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Cognitive Psychiatry

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United States
Chapel Hill, NC
Cognitive Psychiatry

A modern Psychiatric/Therapy Practice in Chapel Hill and Apex, NC

08/11/2025

Youth can find a lot of educational, fun and inspiring content online. But they also may come across unsettling, inappropriate and distressing content that can impact their mental health and wellbeing. 👧 👦

1) Define boundaries. Limit exposure to news coverage and social media use. Let them know they can talk to you about what they see, so they have a supportive outlet. Also, consider blocking sites you prefer they don’t see or think may trouble them.

2) Share information. Talk with your child about the news, explaining things at a level appropriate to their age. Listen and answer any questions they may have. Also, let them know it’s OK to ask questions and encourage them to do so. The more questions they hold inside, the more they might wonder, worry and let their imagination spiral to worst-case scenarios.

3) Be as truthful as possible. Answer their questions to the best of your knowledge and ability, and in a way they can understand. If you do not know the answer, that’s OK. Tell them you don’t know. You also could use this as an opportunity to teach them useful “media literacy” skills by showing them how to find information from a reliable source.

4) Be patient. Until a child fully comprehends the situation or feels reassured, they may ask the same question or similar questions several times. This is natural. By remaining calm and compassionate, you can help them sort it out and feel less stressed.

Wanting to know more about your mental health?
📲 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

08/08/2025

🌟 Give yourself space to change. Whether you’re heading off to university, moving to a new city or starting a job, you don’t have to know everything right now. Expect to grow and shift as you experience life.

😁 Make good choices. You need to look out for yourself. That includes considering the consequences of your actions, like staying out late the night before a major exam or splurging when you’re on a tight budget.

✍️ Understand you’re a work in progress. You may legally be an adult, but your body, mind and spirit continue developing well into your early 30s. Don’t be afraid to ask for help thinking through tough decisions or difficult feelings.

👨‍💻 Stay connected. Regularly keep in touch with trusted adults who can offer support and valuable advice.

🥗 Take care of yourself. Practice self-care for better health and wellbeing. That includes getting enough sleep, eating nutritious foods and being active.
Wanting to know more about your mental health?
📲 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

08/04/2025

International Youth Day is celebrated around the world every year on August 12. The United Nations’ goal is to give youth a voice in how communities and the future are shaped. In honor of this important day, let’s explore ways to nurture and raise awareness for youth mental health and well-being. 🧒 👟

Quick Stats:
-1 in 7 adolescents are affected by mental illnesses
-50% of mental illnesses begin by age 14

People with mental illnesses can and do lead active, productive lives, showing that these conditions can affect individuals from all backgrounds and walks of life. It’s important to understand that seeking professional help is nothing to be ashamed of. Everyone deserves the support they need to thrive.

👉 Complete 3 activities each week on your own or with an adolescent in your care:
http://spr.ly/6184fdPin

Wanting to know more about your mental health?
📲 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

08/01/2025

Preparing for transitions: Back to School 🎒 ✏️

🍎 Be empathetic
One of the most important ways to support your child is to consider their perspective. Sure, they may be excited to graduate to a new level, do new activities and meet new people. But they also are likely to feel nervous about the uncertainty change brings. Will they like their new teachers? Will they miss their current friends? Will they remember where the restroom is? Will they be able to manage the schoolwork? Will they feel accepted?

🍎 Recognize signs of stress and anxiety
Change is tough for most people at any age. Moving grades or schools can bring anxious thoughts and stress. Younger children might tell you through changes in behavior. They might get clingy, act out, withdraw or misbehave. They also might show their feelings through drawings and role-play with toys.

🍎 Encourage communication and expression
When they begin sharing what’s on their minds, do your best to listen and give them space to feel what they feel. As a caregiver, you can help them process their thoughts and emotions — and find comfort in the process. Use gentle, age-appropriate prompts to help guide them to think through their feelings and worries.

🍎 Empower decision-making
Giving them age-appropriate choices can also help them feel more in control. For a younger child, it could be picking a book to read or choosing their favorite snack. For an older child, it could be letting them choose their own outfits or supplies. For an adolescent considering universities, it could be narrowing the options based on practical criteria — such as admission requirements, cost, location, fields of study, their interests and cultural or familial considerations — and letting them make the final decision.

