Markham's Behavioral Health

SNAP (Food stamps) works

Congress just cut back on SNAP and instituted work requirements. But what about people who are already working and not making a living wage? America can afford a safety net to maintain people's dignity. We owe it to one another.

Attachment In Therapeutic Practice

I just finished Attachment In Therapeutic Practice by Jeremy Holmes and Arietta Slade.

 

Attachment In Therapeutic Practice is about attachment theory and how this understanding of human development and behavior can be used in psychotherapeutic practice. Even with 49 years of experience in the mental health field as a Psychiatric Social Worker, I am still learning more every day. Many of the ideas that Holmes and Slade describe I have been familiar with, and their way of connecting the dots is very helpful.

A human beings attachment style gets set in the first two years of life and is determined by a number of factors. The primary factor is the interaction between the infant and the primary caregiver. This interaction contributes to four attachment styles: secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized. I have come to realize that I have an avoidant attachment style which was formed by a relationship with my father in which I was afraid of him, and a relationship with my mother which was somewhat secure but at times questionable.

There are many components of attachment styles and one of the most significant is trust. Here's how trust plays out in attachment styles:

1. Secure - I usually trust that people will like me and I can depend on them.
2. Anxious - I never know for sure whether people will like me and I can depend on them.
3. Avoidant - I know that you can't depend on other people. The only person you can depend on is yourself.
4. Disorganized - I know people won't like me and bad things usually happen to me.

These "internal working models" IMWs, are usually unconscious. They significantly affect our relationships with ourselves and other people. Which pairings do you think might be the happiest on long term committed relationships like marriage?

Also, the client's attachment style has significant implications for work with a psychotherapist which involves developing a helping relationship. A psychotherapist must be aware and skilled to develop different relationships with clients based on the client's attachment style.

This is article #1 in a series on attachment theory.

 

 

 

 

Coffee is good for you.

THURSDAY, Nov. 30, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- Drinking three to four cups of coffee a day is not only safe for most people, it might protect against heart disease or an early death, a new review suggests.

The finding, which applies to so-called "moderate" coffee drinking, stems from a review of more than 200 previous studies.

For more click here.

Other studies have found that people who drink moderate amounts of coffee report less depression.

People with psychiatric illness more stigmatized by the health care system than by the public at large

Sisti says the stigma around mental health is "systematized" in our health care system, more so than in the public view.

Health care providers are "rather leery about these individuals because these people are, often at least according to the stereotype, high-cost patients who maybe are difficult to treat or noncompliant," he says. "I think the stigma that we should be really focused on and worried about actually emerges out of our health care system more than from the public."

For more click here.

Psychotherapy stories podcast, Episode #14 Attachment styles

Direct link to MP3:

Psychotherapy Stories, Episode #13, What's love?

Psychotherapy stories podcast, Episode #12, forgiveness

Psychotherapy Stories podcast - Two adulthoods

Kinship care

 

I see a few families in my private practice where grandparents and aunts and uncles are involved in kinship care.

Risk factors in later adolescent alcohol abuse

As former Executive Director of GCASA, the Genesee Council On Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, I am proud of the fact that we won the Drug Free Communities coalition of the year in 2006 out of 711 coalitions in the United States. I have continued to follow the prevention research and noticed today a study reported by Science Daily entitled, "Understanding Risk Factors Involved In The Initiation of Adolescent Alcohol Abuse" which was based on information provided by the Research Society On Alcoholism. 

The article highlights the findings that adolescent alcohol abusers tend to be male from higher socioeconomic groups, have poorer executive functioning, and who have begun dating at earlier ages under 14.

For more information click here.