Saturday, June 14, 2014

Toxic Relationships Friends, Parent-child and more

Toxic relationships are all around us. Have you ever been in a relationship where you feel more stressed and tired rather than happy and glowing? You may unknowingly be trapped in a relationship that’s leaving you drained and angry. Toxic relationships come in many hues. Sometimes, we date toxic people. And at other times, we have friends and even family who are toxic for our lives. Toxic relationships have many faces; they pop up in both our personal (parent-child, siblings, friendships) and occupational (supervisor-employee, coworkers) lives. You know the type – you lend a family member money, or a co-worker your car; or you care for their children while they go on vacation hoping they will one day return the favor. Unfortunately the toxic person doesn’t pay you back, returns your car damaged with no offer to repair it and asks you to watch their children again next vacation without ever offering to watch yours. It doesn’t happen once, it happens repeatedly in different forms. You feel hurt, taken advantage of and angry – at the offender and yourself. Bottom line is: you are consistently being brought down. You feel “used.”

Friday, June 6, 2014

Teen Drug Addicts? Is your child addicted??

Many parents don't believe that their teenager will ever use drugs. While in a perfect world, this may be true, in this day and age with bullying and peer pressure, most teens are feeling the push to try drugs. Since drugs are easily acquired in most high schools, it's not difficult for students to use them as bartering agents to persuade their peers to try drugs and join in the "fun". Many times, students may not want to use drugs, but they will do it just for acceptance into the group. Establishing autonomy and being accepted by others are two of the biggest developmental stages of adolescences; however, drugs don't have to be involved.