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Terminator star says he won’t be back to couples therapy.

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Movies_____Terminator_2_judgment_day-Arnold_Schwarzenegger_086750_It was reported in the London free newspaper Metro that Terminator in  an interview with Arnold.shock jock DJ Howard Stern, blamed his divorce from his ex-wife Maria Shriver on the therapist, that was helping the couple, after the omission that Schwarzenegger fathered a child with the couple’s housekeeper.

Mr Schwarzenegger, cited the experience as totally counterproductive, and how he was convinced by his ex-wife Maria Shriver to see the therapist.

One caveat that Schwarzenegger did add to this interview is that he feels that couple should get help, when they need help.

Fortunately, not all experiences of couple’s therapy are as negative as the terminator stars. Couples often enter relationships with unfinished business from their past, whether that’s childhood wounds or past hurts from a romantic involvement.

Unfortunately, lots of couples try to work out past hurts within the marriage, this in itself causes ruptures which cannot be repaired without professional help.

There is no doubt that couples therapy can save relationships, with divorce rates high, furthermore, statistical evidence supporting, what is commonly felt as an overall increase in divorce. In fact, there are 13 divorces in England and Wales every hour. With half of these divorces happening within the first 10 years of marriage.

And like the terminator star’s own divorce, one in seven divorces, within the UK, cites adultery for the breakdown of the marriage. One harrowing statistics, is that 42% of all marriages will end in divorce.

Couples therapy, gives each member of the couple time to air grievances and unmet expectations, and emotional hurts, in a safe confidential place.

Indeed, like Mr Schwarzenegger’s marriage, infidelity, can be difficult to overcome, for a couple, but with professional help it can become easier.  Having that third person in the room, in the form of the therapist, who is not emotionally invested in the relationship, helping the couple, rather than judging them, can be of enormous help.

 

 

Does our actions write our obituary?

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Alfred Noble, inventor of dynamite, and the man who had spent a large part of his life profiteering from the sale of weapons. Awoke one morning, in 1888, to find his own obituary in print, in his morning paper. Nobel’s obituary had been indeed printed in error. Alfred Nobel’s brother had died and a foreign reporter had mistakenly reported the creator of dynamite’s death.eleos counselling_Martin Luther King_Nobel Peace Prize

Indeed, anyone would be disturbed in reading one’s own obituary, but Nobel was indeed confronted with how the world saw him, as the inventor of dynamite and inventor of weapons of mass destruction.

As far as the general public was concerned, this is exactly what Nobel’s life had been, making money out of human misery. Unfortunately, none of Nobel’s true intentions were not reported, in the article, his desire to break down barriers, were neither considered, nor seriously taken in the tribute.eleos counselling_Mother Teresa

In reading his own obituary Nobel was shocked into action. He wanted to make clear to the world his true intents and purposes of his life. The Nobel Prize is now one of the most highly prestigious awards one could receive, as recognition of one’s contribution to humanity, through the sciences, and most notable through peace. With such luminaries as Dr Martin Luther King, and Mother Teresa receiving the prize.

 

In reading this story one has to ask oneself, if I was to wake up and read my obituary what would it say. .

 

Become a superhero? How your body language can alter how you feel

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Aeleoscounselling_blog_hero recent article in the New Scientists writer William Lee Adams speculated whether self-confidence can be increased. Self-confidence is something that is often thought to be something one has, or one doesn’t. However, social psychologist Amy Cuddy, would disagree, her TED talk, lecture, currently ranks as the second most viewed TED talk. Speaking of self-confidence, Cuddy recommends standing with your hands on your hip and stretching, to increase self-confidence before any stressful situation, such as a job interview. With her mantra “fake it till you make it”. In fact, there is something to be said for the body language of people, especially those people who are depressed.

Researchers found that people who are depressed tend to hunch, as if threatened. Observing primates in the wild, and in captivity, gives rise to the view that spreading one’s arms out, and making oneself big is a dominant/confident position, and thus this is the origin of Cuddy’s hypothesis.

An interesting point was brought up by the article stating that lower status people, whilst amongst friends or in a work environment are always monitoring the higher ranked individuals, in their group. The research suggests that, because of this constant monitoring, an additional cognitive load makes it difficult for them to stay focused and achieve personal goals. This constant monitoring, in of itself can cause more depression, as goals are not met, or fall short of expectations. Research carried out suggested that more confident people have high levels of testosterone and lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. It was found that less dominant/depressed people have high levels of cortisone.