Wanting to know more about your mental health?
👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

07/28/2025

Beyond awareness: Take action to support your mental health

Value yourself 🧠
We all start from different places with different experiences, goals and opportunities. Take time to get to know yourself. Why do you believe what you believe? What has shaped you? What things and people do you genuinely enjoy? What are your hopes and goals? How do you want to be treated? And how do you want to treat others?

Make decisions 🧠
If you ignore your thoughts and feelings, they just stay there. Over time, they may add up and grow. But you have the power to decide what to do with those thoughts and feelings to help yourself.
For example, let’s say you have a co-worker who frequently interrupts you during meetings. It’s frustrating. And over time, it becomes more frustrating. You begin to anticipate the interruptions ahead of meetings, which angers you. You then begin to brace yourself to be annoyed during meetings. It keeps building, until you become openly hostile to them, such as snapping at them during a meeting or showing your anger through your body language. In either case, the situation is causing you stress and potentially hurting your work performance.

Let go 🧠
All you can control is yourself and how you react in any given situation. That includes how you interact with other people. So, rather than getting worked up or thinking through something over and over, do your best to pause and consider what’s in your control and what’s beyond it. A good example is standing in an airport security line. Getting upset the line isn’t moving faster won’t do anything but make you angry. Instead, you could decide to go with the flow and amuse yourself with a podcast or visualizing fun memories.

👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

07/21/2025

Who are you? 🤔
A combination of factors shapes your self-identity, which is how you see yourself. These include your personality, abilities, appearance, interests, culture and more. It also includes the role you play in your close relationships and the larger community. When you feel uncertain about who you are, it can sometimes lead you to do things you don’t want to do or that aren’t in your best interest. It can also make it harder to appreciate your own value, purpose and potential.

Be honest with yourself 😁
It’s important to consider your own perceptions and potential biases that shape how you think, feel and act. It’s natural to feel more comfortable with people who are most like you, to favor information that supports your existing beliefs and to hold onto assumptions. But just because it’s natural doesn’t mean it always serves you or others.

Ask for feedback 😳
Another approach is to ask people you trust for feedback. You could ask them to share qualities they admire in you, as well as areas they think you might consider improving. You could also ask them for their take on experiences you remember strongly or have strong feelings about. For example, you might ask your sister how she remembers the argument you recently had with your parents. She may offer insights into the situation you didn’t consider or don’t remember, which could help you understand the impact of your own actions differently. And you might realize that these actions reflect patterns of behaviors that have influenced your relationships.

👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

07/18/2025

Heat exhaustion may not be serious. But it can quickly change into heatstroke if you're not careful. "Heatstroke affects your nervous system. And it can have very serious results, including death," says Neil Gokal, MD. He's the medical director of clinical education for Southwest Medical, part of Optum, in Las Vegas, Nevada. ☀️

If a person doesn't get better after about 30 minutes, heat illness has the potential to turn into fatal heatstroke. "When someone becomes confused or irritable or starts having seizures, they need emergency medical attention," said Gokal.

🔆 This is especially true if their body temperature reaches above 103° F. Besides heat exhaustion symptoms, signs of heatstroke include:
-Hot, dry skin or skin that becomes very hot and sweaty
-Strong, fast pulse
-Confusion or slurred speech
-Loss of consciousness
-Seizures

🔆 When signs of this serious form of heat illness appear, act fast.With heatstroke, your body temperature can reach 106°F or more in 10 to 15 minutes. It can cause a disability or death otherwise. You should:
-Call 911 right away.
-Move the person to a shady, cool area to help lower their body temperature.
-Take off their outer clothing.
-Have them sit in cold water. The faster someone with heatstroke can be placed in cold water, the less likely they'll suffer damage to their organs, lasting disability or death.

Wanting to know more about your health?
👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

07/14/2025

Why We Stress 🤔 💭
When you experience stress, your body reacts as though it is under attack and usually you go into fight or flight mode. That is, you either defend yourself or remove yourself from the situation. In certain cases, you may also “freeze” or “fawn.” Freezing can feel like going numb, where you can’t think clearly or move. Fawning happens when, for example, you feel threatened by someone and try to calm them down to protect yourself.

In any case, stress motivates you to protect yourself, and then you return to your regular state.

