How Modern Lifestyles Activate Ancient Stress Responses

Do you feel fried, get easily irritated, or sink into negative states of mind faster than you used to? Do you want to collapse and cocoon at the end of the week? If so, consider what might be going on with your stress level that might be affecting your mood. Read More

Write a Love Letter to Your Inner Child

Write a love letter to your inner child, to that part of you that is young, playful, innocent and vulnerable. That part of you who you need to be listening to, who you need to be on good terms with so that you can feel spontaneous, alive and creative! Letter… Read More

Growing Up in the Shadow of Addiction

Children of addicted parents who experience relational trauma can carry the imprint of that pain for the rest of their lives. As adult children of alcoholics (ACoA), we can be perplexed about what we’re healing from and how we should heal it. Many of us think that we can… Read More

Laughter: Why It’s So Important

Why do we need to laugh? And what can laughter do for us that nothing else can? Well for starters, laughter is a complex brain/body catharsis, if you will, that is cleansing and enlivening mentally, physically, emotionally, and socially. Let’s face it, we all love that person who makes us… Read More

Oh There’s No Place Like Home for the Holidays

How the Legacy of Unresolved Familial Trauma Can Emerge Around the Holidays “We are threatened with suffering from three directions:… Read More

Parental Addiction: Children are the First Responders

By Tian Dayton, Senior Fellow at The Meadows Children experience a great deal of emotional pain when they watch the parents they love, look up to, and need to feel safe and secure exhibit the kind of behavior that is part of addiction. Children experience deep anxiety. Read More

The Long-Term Impact of Deep Stress on Children

Everyone understands stress. We work too hard, play too hard, and get little to no sleep. We’ve got too many balls in the air and ignore self-care, resulting in deep stress. As a result, everything suffers—our mood, health, and work. Minor problems feel more significant, and our reactions to anything… Read More

The Effects of Living with an Alcoholic

This blog was originally published in the Huffington Post. There is a much larger story here. It’s the story of all mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, and cousins who care about and are concerned about someone abusing alcohol. Even closer to home, it’s about the… Read More

Mothering and Codependency: A Catalyst for Personal Growth

If I had been more honest with myself and diagrammed my family when my children were young, I would… Read More

Delicate Dynamics of Intimacy: The Effects of Early Relational Trauma

Tune or out of tune with those who bring us into this world from conception onwards. Our nervous systems are fashioned by nature to resonate with the nervous systems of others to achieve a sense of balance and connection (Schore, 1999), and these early interactions become the neurological templates upon… Read More