Of course, being overconfident can have its downside, a recent radio programme investigating air disasters, stated that because hierarchy is hardly ever challenged, particularly in the work environment, and most notably in airline infrastructure, this in of itself, can cause problems. One of the worst air disasters on record the Tenerife air disaster is such a case. For those who don’t remember the 80s, the crew was asked to go to a holding pattern before landing, the commander took the plane over dangerously high terrain, contrary to the orders from the control tower. It is now considered that if someone had questioned the flight commander, this would not have taken place; this disaster was compounded by dubious instructions from the Spanish air traffic controller.

Clearly, confidence is a complicated issue, too much and problems occur, too little and one can become stressed and thus doesn’t get that killer job one has been looking for.

 

If you’re worried about your self-confidence, there may be psychotherapy can help.

Eleos  Counselling is a  counselling organisation offering counselling, in Crawley West Sussex.

 

 

The sober truth: are you drinking too much?

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This week Alcoholics Anonymous celebrates 80 years of helping people with alcohol problems. The 12 step program originally eleos counselling_alcohol_counselling_12 step program.started by two men stockbroker Bill Wilson and an Akron surgeon merely known as Dr Bob, revolutionised help for people with drug and alcohol problems, the 12 step program has been adopted in many treatment programs, throughout the world.

The 12 step program helped millions of people stay sober. Problem drinking can affect anyone, from any strata of society, from the lowest to the highest jet setting international businessman or woman.

This week the Daily Express highlighted the increase in middle-class, middle age drinking, in women. What is not widely known in the UK is that you are actually binge drinking if you double your units, simply put if you’re double your units that is three units daily for a woman and four units daily for a man, your binge drinking. To ground this in real terms, for a woman if you have eight 125 ml glasses of wine, of 12% proof alcohol you are binge drinking.

This article is not meant to be anti-alcohol rather a plea for more sensible drinking. Alcohol can often help overcome embarrassment, depression, and stressful situations. This can set up a wrong relationship with alcohol, as it can be used as a crutch to help overcome stress, depression and social embarrassment. Using alcohol as a crutch can set up a reliance on alcohol in demanding situations, this could be a beginning of a problem.

The increased rise of home drinking has masked the fact that one could be drinking more than one should, the idea of three fingers of whiskey, is not unheard of as an example of how hard it is to monitor your drinking when you’re just pouring it for yourself, especially after the third glass.

A lot of people justify binge drinking saying that everybody else is doing it, yes everybody is. The increase in people being taken to A&E with drink -related injuries has increased dramatically, and so has the increase in people trying to find help for their drinking.

 

Here are some questions to ask yourself, if you think your drinking is becoming problematic.

  • Have you been missing work because you have a hangover, or to go drinking?
  • Have you driven after you have been drinking?
  • Has close relationships suffered due to your drinking (do you find you are arguing with your partner more).
  • Have you ever tried to give up drinking and those attempts have been unsuccessful?
  • Have you been drinking for long periods of extended time, more than you intended?

If some of the questions about above are yes, maybe you have a problem with drinking.

UK advertising standards take positive action to ban unhealthy body image advertisement.

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Channel 4 announced yesterday on Twitter that the advertising standards authority has banned an advert for Yves Saint Laurent, featured in Elle magazine, in which a model which the advertising standards described as “unhealthily underweight”. anorexia-black-and-white-bulimia-eating-disorder_counsellingThe advertising standards authority upheld the complaint saying that the use of an underweight model was “irresponsible” but regrettably no action was taken in reply to this decision.

Using underweight models can promote an idealised image, which vulnerable and susceptible teenage girls and boys, have a propensity to aspire to. It is not just the advert by Yves Saint Laurent which is promoting an ideal body image, if one looks at the content of popular chat magazines, often displayed on supermarket shelves, they are full of bikini clad minor celebrities and are already to point  out deficits with their body image.

Recently, Google closed down a pro-one  website, unfortunately these pops up just as quickly as they are closed down. Young people are under a great deal of strain to aspire to a lot of standards, which are often reinforced by peer group pressure, social media, and Internet websites.

Unfortunately, there is a rise in the amount of teenagers with eating disorders with over 2,500 admissions to hospital A&E’s in 2014, and with the most common age being between 13 and 15.

