Millcreek Counseling Associates

10/08/2025

💥 Sometimes the person you need to say "I'm here for you" to is yourself. 💥

Created by: Cory Allen

08/08/2025

(this means that your response to someone else’s need is more about you what’s going on within you, too.)

Advocating for needs is hard & feels vulnerable for many of us, especially when (or often because) we were shamed (directly or indirectly) for having needs as little people who were learning how to exist in the world & in relationship.

But now many more people are in this space of learning that we’re allowed to have needs & boundaries, and that it’s important to communicate them to our people if we want healthier relationships.

Yet we’re all in different places with this - some people are excellent at communicating their need & simply take it as information when someone can’t show up. They move on.

But many take it deeply personally when someone can’t show up; it’s easy to make it mean that it’s about who you are.
(Or when someone hears your need, THEY take it deeply personally & get angry, shut down, or withdraw.)

It’s easy to think that if only you were more X, they could have met that need. That it's your fault.

But if you take a moment and reflect on the last time someone you cared about needed something from you and you couldn’t give it - it wasn’t about them.
It was about you not having enough energy or bandwidth.
Or feeling triggered by the request.
Or having so many other things going that it felt too hard.

Not taking things as personally involves being willing to challenge the narratives about the feelings that arise when someone doesn’t respond in the way we want or expect them to.
You do have agency here! It starts with developing greater self awareness, learning to pause, & being present with your own feelings.

The 12 month Cycle Breakers Program begins September 2nd.
Come practice deepening your self awareness, learning tools for better emotional self management, and learn new ways of showing up in your relationship with yourself and others.
Small group, lead by me. Space is limited - halfway full!
https://theeqschool.co/cycle-breakers

06/08/2025

Bless the daughters who sat carrying the trauma of mothers. Who sat asking for more love and not getting any, carried themselves to light. Bless the daughters who raised themselves.
Bless the daughters who learned to be gentle in a world that taught them to harden. Who held their breath through chaos, who grew up too soon, piecing together their sense of worth from the fragments left behind. Bless the daughters who were told to be strong when all they wanted was to be held. Who became their own protectors, their own nurturers, their own safe place.

Bless the daughters who waited at the door for affection that never came. Who stared into cold eyes hoping to feel seen, who swallowed their pain just to keep peace, and walked on eggshells just to survive another day. Bless the daughters who were taught to shrink, to silence their truths, to put everyone else’s needs before their own—but chose to unlearn those lessons and rise anyway.

Bless the daughters who became women still carrying the weight of generational wounds, yet chose healing over bitterness. Who looked in the mirror and promised themselves they would be different. Who cracked open their own hearts, poured in love, and stitched themselves together with grace. Who understood that breaking cycles is exhausting, often thankless, but still did it with fierce determination.

Bless the daughters who didn’t have mothers who showed them how to love themselves, but figured it out anyway. Who found family in friends, purpose in pain, and wisdom in the silence. Who speak with kindness even though they were spoken to with cruelty. Who dream big despite being raised in smallness. Who are soft, yet strong. Tired, yet resilient. Broken, yet blooming.

Bless the daughters who raise daughters now—with gentleness, with patience, with everything they never received. Who rewrite the story every day, who choose connection over control, understanding over shame, love over fear. They are the quiet revolution. The bridge between what was and what will be. The beginning of healing. The end of hurt.

06/08/2025

Rescuing someone who continues to make poor choices is not called love — it’s called enabling.
And there comes a point where your constant rescuing stops being an act of love and starts becoming an act of self-betrayal. You’re not helping them grow — you’re helping them stay the same. Every time you shield them from the consequences of their actions, you're not being loyal or loving — you're just making it easier for them to avoid growth, responsibility, and change.

Love doesn’t mean sacrificing your peace, your mental health, your emotional safety, or your future to save someone who isn’t even trying to save themselves. Love is not supposed to feel like exhaustion, chaos, or pain. It’s not your job to keep cleaning up after the same mistakes they refuse to learn from. You’re not their parent, therapist, or savior — and even if you were, healing still has to be chosen, not forced.

Stop enabling. Stop cushioning their falls while they’re not even trying to stand. Stop being the one who always shows up while they stay stuck in patterns that are harming you both. Sometimes, the most loving thing you can do is let go. Let them sit with their decisions. Let them wrestle with the discomfort. Let them feel what it’s like to hit the bottom without you being there to soften the landing.

