Out of Your Head

01/10/2023

Unlimited Growth Increases the Divide: Although discourse is slowly shifting, we are quick to individualize the problem of addiction. It is easier to reduce the issue to one of willpower or of disease, both of which situate the problem within the individual. As we begin to talk more openly about mental health, it is vital that we consider the wider social context of addiction.

Full post: https://www.outofyourhead.ca/blog

12/07/2022

Gaslighting - My thoughts on the word of the year.

Since I started my private practice two years ago, I've had to pay careful attention to social media trends in mental health messaging. This is increasingly the language people use, in session and in life, to describe emotional and psychological pains and discomforts. These are the terms they mobilize to articulate difficulties in their relationships with others.

Click here for full post:
https://www.outofyourhead.ca/blog

11/23/2022

Photo throwback to early COVID times, days after the mask mandate came into effect on planes. We're in a different place now, finding movement again after a time of stagnation.

Historically, our social programs have been born out of times of crisis (Guest, 1995). Let this be no different.

We have normalized receiving patchwork care in an overstressed system. We have normalized burnout in health professionals. For two years, we kept a distance from friends and family to protect one another, and to protect our fragile system. The best way of supporting the heroes that we've praised, the essential workers, is to support them in their fight for a system that has the capacity to care for us.

Click here to read full blog post:
https://www.outofyourhead.ca/blog/petition-for-universal-mental-health-amp-substance-use-health

Or here to sign the Canadian Mental Health Association's petition for universal mental health and substance use services:

https://www.actformentalhealth.ca/

11/14/2022

Surviving in cities requires a certain degree of disconnection. Unfiltered, the barrage of textures, sounds, sights and smells is too much to take in. There are too many people, too much movement. We become so effective at shutting out stimuli we don’t even realize we’re doing it.

Read full post on my blog -
www.outofyour head.ca/blog

11/14/2022

Disconnect

Even after two years here, the view from the beach a few blocks from home regularly stops me in my tracks. I feel like I’m running into a postcard as the sun sets over the water with the mountains in the background.

I run without music so I can hear the waves crash on the beach. I watch for herons and seals. I notice the first signs of snow on the North Shore mountains. As I cut through Stanley Park, I’m struck by the silence. I hear my feet on the gravel and notice the stillness around me...

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A few days later, a woman sitting in that same spot called out to me. “Do you want an Oreo?” I smiled and said, “No, thank you,” while reaching into my bag of groceries. I asked if she wanted an apple. “Sure, but only if you take the Oreo.” It sounded like a fair trade and I told her so....

11/05/2022

Contemplating the contradiction of expensive coffee on East Hastings.

Next week will mark my two year anniversary as a resident of Vancouver. I now describe the experience of being here as a sort of chronic culture shock. I notice differences and wonder what they mean for the city and more broadly, for society.

My new blog will share my disorientation and my efforts to understand the city through my lens as doctoral student researching addiction and as a practicing social worker/psychotherapist.

www.outofyourhead.ca/blog

11/02/2022

https://www.outofyourhead.ca/blog/out-of-my-head

My thoughts on mental health, as a social worker, psychotherapist and researcher living, practicing and studying on the unceded lands of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh people known as Vancouver, BC .

Thoughts on mental health from a psychotherapist and mental health researcher.