Social media sites such as Facebook boosts a fixation with image, as girls and boys post photos of themselves so that friends can “like” them, or not she one has to admire Celebrities such as Victoria Beckham, who, herself has spoken publicly about her own battle with an eating disorder.

 

Unfortunately an eating disorder can follow a young person into adulthood, and becomes a learned behaviour when things become stressful for them. Many families find it difficult to deal with when a son or daughter refuses to eat, or become secretive and learns to hide food, which they are given to eat.  The eating disorder information web site Beat advises parents to actively promote a healthy attitude towards body image and body size. Often, an eating disorder is an indicator that something more is happening, for the young person.

 

New law to ban so-called legal highs

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The recent news that the UK government is finally starting to close a loophole on the sale of so-called legal highs. This follows mounting pressure from experts such as mental health Legal_highs_eleoscounsellingprofessionals, not to mention the families who are affected by tragedies such as the one reported in the Daily Mail this week of a young promising student dying after taking legal highs with her boyfriend.

Unfortunately, the availability of legal highs has increased exponentially with admissions to hospitals. The NHS reported a 56% increase in 2012 of people being admitted to A&E’s suffering from the effects of legal highs. Furthermore, it was reported there was 97 deaths in 2012 from legal highs compared to 12 in 2009.

As reported in this blog, legal highs are untested, unpredictable and potentially fatal. Currently manufacturers of legal highs are able to get round the law by marking the drug “not for human consumption”. Also, altering the chemical constituent of any drug makes it potentially a new drug. Substances with such exotic names as Bliss, Mary Jane, clockwork Orange are sold openly in so-called head shops up and down the country.

The psychological and neurological effects of such drugs are completely unknown, as and if taking legal highs causes long-term damage to the brain. Certainly drugs like cocaine and heroin have been well documented for many years and people know the outcome, not so legal highs.

Unfortunately, making legal highs illegal will force the sale of these drugs underground. Furthermore, how the government monitor the sales of legal highs online is yet to be seen.

 

 

Eye contact: eyes really are the windows of the soul.

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eleoscounselling, West Sussex_eye contact_blogJust recently we were sent a short video on Facebook, nothing unusual you might say, but this video was quite profound inasmuch as it commented on the very media it was posted on, social media. In the short video, it spoke of how people are becoming increasingly isolated, as we use technology to interact with friends.

One thing that struck us about this video is often people do not give eye contact. Recently we have been looking into creating an anger management program for young people, as part of that study we found how important eye contact actually is.

If a child is denied eye contact it can become socially isolated, and angry. The part of the brain that governs emotions, the limbic system and particularly the amygdala needs input from faces to judge whether something is a threat. Studies have shown that averting your eyes can be a form of silent treatment; basically you’re saying you’re not worth looking at.

Now think how many times you pick up that phone during the day, to look at emails, your head is pointed down and away from people, and people who are trying to make contact with you. You’re saying that this text message or email is far more important than you are or what you are saying, or what you’re showing me.

How many times have you been annoyed with someone who picks up a smart phone and starts texting, whilst at the dinner table?

Fundamentally, the lack of eye contact can make one suspicious and ultimately angry.

Conversely, averting your gaze from someone to look at your smart phone or tablet can actually have a negative effect on you. When you’re looking down at your smart phone you increase the chance of losing the respect and trust because you’re essentially you  are not communicating those attributes to others.

 

The next point we would like to raises is what are we telling  our children, albeit silently. A study carried out in the Netherlands suggests that an infant’s brain is rapidly forming connections and new pathways linking the ancient limbic system to the neural cortex and prefrontal cortex, laying down circuitry which becomes arterial roads for emotion. This delicate and vital infrastructure result in how we interpret social interactions. If part of that interaction is missing, because I contact is not made or given, we do not receive the right information and thus cannot communicate effectively.

Our brains compare the incoming data with memories of past experiences and ultimately facial expressions effectively this is our own trust mistrust gauge or scale. If the infant hasn’t built up suitable knowledge, the default will be to see things as a threat, and thus become angry.

Intimacy and the modern man (what intimacy means for men)

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Mention the word intimacy with a man today, you will get a strange look, and a feeling that you should move on and talk about another subject. The word intimacy, for most men today, has become a 21st-Century Pandora’s Box.eleos counselling_blog post_intimacy and men

Metaphorically, the fear of the unknown keeps us from drawing near to the box and opening it up. Fundamentally, we hide ourselves from our wives and partners, therefore they tend to love what we do, not who we are.

