Pomegranate Mental Health

06/08/2022

27/12/2021

🥳😎

y’all.

Posted • ‼️ important, read now ‼️

xo,



I will post this every year probably forever ❤️ also…NEW 15 DAY SURPRISE:

The Mindset Reset

~link in bio~

31/05/2021

Ever wondered what looks like for your ?
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Pay no attention to the behind the curtain. No dogs were harmed in this hour.
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20/05/2021

Someday ask me about the time my dad got into an argument with an Israeli cab driver at the airport in Tel Aviv about how . But not today.
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, , and . I’ve been quiet for too long.

17/03/2021

Raising and witnessing voices of of and 💔❤️💔

Posted • Hi community, it's . How are your hearts? ❤️

I couldn't get out of bed this morning. My stomach is in pain. The tears come, and absorb back into my eyes.

The first people I thought of were you. How do I show up for community today? How do I lead?

I checked in on my friends. I voiced my grief to loving friends. I rescheduled meetings.

The grief is complex and deep.

The grief is layered. It is ancestral, historical, intergenerational. It is also fresh, raw, and indigestible.

The grief is tangled. It is relational, collective, political. We're caught in many binds that make processing so tricky and difficult.

For Asian kin, this is my best attempt of putting feeling to words. It's as imperfect as I am, and I hope you know that you are seen, believed, valued, and cherished. Please visit our website if you are seeking a therapist or groups for support.

For supporters, thank you. Keep voicing up, keep amplifying, keep learning and unlearning. Keep shutting down microaggression, racist jokes, stereotyping, fetishism, no matter how subtle.

For Asian therapists, I hope that we can honor our humanity and seek out what we need. I understand the duty/desire to show up for others is strong.

For our community members, you are amazing. I am endlessly humbled and continue to be transformed by the ways we lift one another up and move in solidarity, in ways that defy colonial tactics aimed to keep us divided.

For folks seeking to understand Asian racial trauma & extend healing, see our Tending to Racial Trauma During Crisis training via link in bio or inclusivetherapists.com/trainings

We are working hard to extend more collective care, decolonial education and mental health justice advocacy.

To support our efforts: Venmo or inclusivetherapists.com/support

Swipe to see more ways to support AAPI communities.

Follow more Asian mental health kin leading the convo: .han.ren ...

16/02/2021

Still (always?) reflecting on these words from
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Posted • I learned from Skwxwú7mesh Decolonizing Facilitator that organizations are quick to indigenize before decolonizing and this leads to appropriation and further harm.

This same behaviour occurs with anti-racism work - reading books on cultural diversity or attending DEI workshops without firstly reflecting on the inherent white supremacy within.

The therapy industry is obsessed with cultural competency and diversity. But what good does cultural competency do without first unpacking the white supremacy that is so ingrained in and perpetuated by this industry?

Western psychology has been and continues to be a tool of white supremacy. So before we add on workshops on cultural competency or DEI to our training, let’s unpack and uproot the white supremacist beginnings, foundations, and practices of therapy.

The five points in these slides only begin to scratch the surface of the ways that white supremacy is built into therapy. So may we reflect, critique, and question. We must fully confront the harms of this industry in order to truly address them. Otherwise, it’s just more of the white saviour s**t that is all too common in this industry.

If you find my content helpful, consider supporting through:
- Financial compensation (inviting white practitioners in particular)
- Sharing this content with full credit (in the caption for reposts)
- Bringing up these conversations with your colleagues, peers, faculty, institutions (esp white practitioners with institutions because BIPOC therapy students are already doing so much labour to educate their white peers & instructors)

Learning from of to acknowledge my own labour in creating content from the harm that I have faced from this industry and to invite financial contributions. Thank you for the words to frame this. And follow for related content.

Other folks I'm constantly learning from:

25/12/2020

Merry Christmas, to those who are celebrating. Happy Friday, to those who aren’t. 2020 means serotonin by any means necessary😂🤩

25/12/2020

With you all, in spirit, tonight and every night.



Posted • We're sending extra care this holiday season to you and those in your circles. This trying year highlights the essential duty to continue to focus on the strengths and needs of communities that have been marginalized. 🎁❤️

We see you. We honor you. We support you.

13/12/2020

Once more for the folks in the back 🗣🗣🗣







Posted • As social workers, WE ARE (some more than others, of course) an extension of the very systems we are fighting against and don’t you ever forget that. It is never okay to assume that as social workers, as mental health providers, that the experiences and interactions that folks have with us will always be positive ones.
History has shown us that social work, as a profession, has been complicit and has played an active role in the oppression of communities that have been historically marginalized and oppressed.
I always cringe when I hear social workers say “social workers get such a bad rep. When I tell people I am a social worker, the first thing they think is that I take babies away”
Folks have that perception of social workers because that is what we have done and THAT IS WHAT WE STILL DO. Even if we don’t directly work with child protective services, as social workers, our actions may still lead to families being unjustly separated, in different capacities whether it be due to the active role social workers played in the incarceration, failed reunification, involuntary hospitalizations and so on that lead to the separation of families (short term or long term)
To say “not me” I’m one of the “good ones” is to ignore the deep harm that the social work profession has and continues to do to communities that have been historically marginalized and oppressed. It is not okay to ignore folks very real perception and reality of social workers. We can not change as a profession until we acknowledge that.
And as licensed social workers our very livelihood is tied to the stipulation and regulation of the state. We have to carry out their rules, their ideals, their values and ethics, and their perception of what is right or wrong in order not to lose our licensure. We are agents of the state.