🤝 Control what you can:
When you focus on controlling what you can, it helps narrow your attention and calm you. Once you’re calmer, you’re more likely able to think through how to manage the stress, or at least the parts of it within your control.

👍 Depending on the situation, you may need to:
Find a way to avoid the trigger:
Decide to do something differently if it were to happen again
Remove yourself from the situation
Accept it’s something you cannot change

🧘‍♀️ For example, if your co-worker often tries to get you to reveal confidential information or wants to gossip about others, you could:
-Choose not to engage and instead steer the conversation in another direction
-Tell your colleague politely but directly that you prefer not to discuss such topics
-Limit the time you spend with the co-worker, such as by excusing yourself from the conversation or scheduling shorter meetings

👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

07/11/2025

Sunshine, sparkling waves, white sand — it's a picture-postcard day at the beach. And it's a perfect setting to relax and have fun with friends and family. That said, there are a few hidden dangers you'll want to watch out for to help keep everyone safe. 🏖️ 🐠

1. Bring sunscreen (and reapply often)
2. Wear a hat and sunglasses
3. Throw some shade
4. Keep your food cold
5. Read the signs
6. Look before you leap

07/07/2025

Water workouts are easy on your joints (low-impact). And they help build strength because water provides natural resistance as you move. Those qualities make it a great choice no matter your age or fitness level.
💦 🤽‍♀️
1. Swim laps
Keep track of how many you can do without taking a break. Then, try to add one to that number each week.

2. Walk or run
Walking or running in the water is a great way to keep up your fitness after an injury. Pool cardio can also help people with joint conditions.

Try a water aerobics class
If a water aerobics class isn't offered in your area, you can find videos online to inspire you and get some workout guidance.

Challenge your strength
You can do many dry-land strength moves, like biceps curls and chest presses, in the water.
Use the natural force of the water to add resistance as you go through the exercise.

Stretch it out
Who said water workouts have to be super strenuous? Take advantage of the water's buoyancy to do your favorite stretches and balance exercises.
This can be as simple as standing on one foot or moving your joints. Think: hip and ankle circles, knee bends and shoulder raises.

06/30/2025

Words are tricky. It can be difficult to find or know the right words, especially because their meanings sometimes change over time, or mean different things to different people or in various contexts. But, understanding that we might not always get it exactly right, it’s still important to try.

☀️Ally
A term used to describe someone who is actively supportive of LGBTQ+ people.

☀️Gender identity
Describes our internal understanding and experience of our own gender identity. Each person’s experience of their gender identity is unique and personal, and cannot be known simply by looking at a person.

☀️Gender expression
Describes the external appearance of one’s gender identity, usually expressed through behavior, clothing, body characteristics or voice, and which may or may not conform to socially defined behaviors and characteristics typically associated with being either masculine or feminine.

☀️Sexual orientation
The scientifically accurate term for an individual’s enduring physical, romantic and/or emotional attraction to others. Note: Avoid the offensive term “sexual preference,” which is used to suggest that being gay, le***an, or bisexual is voluntary and therefore “curable.”

☀️Pronouns
Since some pronouns are gendered (“she/her” and “he/him”), it is important to be intentional about the way we use pronouns as we all work to create as inclusive an environment as possible. Commonly used pronouns include: She/her/hers, He/him/his, They/them/theirs. Listen for and respect how the pronoun someone uses to self-identify. To show your support and understanding, you can also introduce your own pronouns when you meet a person, which gives them the opportunity to share theirs.

06/17/2025

Writing isn’t the only way to have a gratitude habit. You can also take time to think about, or meditate on, what you’re grateful for.✍️❤️

You can think about:
-Family
-Food
-Friends
-Nature
-Pets
-Work
-Your home

So, now you have what you need to add more gratitude to your life. Start small and work your way up. Write in your journal once a week and add days from there. You don’t have to become an expert in a day.

Pick the gratitude habit that makes the most sense to you, and stick with it. Soon you’ll be able to tell if it’s truly the right one for you. It’s fine to stay with just one or move between a few. See what changes in your relationships, your outlook on life and your overall mood.

👉 Find care at: http://spr.ly/61812rm57 or call 1-877-OBC-0013

Address

Chapel Hill, NC
27517

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Telephone

+19196365240

Website

http://Www.cognitive-psychiatry.com/

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