath their surface. If we watch a little more attentively, we may see some effort behind their smiles and a waver in their confidence.

These are the people who are living their lives under the influence of powerful, invisible childhood emotional neglect (CEN).

I love learning about the creative processes and daily habits of people who’ve given us great gifts, everything from powerful writing to awe-inspiring art to beautiful symphonies.

So I was excited to pick up a copy of Mason Currey’s book Daily Rituals: How Artists Work. In it, Currey shares the everyday routines of writers, composers, painters, playwrights, poets, philosophers, filmmakers, scientists and other artists — 161 in total.

In his introduction, he notes that Daily Rituals is “about the circumstances of creative activity, not the product; it deals with manufacturing rather than meaning.” His goal, he says, is “…to show how grand creative visions translate to small daily increments; how one’s working habits influence the work itself, and vice versa.”

Daily Rituals is a fascinating glimpse into some of the greatest minds, and the habits and practices that are integral to their creative process.

There was a fascinating article that recently showed up on NBC News.com on June 2.  It dealt with the overarching concept of resiliency possibly being rooted in childhood, and featured some survivor stories of recent tragedies of natural disasters.  It presented that some people did well; others less so.

The article nicely brought a mental health issue with the potential to affect us all one step closer to the general public.  As well, though, it pointed toward something fascinating — that in terms of causalities of mental health and illness, there is “nature and nurture” and then there is something else.

“Nature” widely has been understood to be our genetics;  “nurture” our early life experiences.  Human behavior has been catchphrased as shaped by these two for centuries.

But then there is brain chemistry.  The genetics category, you say?  Not so fast. Apparently it can be altered by early formative experience.