Blogs
Yoga, an ancient Hindu exercise designed to bring spiritual enlightenment, has slowly gained in popularity in the West. It has many health benefits, including some benefits for borderline personality disorder and other severe mental illnesses. More Than Borderline's Becky Oberg demonstrates three easy poses: Mountain, Warrior, and Downward-Facing Dog.
Nothing is more important than reconnecting with your bliss. Nothing is as rich. Nothing is more real.~Deepak Chopra
Do you want bliss? Do you ever feel outside yourself? Are there times when you feel life is larger than you? When was the last time you felt more beautiful and more powerful than ever?
![Learn about the Semicolon Project, anti-self-harm movement, that uses a semicolon to represent those who have continued in spite of self-harm struggles.](/sites/default/files/styles/blog_listing/public/uploads/2014/03/HP-PIC-semicolon-243x325.jpg?itok=meZ5sww9 "Self-Harm and the "Semicolon Project": Your Story is Not Over Yet")
During one of my nightly adventures on Pinterest, I came across a tattoo that instantly grabbed my attention. Being a writer, and someone who has some tattoos, the semicolon on this person’s wrist made me want to seek out more information about it. As I looked further into the reason behind it, I came across the Semicolon Project that had been started in April of last year.
The Semicolon Project was created for those who were going through struggles with self-harm, depression and suicide who could have stopped moving forward, but didn’t.
So you've been stuck in a rut, lost the momentum or are feeling less than jazzed about your life. Maybe the dreams you wanted aren't so great in reality or the ideas you thought would bring you happiness are no longer serving you. Sound familiar? Your confidence and self-esteem takes a hit when you're stuck in a rut; you lose life-balance and tend to freeze or take a few steps back into your comfort zone.
The journey through alcohol addiction recovery is a long and bumpy ride. Some individuals may have the expectation that as soon as they stop drinking alcohol, all of their problems are going to go away. However, this is not the case. Addiction is a disease, not something one can simply walk away from, and building a new life without the use of alcohol is going to take time.
I enjoy reading blogs written by other parents. It’s great that the Internet has given us a virtual park bench on which to sit and share ideas, tips, frustrations, and joys. I read all kinds of parenting blogs (I dislike the term, “mommy blogger”), not just those about raising special needs kids. I say this as preface to what has historically been a statement that has elicited blow back. Here it comes:
I cringe when a parent blogger contributes to mental illness stigma with their blog title.
Effective depression treatment through medication and therapy can take months or years to help you feel better, but don't get discouraged. There are lots of things you can do now to help you cope with your depression and feel at least a little better until your other treatments start working. Here's a quick list to get you started.
When I walked into my first substance abuse recovery meeting, "one day at a time" had no meaning to me. Because of my anxiety, I always thought days and even years in advance, future tripping and wanting alcohol to cope. I thought of never being able to have a drink ever again, and it terrified me. It wasn't until someone with multiple years of sobriety told me that all I had to do was live one day at a time that immediately, miraculously, I found a sense of relief.
It’s no secret that anxiety is very difficult to ignore. Anxiety can be loud and demanding, and as a result, we focus on it. It’s very natural for us to do that, but sadly, focusing on anxiety can make it grow. We need to ignore anxiety by focusing on what anxiety is not.
My name is Gabe Howard. I live in Ohio, am married, a hockey fan (go Blue Jackets), a college football fan (go Buckeyes), a couch potato, the life of the party, a home owner, and a pizza connoisseur. I sleep too little, talk too much, and drive my wife mad. I tell her I do it because I like the company.
In my late 20s, I was diagnosed with bipolar, anxiety, and panic disorders. Everything changed pretty much overnight. Severe panic attacks, paranoia, and general anxiety sidelined me for a long while costing me a marriage, a career, friends, social status, money, and time.
I believe she will only be able to rid herself of her demons, and hopefully her BPD as well, when she's ready to confront the abuse of her father. If she can put the blame where it belongs, she may stop projecting that victim/perpetrator cycle on the present men in her life. These demons are a metaphor for the purgatory she has created for herself. That reality has consequences in the real world, but it need not be real in the tangible sense. Exorcising her demons will require the expenditure of real physical energy and probably the destruction of aspects of her personality. If this ever happens, and it's possible but not probable, then these demons will evaporate. They are only as real as one's personality is real. In short, reality is not the question, it's what you make of the things you feel to be real.