As a husband or partner, you do not have to be a 10, you just have to be yourself. Often it is said that a woman doesn’t want a strong man, but a man who leads, and is sure of himself. Often, today, you hear of men who are not sure of themselves, this can often bring isolation, anxiety, and ultimately depression. It is well known, that the biggest killer of men between the ages of 18 and 34 in the UK, is death by their own hands.

Society tells us that we have to suck it up, grow a pair or man up. Furthermore, in the same breath, show tenderness, compassion and love. With dire posing messages such as this, no wonder most men feel confused and often end up with unhelpful behaviours, as a way of helping them deal with modern day living, such as drug addiction, alcohol problems, and extramarital/relational affairs, not to mention, problem gambling.

There are many outside influences telling men how they should be. Some these influences can be cultural, or media based. Often men put their identity in their jobs, but when their job is gone or lost, they struggle, never really knowing who they are.

There is a popular concept that most men have a midlife crisis, whether this is true or not is entirely up to your own opinion. But it is at these times when men try to find themselves, possibly after a loss or a loss of connection with themselves or, even worse, finding out that they were never truly connected to themselves, let alone their partner.

The incidences of depression in men in the UK are rising; as with all sectors of the population mental health is now being looked at by healthcare professionals and politicians, as a real issue. Often, men would like to talk to men about their problems, finding it difficult to relate to a woman, when they talk about intimacy, and what this means to them.

The word intimacy for most men means being exposed, this can be frightening, and talking to a professional, such as a psychotherapist / counsellor can often help men find their own meaning for the word intimacy.

 

If you would like to know more about the therapies eleos counselling offer, please click on the link below.

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Habitual gamblers see patterns where none exist

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In a new report published by German researchers suggest that habitual gamblers see shapes or patterns, in random behaviour. Furthermore, seeing these patterns, combined with a lack of control results in compulsive behaviours. eleos counselling_gamblingThe research showed that people who habitually gamble our more willing to impulsively bet on, what they perceived to be a logical pattern of events, which are in fact random, compared to those who don’t gamble at all.

As humans we try to make sense of illogical and random patterns, as a way of making sense of our world. However, it is thought that gamblers see these random patterns in a more defined way than non-gamblers.

For instance, if one is gambling on a roulette wheel a gambler will see that Black has come up five times so therefore red is due any moment now, and thus bet on red. It is this perception of knowing that you may be right that can set up unhelpful behaviours.

Research participants consisting of 91 habitual gamblers and 70 non-gamblers, were shown a picture of a casino and two gaming machines. Over the period of time, the participants were asked to predict the outcome probability as to which machine was going to pay out next. In fact, the research showed that over time, the participants were effected by a false sense of probability and that they somehow could “predict the outcome. What is striking, is that the gamblers had a higher rate of probability matching.

 

The research also showed that gamblers a lot more likely to feel that they could perceive random behaviours.

 

If you have a problem with gambling Eleos counselling can help just click on the link below and you will be taken to the Eleos counselling web site.

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Pre-marriage counselling, before you get married

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Before getting married many couples have different expectations about what marriage actually is. Each member of a couples expectations, are frequently never spoken about. Often, as a result, conflict becomes inevitable when those assumptions about marriage often collide. So it is wise that you both talk about your assumptions and understandings before you end up in a divorce court. Psychologist Archibald Hart asked the following questions of couples who come to his consulting room.eleos counselling blog_wedding preparation

  1. If I had never been introduced to the person you’re preparing to marry and had to be dependent on you to give me a description of who that person is, what would you tell me?
  2. If you could think of one thing that you would like to see you fiancé stop doing what would it be?
  3. What are the five or six main aims you have established for you as a couple in your first year together?
  4. Have you both discussed money together, and how finances will be handled?

These indeed asked tough questions, but if there is no agreement on them before you’re married certainly cannot argue about them after, you’re married. Since 50% of all marriages today end in breakup and divorce, you best be sure you know the answers. One of the biggest misgivings you can make is supposing that the future with your husband or  wife will be inevitably be better as a consequence of marrying you.

Often it is best for a couple to have pre-marriage counselling as a way of airing these expectations. It is certainly cheaper to pay a marriage counsellor for a series of pre-marriage therapy than it is to pay a divorce lawyer. As a result of pre-marriage therapy one can decide if you have common goals, often you both do, but how they are achieved is seldom talked about before the marriage.