Loneliness

I want to share with you a bit from what I read in Psychology Today, April 2018 edition regarding loneliness because I do think it is a problem in today’s society. I see it with teens who spend excessive time alone on the internet. I see it with people suffering who are unable to share and become withdrawn. I see it in occupations where socializing is restricted. I see it so much that I am glad it is a topic of concern. They are roughly twice as likely to die of all causes. “Loneliness is not simply being alone,” indicates John Cacioppo, the director of the University of Chicago’s Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience and author of Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection (p 45). Researchers make a point of distinguishing the effects of loneliness from those of depression. Depression does elevate the risk for Alzheimer’s slightly but not as much as loneliness (p 46). Being married does not protect you from being lonely. A 2012 study followed 1600 adults over 60 for six years. Out of 43% of participants who reported chronic loneliness, more than half were married. Loneliness has also increased dramatically among teens and young adults. A recent British study found that the youngest people surveyed between 16 and 24 were the most likely of all age groups to report feeling lonely (p48). In the USA loneliness is especially lethal for military veterans. A 2017 study by Yale researchers found the biggest contributor to veteran suicides on average 20 a day was not war related trauma but loneliness. Approximately 40% of Americans reported regularly feeling lonely in 2010, up from about 20% in the 80’s. The number of Americans who say they have no one to confide in nearly tripled between 1985 and 2005 (p49). Now of course being Canadian, I will like to talk about the Canadian Veteran. Sage, spring edition, 2018, dedicated the entire magazine to Veterans. According to Veteran Affairs Canada, the number of homeless veterans has grown each year since 2015. On Jan 1, 2015, the department reported 475 homeless vets. In one year that number has grown to 578. As of Jan 1, 2017, there were 687 homeless vets, then 770 in Sept 2017. Canadian Vets are more prone to suicide. Suicide risk for male veterans of all ages is 36% higher than for men who never served. Those under 25 years of age are 242% more likely to kill themselves than non vets of the same age (SAGE, p 28). Homeless shelters only began being asked about veterans a year ago….”unlike the U.S., Canada was doing practically nothing about homeless vets (SAGE, p 8). I have provided you with some info regarding the articles and if you want more, please feel free to look up the references. It was during my first basic psychology course that my professor said that the Aunt Martha that people used to confide in is no longer for many. Sometimes, just being able to talk to someone, to confide in someone has been replaced by the therapist. I know that for myself as a therapist, I normally ask if the client has a confident, a social network, a group of friends, however what is important is the quality of those relations. I always promote a balance, a hobby, an outlet for those who need it. I do not find it amazing that some have no time for themselves because they spend all their time helping or nurturing others. They need to slow down, reflect and begin to take care of themselves, to have a life so to speak. They need to spend time with others to have “fun.” I hope for those of you who read this article and can identify with this, that you begin to think of ways to feel less lonely. Alone time is important. However, socialization is important too. We need others in our lives. Why not take a chance on someone today who you would like to meet? Why not tell your partner how you are feeling? Why not join a club, take a cooking course etc…and meet other people who you may have something in common with? Why not smile at a person today? What do you think? I wish you all a Happy Easter this weekend. If you have no family why not invite a friend? You can choose your friends. You can choose to mingle with those you feel a commonality with. You cannot really change others, but you can certainly make changes yourself. If you think no one cares, you are wrong. Many do care and do great things to reach out. Feeling lonely surrounded by lots of people? Go find someone you have something in common with. Go find someone who appreciates you for you. I find that so many feel guilt and shame when that has been instilled by the actions of others. Look at yourself in the mirror and tell yourself how much you love you. Then go out there and start talking to people. Meet a friend for lunch and tell her or him how you are feeling. What do you think? Happy Easter everyone and thank you for reading my blogs.