You cannot love someone into maturity. You cannot carry someone into healing. You cannot force growth on someone who benefits from staying broken. The more you hold them up, the less they feel the urgency to hold themselves accountable. And while you're trying to save them, who’s saving you?

Being someone’s emotional life raft will only drown you both. At some point, you have to choose yourself — your peace, your boundaries, your future. Not out of spite, but out of self-respect. Because real love isn’t about sacrificing yourself to keep someone else comfortable in their dysfunction. Real love says: "I believe in your ability to rise, but I refuse to drag you uphill."

So, step back. Detach with love. Let them figure it out. If they grow, they'll come back better. If they don’t — at least you finally gave yourself the space to breathe, heal, and move forward.

06/08/2025

Unsaid
[Photo: Laura Makabresku]

06/08/2025

💥 People don't become estranged from people they feel safe with. A very good reminder for those that have been through this and great insight for those that haven't experienced this. 💥

Stated by: Nate Postlethwait

31/07/2025

The moments where we snap, withdraw, go numb, or take it deeply personally — they are our greatest teachers.

They're often reminding us of something from our past that still hurts; that doesn't feel safe.
Of an unmet need, a wound, a disconnect from a neglected part of our Self.

They remind us of pain yet unprocessed that still lives within our bodies, trying to protect us from future hurt. They are our adaptations, our coping mechanisms, learned in moments when we couldn't actually process or feel the feeling in a safe way with supportive, present people who could attune to our needs and help us move forward.

These reactions and feelings are letting us know exactly where we need tenderness, attunement, and care.
Where there is an unmet need, it is held by feeling (or lack thereof), and the feeling calls out to us to signal that a younger part of our Self still needs help in this area.

We need to allow ourselves to release the feeling by feeling it without judgment. To begin to attune to our own deeper needs and to give ourselves the tender compassion, attention, safety, and support that was once missing.

It's okay to be triggered.
It's information.
Information that, when taken seriously, held gently, and used wisely, can help you begin to heal on a deep and gratifying level.

If you're working on going more deeply with yourself and others, the Cycle Breakers year long program begins September 2nd (and early bird pricing ends this week!).
If you're doing the slow, deep, and often quiet work of meeting yourself in new ways as you shift old patterns and break the cycles that are no longer serving you, then this program is for you.
Develop self awareness, practice emotional self management, and learn tools and skills for relating more authentically and safely in your relationships.
It's small group, lead by me over the course of a year.
Come practice in small, heart-centered community and keep returning to yourself again and again.
https://theeqschool.co/cycle-breakers

31/07/2025

It’s been a long day.
You walk through the door and your 5-year-old is already melting down.
You ask once, then twice, and suddenly you’re snapping.
Again.

You tell yourself they’re being difficult.
That they should know better.
But deep down, you know what really happened—your short fuse got the best of you.

You can’t raise emotionally steady kids if they never know what version of you they’re going to get.
They need consistency.
They need safety.
And right now, your reactivity is setting the tone.

Mastering self-control and emotional regulation gives you the ability to stay calm when their emotions are all over the place—so they learn from your presence instead of fearing it. 🧠💪

When you develop these skills, you stop reinforcing chaos and start becoming the steady example they’ll carry into their own future.

So ask yourself this.
Are they learning calm from you, or learning to brace for your reactions?

If this resonates, you’re not alone in wanting to parent differently. The next step is to tap the link in my bio to book a call and learn how to master self-control and emotional regulation to create a happy marriage. Let’s raise a generation that doesn’t have to heal from our reactions. ⚡

- Jason

30/07/2025

30/07/2025

What if what you’re calling love is actually just a lack of emotional safety?

29/07/2025

She’s not looking for someone who always agrees.
She’s looking for someone who can handle the truth—without shutting down, getting defensive, or turning it into a fight.

Because if every honest conversation turns into tension, she learns to keep it in.
And the more she holds back, the further apart you drift.

Attention husbands—if you want your wife to feel safe, start by creating space for her to be honest without fearing your reaction.

Mastering self-control and emotional regulation gives you the ability to stay grounded when she’s vulnerable—so she can stop bracing and start trusting. 🧠💪

When you develop these skills, you stop reacting from ego and start creating the kind of emotional safety that keeps intimacy alive.

So what are you showing her in those moments
That her feelings are a threat, or that you can handle the weight of her truth

If this resonates, you’re not alone in wanting to lead your marriage differently. The next step is to tap the link in my bio to book a call and learn how to master self-control and emotional regulation to create a happy marriage. Let’s build a relationship where she never has to filter herself to stay connected. ⚡

- Jason