11/12/2020

Oops, we’re flowers! What seeds are you planting, today?
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Posted • Oops, we're flowers.
🌼🌼🌻🌻🌺🌺🌹🌹🏵🏵💮💮🌸🌸💐.
There's self-discovery and truth in that down. Embrace your murk and soil. It goes dark to light.

08/12/2020

I struggle so hard to articulate what I do, and how I do it. My about sucks, y’all. I get tangled in my words and it’s all and and . That’s because: I’m a human who tends towards , and because I was primed to . And: because so much of is not thought, it’s felt and touched and a .
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Posted • .somatics SOMATICS IS ::
Part 1
What is Somatics? I get asked this question all the time, and I always find myself stumbling over the answer. I think this is because there isn’t “an answer.” Somatic is many things. Many people come to it from many different angles. There are so many different lineages, modalities, and schools of thought, that aren’t often in conversation with each other. Somatics is an emerging field that has not yet defined itself. Who and what will get to define it?
To me, Somatics is a social practice. It really bothers me that the field has taken a sharp turn toward individual practice. Somatics is so much bigger than the individual. We are constantly shaping the world and constantly being shaped by the world and by each other. Our bodies, our habits, our beliefs, our movements and gestures and innuendos and knowings, are all formed through a constant interplay with our environment. To me this is honestly one of the most exciting pieces about Somatics potential- to bring this interplay into conscious awareness, to take agency in how we are shaped by the world and how we are shaping it.

21/11/2020

I’m , y’all. How are you caring for yourselves and your communities? Is it working? Is it enough?
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Posted • UPDATED VERSION! .
Posters and cards: deanna.nyc/selfcareposters
Print comics: deanna.nyc/selfcarecomic
Thank you all SO much for your suggestions on how to improve this. The main one is that I moved “massage” to self-care, thanks to the rallying cries of many practitioners. It was such a mistake! I view my own massage experiences as self-care, why on earth did I put them in soothing?! Haha.

Next, I wanted to reinforce that I view self-soothing as SUPER important. I think with the original text, some people thought I was saying that self-soothing was frivolous or not useful. Quite the opposite! I soothe the helllll outta myself regularly. I've updated that explanation panel to reflect this thinking.

I realized also that I had gotten quite ableist with my drawings, so I made sure to include a person with physical disabilities in the new “nature” drawing in self-soothing. It’s bugging something in my brain that “wheelchair” is the default representation of all people with disabilities, though. Does someone have a suggestion for how I can do better in the future?

In structural care, I separated gender/sexuality and racial equity/justice. I was trying to show their integrated nature in the first version, but I think ended up doing a disservice to both. I also renamed the planet one to “environmental defense & renewal,” though that still doesn’t cover the total essence of righteousness that I feel there, heh.

Finally, there were LOTS of additional suggestions that came through that were fantastic, but I just didn’t have the space to accommodate — such as adding journaling to self-care, breaking out the complicated ideas in the structural section, and noting that too much of anything isn’t a good thing. .
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12/11/2020

adventures: what’s calling your attention today? To what are you ? What can you ? What happens next?

04/11/2020

Sit with this. These . This . This , this knowing or unknowing. This . This is where we are, outcome or no outcome. This is our work.

03/11/2020

Today, , all days: .

Posted • As therapists, we often get taught in school to be “impartial” or “non-political”.
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I call bulls**t.
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We don’t have time to mess around with only focusing on the individual and the intra and interpersonal.
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We don’t have time to wait, or numb out, avoid, or to “not get involved in politics”.
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Whoever you are, you are inherently political, just by existing.
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White people, let’s donate, let’s show up and do our work.
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It’s our job to dismantle white supremacy and no one else’s.
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Denver-area folks, here is a link to donate and support Black folks in Colorado.
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Colorado Freedom Fund is a “revolving fund that pays ransom (posts money bond, pays cash bail) for people unable to afford the cost of buying their own freedom”
https://fundly.com/coloradofreedom #
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(quote adapted from Flavia Dzodan who said: “my feminism will be intersectional or it will be bulls**t”)
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02/11/2020

Unclench your jaw. You! Yes, you. And me too.
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Posted • Something we all need to do probably today and tomorrow more than ever before: unclench your jaw. And while you’re at it, take some deep breaths, relax your shoulders, and drink some water.
New stickers are now live in my Etsy shop, along with custom sticker bundles! Shop link in bio to check it all out!!

02/11/2020

What are you doing to ?
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Posted • ☕️🎤🧠
“Heal Responsibly” is our newest call to action. Let’s grow up together, because we have to. It’s a must that we do the necessary work to build a beautiful human experience.

31/10/2020

Happy Halloween, y’all. Hearts, brains, otherwise— take good care of each other.
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