Being mentally healthy during childhood means reaching developmental and emotional milestones and learning healthy social skills and how to cope when there are problems. Mentally healthy children have a positive quality of life and can function well at home, in school, and in their communities. Read more ›
Whenever a mass shooting takes place in schools, public discussion often focuses on laws or policies that might have prevented the tragedy. But averting school violence needs more than gun policy. It requires both prevention and crisis response that take students’ emotional well-being – not just their physical safety – into account. Read more ›
The news can be devastating. Events such as a mass shooting at an elementary school can be incomprehensible to adults — so how do we talk about them with kids? Read more ›
In proud partnership with Common Ground, a locally renowned speaker series for over 15,000 families in over 40 schools, we are excited to bring you this Voices of Compassion podcast episode. While Common Ground is primarily a parent education consortium, this conversation is specifically targeted to mental health professionals in schools and beyond. Read more ›
As a healthcare professional, you may face stress on the job under usual conditions due to long shifts, competing responsibilities, and witnessing or hearing about difficult patient experiences. As a responder on the front lines, you may be noticing signs of stress and distress in yourself and your coworkers. Read more ›
Although data exist to support the notion that physician self-care is correlated with patient care, the culture of medicine has traditionally valued the ideals of self-sacrifice and perfectionism — often to the detriment of clinicians themselves. Read more ›
Between 2009 and 2019, the percentage of teens who reported having “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness” rose from 26 percent to 37 percent and, in 2021, to 44 percent. Further, research shows that 1 in 5 youth in distress felt that they didn’t have someone they could turn to in a crisis. How can we let our teens know we’re here for them and protect them from significant mental health challenges? Read more ›
Many of my patients are stressing over—and feeling exhausted by—the same things: uncertainty about travel and social gatherings, trouble focusing and completing tasks, and general burnout, to name a few. We’re all tired, and talking about exhaustion over and over again is, well, exhausting. Read more ›
In 2018, Isabelle Roskam, PhD, and her colleagues developed a measurement called the Parental Burnout Assessment after surveying more than 900 parents they had determined to be experiencing burnout. From these subjects’ testimonies, the researchers extracted four dimensions of parental burnout: exhaustion in one’s parental role, contrast with previous parental self, feelings of being fed up with one’s parental role, and emotional distancing from one’s children. Read more ›
Children often experience a rollercoaster of emotions, even on a good day. But prolonged symptoms of sadness, irritability, short-temper, change in eating or sleeping habits or lost concentration or interest could be signs of depression. How do you know what’s normal and what’s cause for concern? Read more ›
