Psychotherapy Articles

Listed by most recent articles first.

• Living with Depression: Why Biology and Biography Matter
  Dr. Deborah Serani's new book, Living with Depression: Why Biology and Biography Matter along the Path to Hope and Healing is a solid entry in the self-help depression book genre, once you get past the ...
• Grief After Suicide: An Interview With Dr. Jack Jordan
  With approximately 30,000 suicides happening each year in the US, countless people are grieving the loss of loved ones who have taken their lives. The grieving process is different to those who have lost a spouse, father, sister, or friend to cancer, heart disease, or a stroke. Many “suicide survivors” are left to process their emotions in private because the topic of suicide is still so taboo in this country. One great resource is the Grief Support Services of the Samaritans of Boston. They recently conducted an interview with Dr. Jack Jordan on the topic of grieving a loved one who has committed suicide. Dr. Jordan is a licensed psychologist in private practice in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and Wellesley, Massachusetts, where he specializes in working with loss and bereavement. He is coeditor of the 2011 book Grief After Suicide (Routledge) and the Clinical Consultant for Grief Support Services of the Samaritans of Boston (www.samaritanshope.org), where he is helping to develop innovative outreach and support programs for suicide survivors. I have obtained permission to reprint the interview here, specifically for Psych Central readers. Q. Your book notes that “suicide survivors” can include people who are not on close terms with the deceased. Can you explain? A. Immediate kin are the most likely to be affected, but it’s not just them. It could be a next-door neighbor who saw the person every day. Or a subway train driver could be traumatized after someone jumps in front of a train. Or a high-school student may have had no personal relationship with another student who died by suicide, but may have somehow identified with that person. In general, a survivor is anyone who felt responsible for the death or for not preventing it, or who was deeply and negatively impacted by the death. Q. How is grief after suicide different from other kinds of grief? A. It depends on what aspects of grief you’re talking about. After any type of death, there is a yearning for the deceased. After sudden death, there is shock or disbelief; people have trouble accepting the reality of the death. After a sudden, unexpected, violent death (such as a homicide or suicide), people focus on the horror or trauma of the death. There is a preoccupation with, “What did my loved one go through during their final moments?” But with suicide, there is a whole struggle with, “Did they know what they were doing? Why did they choose this? Didn’t they know how much this would hurt me?”
• Feedback-Informed Treatment: Empowering Clients to Use Their Voices
  How often does your therapist ask you how they’re doing? Or give you questionnaires to complete to see ...
• Overcoming Anxiety in Today’s Tough, Tuned-in, Plugged-in World
  Every era has its ups and downs — war, natural disasters, economic trouble, social problems and ...
• Differences Between Outpatient and Inpatient Treatment Programs
  For patients needing drug and alcohol treatment, outpatient and residential (inpatient) treatment programs can provide an essential level of ...
• What I Wish I Knew in Grad School: Current and Former Students Share 16 Tips
  Graduate school is both an incredibly challenging and rewarding time in ...
• 8 Tips for a Successful Internship
  You’ve finally received word that you’ve scored an internship site — a process that’s taken tremendous amounts of work and ...
• 9 Ideas for Increasing Your Chances of Matching
  “The number of students seeking internships significantly outnumbers the availability of internship positions,” according to Sharon Berry, Ph.D, ...
• 8 Hints for Selecting an Internship Site
  With so many internship sites to choose from, it can be hard to narrow down your search. What criteria ...
• Making the Most of Your Clinical Practicum
  A practicum placement is a pivotal and exciting time in a student’s graduate school career. You’re finally putting all ...
• Attachment-Focused Family Therapy Workbook
  Almost every mental health professional will remember the moment when they first discovered the counseling theory which really felt right for them and encapsulated their view of the world. For me, that moment came when ...
• The Long Half-Life of Trauma
  Here's a question: How many times in the last week have you thought about the disaster in Japan? What about the ...
• When One Bipolar Marries Another: An Interview with Shannon Flynn
  Today I have the honor of interviewing Shannon Flynn, who works at the National Institute of Mental ...
• A Users Guide to Therapy: What to Expect and How You Can Benefit
  Deciding to seek therapy can be downright frightening for some people. This can be due to confusion about how the therapeutic process works, inaccurate portrayals of psychotherapy in the media, or stigmatization and judgment from ...
• 7 Ways To Make Interfaith Relationships Work
  “People try to minimize the differences when they’re in love,” says Joel Crohn, Ph.D., author of Mixed ...
• The First Line of Treatment for Insomnia That’ll Surprise You
  Whenever most people have serious trouble sleeping, they automatically reach for a sleeping aid, whether that’s ...
• Making the Most of Your Whole Self: Being an Embodied Therapist
  Since human beings communicate through their bodies long before they learn to talk, the language of ...
• Psychologists Spill: When I Knew I’d Become a Psychotherapist
  For some people, what they want to be when they grow up comes in ...
• 9 Ways to Make the Most Out of Therapy
  Therapy can be tricky. Before even walking in the door for ...
• 10 Things You Should Know About Compulsive Hoarding
  Many people might claim that, at least at one point in their lives, they could be classified as a "pack rat" or a ...
• The House on Crash Corner
  Mostly anecdotal, “The House on Crash Corner,” by Mindy Greenstein, Ph.D., has a message if you “listen between the lines.” It’s a message on life and death, of understanding, simplicity, synchrony and relating. Divided into four ...
• 5 Steps to Reduce Worrying and Anxiety
  Everyone worries from time to time. But for some people, “worry is a way of life,” writes clinical ...
• Challenging Our Cognitive Distortions and Creating Positive Outlooks
  In this time of mounting economic issues, financial burdens, and the stress of everyday life many of us find ...
• The Handy Psychology Answer Book
  In The Handy Psychology Answer Book, Lisa J. Cohen, PhD endeavors to provide answers to approximately 1000 questions regarding the study of the human mind in an easy-to-read Q&A format. Dr. Cohen states that her ...
• How to Halt and Minimize Panic Attacks
  Experiencing a panic attack can be scary. While panic attacks vary among individuals, attacks tend to ...