Scam Alert

Hi, On a weekly basis there are attempts to scam me and it gets rather tiresome and time consuming. It also takes up too much of my time. A few weeks ago a neighbour came to see me and let me hear the voice mail on her cell phone. It was a man's authorative deep voice saying that if she didn't pay a certain sum, for I think it was revenue Canada, the police were going to come and arrest her. Yah, yah, yah........I informed my client that the police would never call and leave a message like that. These scams can be very disturbing for some. These people are after your money whether you have any or not and people regardless of education etc.....provide that money out of fear. Fear is my business and so I will start copying some of the stuff I get so you have an inkling of what to expect. I have also been having calls claiming to be from google asking me to press 7 or 9 to continue or naught. I called google in the States and saw them here at the HOme show. I provided them with the number and also reported them to the do not call list. Please do not press these numbers when you are asked. Hang up. So, note the below. Very tiresome, but when I get lemons, I like to make lemonade, so here is a tip from me to you. I am still doing my taxes and am seriously thinking of hiring someone next year. I may be ripping myself off. I will write another blog as promised this week about lonliness. I have also been reading more about veterans pertaining to the USA and us here. So, have a good week. And thank you for reading my blogs. This letter is notifying you of the death of my client. I am contacting you to inform you that a notice has been given by the bank that if no one comes forward for the claim of the assets of the deceased that it will be marked as ownerless and subsequently claimed by the Government. I found your name in some of the documents of the deceased and traced your email through an advanced search.I am contacting you because you bear the same last name with my late client.I want to know if you are in anyway related to my late client. Please respond with your full name and contact telephone number. Best Regards, William Ryan Esq

The tax person

I know I wanted to write to you about an article I read regarding lonliness. I also have one more conference to share with you regarding transcendence. However, as you know life happens and I have to focus on my income tax and clients this week, as well as my weekly dose of fun. I will let you know what I did for fun next week. If I tell you now and I do not have fun, than it is not fair to you, nor me. Stay tuned. I want to thank you all who read my blogs. USA, you are my favourite country outside my own of course. I love New York and Disney World is my favourite destination. If I was wealth, I would have a condo at Disney for sure. As I get older and my family and friends spend more time in Florida, I am left behind with my life in progress. I am not complaining. I love my life. However, I also love sun.........I have a priority. What is your priority? What stage in life are you at? Are you young and trying to find your station in life? Are you finding yourself happy? Are you older looking back at your life and wish you had done things differently? Some can stay stuck in the past and forget about living in the moment. I have always had dreams which is part of my life. I have probably done everything I have wanted to. Life is not long enough for me to try more careers. I would love to be a lawyer, an investigative reporter, an actor, a professional singer, a ............ If I had more lives I would experience more careers and more hobbies and more of life, because I love it so. What are you doing in your life? Do you enjoy going to work? Do you smile as you greet your partner or go home to him or her? Do you feel good about yourself? Why not take a look in the mirror today. Who do you see? Now smile and tell yourself how beautiful you are and how you love yourself. Keep doing this, if you are not feeling it, each morning. One morning you may surprise yourself and actually see the beauty within you. What do you think?

Come From Away - musical. What do you enjoy? Explore your feelings.

This is certainly the best musical I saw this past year. It evoked emotions that surprised me. I laughed, I teared, I was happy and I was contemplative. What happened at the terrorist attack with the twin towers, and other disasters during 9/11 clearly more than upset the world, as it was designed to do so. However, what the terrorist fails to realize due to his limitations, is how people bond, and how the best can be seen as well with those suffering. This theatre show is definitely about bonding, but it is even much more. The setting is Gander Newfoundland where airplanes land and park, following the acts of terrorism during 9/11. I too learned a bit more about my country. I didn't realize that Gander is small. I thought it was a metropolitan city because of the size of its airport. I learned a bit about their customs and structure. This is a production that won awards because it is amazing, the acting, singing and story. I don't want to say too much more because I do not want to give anything away as a spoiler alert. One of the things I normally ask my clients is what do they do for fun? What do they like? What are their hobbies? What I do find is that some have no interests. They think they may have no interest because they are overwhelmed, or depressed or etc.....They may fail to enjoy hobbies, etc....because they have never had the opportunity to try or they had a bad experience. I always encourage a balance no matter how busy one seems to think he or she is. I encourage a balance to enjoy what life offers. Humans are not meant to live isolated. As I watched the performance I was quite aware of all the emotions I was feeling because I have been trained to do so. You can learn too to focus on how you are feeling in the moment and try to explain this feeling to yourself or someone close to you. Explore how you feel when you are in the company of other(s). Is it positive? Negative? Why? If negative, what are you going to do about it, now that you are acutely aware? What makes you laugh and/or cry? What memories are conjured? Why not take some time this weekend to reflect? What is you position in politics, religion, quality of relationships, definition of fun? Does any of this make you mad, sad or happy? Are you content? More than content? Less than content? What do you do to relax? Is it healthy? Do you try to escape by drinking, taking drugs, or have you realized that you may have an addiction because you cannot seem to stop or have binges? Take some time to reflect and ask yourself if you are where you want to be? If not, why not start today to make a change in your life, whatever it may be you need? Do you need to develop coping skills? Do you need a satisfying job? Do you need a healthier relationship with someone in your life? Do you need to find a way to forgive? Do you need to find something to enjoy? Do you need to take control back for your life, or make a change? Why not start right now? What do you think? Have a nice weekend. I shall.

