Articles
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Mental and Emotional Wellbeing in Childhood & Adolescence
Mental and emotional wellbeing of children is vital for their overall development. As children progress through different stages of childhood, their emotional needs and challenges evolve. It is crucial to implement strategies that promote mental and emotional wellbeing at each stage. This article explores practical approaches to enhance mental and emotional wellbeing among young pre-school…
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Everything You Need to Know About Provisional Psychologists
Our provisional psychologists have studied a minimum of 4-5 years in tertiary education before undertaking an additional internship year to develop their professional practice. During this internship, they undertake a higher level of supervision from fully registered senior psychologists. This supervision process ensures that provisional psychologists have additional support in skill development, ethical practice, and…
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How to support someone with Postnatal Depression
Postnatal depression can be an overwhelming and isolating experience for mothers after childbirth. The transition into motherhood brings forth numerous challenges, alongside the joy of having a newborn. New mothers can often grapple with disrupted sleep, depleted energy levels, diminished self-esteem, and pervasive feelings of inadequacy and guilt. What is Postnatal Depression? Postnatal depression is…
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A Guide to Overcoming Codependency in Relationships
Codependency in relationships is a dysfunctional dynamic where one person excessively relies on another for their self-worth and well-being. It involves sacrificing one’s own needs, enabling destructive behaviours, and lacking healthy boundaries, hindering personal growth and perpetuating dysfunction. Are you in a codependent relationship? Relationship codependency is a dysfunctional pattern of behaviour. A codependent person…
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How Do I Stop Worrying?
How many times have you heard the words ‘stop worrying’ by those well intentioned loved ones? And how many times have you wanted to answer, ‘tell me how, and I will.’? It’s a frustrating experience to be repetitively told that all you need to do to ease your anxiety is to stop this seemingly incessant…
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Anxiety, Worrying, and Overthinking
Anxiety, worrying or overthinking are like most things — on a scale. Some people will avoid ‘scary’ things like the plague, others will play an event over in their head a thousand times, or ruminate and stay up all night worrying about ‘what if’. Some people will be known as ‘nervous’ whilst others will be…
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Tips to Improve Your Sleep Hygiene
Did you know there’s a term for your bedtime rituals and nightly habits? Collectively, these behaviors are known as sleep hygiene. You already know sleep is important; and if you want to get a better night’s sleep, the answer often begins with improving your sleep hygiene. Improvements in sleep hygiene offer an ‘easy win’ in…
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Anxiety In A Time Of Uncertainty
Anxiety in times of uncertainty can be difficult to manage. You already know the drill. In an effort to keep you alive, your brain is constantly scanning the environment looking for things to worry about that are a possible ‘danger’ to you. It is a pattern recognition machine, and oh boy does it go to…
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In Times of Uncertainty or Anxiety, Follow Your ‘True North’, your Values
It is difficult to stay focused on what is important in times of anxiety or uncertainty. When the ocean is calm and you can see land, it is easy to navigate true north; you can see the way forward with your own eyes, all you have to do is stay the course. However, when the…
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Games to Play with Children at Home
Playing games with your children at home offers numerous benefits. First and foremost, it creates a strong bond and strengthens the parent-child relationship. It provides an opportunity for quality time together, fostering communication and understanding. Games stimulate cognitive development by enhancing problem-solving skills, critical thinking, and strategic planning. They promote creativity and imagination, allowing children…
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How To Get Better Sleep (And Why It Is Vital To Your Mental Health)
It isn’t a health secret that getting a good night’s sleep is beneficial, but what role does your sleep play in your mental health? Studies show that during REM (rapid eye moment) sleep, the individual gains benefits of enhanced learning, memory, and improved emotional health. Sleep disruption, or as we may refer to it ‘a…
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Is this Forever? The Permanency of Diagnosis
If you have recently received or your child has recently received a mental health diagnosis, you may be wondering if this diagnosis will last forever. The label and stigma of a mental health diagnosis can be pressure and temptation enough to want to avoid the entire process. Will this be my label for the rest…
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Divorce: How To Help Your Child Cope With Parental Separation
Experiencing divorce can be complicated for the entire family. As parents, it is uncharted territory as to how to proceed when it comes to topics like shared custody or split time between parents. It can be particularly difficult if a child will be seeing one parent significantly less due to relocation or custody issues. Separation…
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What is a Behavioural Assessment?
Is this normal? Is something wrong? Is this more than typical child- like behaviour? If you are parenting a child who may be exhibiting challenging behaviour then these questions may have crossed your mind a few times, or even a dozen times a day. Behavioural assessments are used to answer these questions, and examine whether…
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Mental Health and Childhood: Where did we go wrong?
It is no mystery that mental health issues are becoming more common in our children. There are staggering statistics that indicate children are experiencing more mental health issues and symptoms then the previous generations. The suicide rate for children 10-14 has doubled in the last decade. There has been a sharp uptick in both depression…
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What is Contempt? What is the Antidote for Contempt?
Contempt is harmful to any relationship. It can surface in anything from familial relationships, professional relationships, friendships, and even in romantic relationships. What exactly is contempt and how can you prevent it from damaging your relationships and your personal wellness? Contempt is defined by Merriam Webster as ‘the act of despising’ or the ‘lack of…
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What is Criticism? What is the Antidote within a Relationship?
Did you know that criticism is one of the four defining behaviours that predict the success of a relationship? But avoiding criticism within a relationship is commonly confused with never vocalising frustrations. There is a very distinct difference between criticism and verbalising frustrations or complaints. Let’s look at the definition of criticism, as well as…
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Navigating Divorce
Divorce has become common in our culture, with almost half of all marriages ending with divorce. It can be a trying time for an entire family, but it can be hard to navigate divorce without some guidelines. Emotions are high, there is an increase in stress and it is the beginning of a major lifestyle…
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What Is Stonewalling? What Is the Antidote in your Relationship?
Stonewalling is a common struggle in relationships. Some may also refer to this as receiving or giving their partner the ‘cold shoulder’. That moment when you or your partner shut down and walk away in the middle of a conflict. Perhaps it surfaces in your relationship as being intentionally avoidant or cold towards your partner. …
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Transitioning From School to the Workforce
Congratulations! You achieved your educational goal and now are a true working professional. Getting your first job is an exciting time of your life that should be celebrated, it may finally feel like you are now in the ‘real world’. Like any big life transition, there can be some struggles and challenges that you may…
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Workplace Bullying
We are lucky that culturally we have begun to focus on the impacts of bullying on children. Many organisations and schools have developed anti-bullying policies or practices. The problem is that the word ‘bullying’ for most of us leads us to think of examples amongst school aged children. What if you are being bullied as…