Abortion

Ok, I have one more conference to talk about after this one from November. There is so much to tell you and I realize I am behind, especially regarding notes, but I will get there eventually. Those of you who have come to know me from my writing, realize I do talk about things which may be controversial. This is one topic that certainly is. This is not about taking a side. This is about human suffering and that is my job. I help people deal and cope with their suffering. I don’t normally have people see me because they are happy with life. When that happens, they no longer need me. When I first heard about abortion as a very young person, I did not think much about it. When I grew older and some people I knew had abortions and suffered depression afterwards, I noticed. When mothers had miscarriages and suffered - I noticed. When a grandmother was on the tv news not that long ago because her pregnant daughter was killed and she said she was suffering because her unborn grandchild was not acknowledged in court and therefore the killing of the fetus would not be held into account - I noticed. My first case as an intern, of a woman suffering from having an abortion twenty years earlier was an awakening. Since, I realize that many women still suffer after having an abortion decades earlier. They are mourning their unborn child. I notice. When as an intern at a hospital, one of the supervisors reported how a woman, not a Canadian wanted an abortion. The patient was hysterical and upset and the supervisor informed her which hospitals would help her with that. I remember as an intern wondering why she wasn’t more concerned about helping her deal with her hysteria. What had happened to the Supervisor was that she allowed her own biases being pro abortion, to interfere with actually helping the patient to deal with the pain, the core of what had happened to her. Instead, since she was working in a hospital where abortion was not an option and she didn’t like the policy, her focus was to quickly let the patient know where she could get it. I am not saying that people should not have the right to know what their options are, but the helper’s biases should not take a forefront. During this conference day I again listened to what I had listened to many times before, only from much older women, how they had an abortion, how they felt they were pressured into it and how they could not stop suffering or thinking of their baby and how they had killed their baby. I mostly hear from women blaming others, such as their husbands, parents etc…..I often wonder if they can gradually assume some responsibility if they would be able to begin healing. My question to these mothers are, “Can you forgive yourself?” Sometimes, their partner is brought into the therapy room and the partner does not understand. I find it very common that partners or friends etc….cannot understand why a person who is suffering, suffers years after any incident. This only compounds the suffering. That can be the topic of another blog. I bought and read a book years ago before I was a therapist, The Hand of God A Journey from Death to Life by the Abortion Doctor Who Changed his Mind by Bernard N. Nathanson, M.D., 1996: Regnery Publishing: Washington. Dr Nathanson presided over 60,000 abortions as Director of the world’s largest abortion clinic and was the nation’s most prominent abortionist. He helped through his work legalize abortion. Then he had a change of heart. He became very opposed to abortion. At the writing of his book, Dr Nathanson was a clinical Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at New York Medical College and a visiting scholar at Vanderbilt University. I read the book and will read it one more time before donating it the people who held this conference. I asked myself why a physician who had performed so many abortions would change his mind and become an advocate for the other side? Sorry, but you are going to have to read the book for yourselves. I really took notice this time. I also took notice when a classmate of mine in a biology course was suffering because she had attended to an abortion in a hospital and she too suffered because she held the fetus until she/he died. Fortunately the mother never knew. The fetus had been placed in a bucket and my school mate could not bear it. I notice all this and then have to ponder how to help people heal when they suffer such. For the women talking about their experiences at the conference, I know this promotes their healing. At this conference I learned that clients who suffer from abortions are from all religious dominations and are atheists. I learned that women may attend retreats, monthly support gatherings, and annual weekend retreats. Clients are encouraged to provide names to the children they mourn for. They have an option to do it privately. Roses represent each child. These women suffer greatly especially during Christmas and Mothers day. I was very impressed with this conference and almost didn’t go because I was concerned I would not learn anything new which is becoming the norm in too many conferences, workshops etc… that I attend, but I was very wrong. What would I advise you if you are a woman suffering from an abortion you had? Give your child or grandchild etc….a name. Paint a picture of how you see your baby through your own lens. Don’t judge yourself or let others judge you. Allow yourself to grieve. Forgive yourself. See a professional if this is haunting you and you cannot seem to move on. You do not have to suffer in silence.