How to Prioritize Self-Care: Navigating the Holidays & Toxic Family

Mia Barnes 12/04/2023

Everyone’s supposed to feel joyful during the holidays, according to the commercials and movies. Although the season can create happy memories, it is an emotionally challenging time for people caught in unhealthy family dynamics. You deserve to prioritize your self-care and wellbeing during every month of the year. Here are a few tips for navigating the holidays without going home to a toxic family. 1. Set Communication Boundaries Healthy family dynamics feature open communication and strong interpersonal bonds based on mutual respect, love, and support. Research shows a childhood without those things causes depression and anxiety, which remain a strong factor in adulthood. You don’t need to make your mental health worse by putting yourself in situations with family members who belittle, ignore or criticize…

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Categories: Wellness & Personal Growth

Tags: family, holidays, self-care

Mia Barnes

Women Are Twice as Likely as Men to Have Depression 一 Here’s Why

When it comes to gender differences in depression, the numbers are shocking: women, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or cultural background, are twice as likely as men to have depression. Research has proven this; one meta-analysis, for example, found that girls start becoming more likely than boys to have depression as early as the age of 12 (or after puberty). But what are the reasons behind these numbers? Why are women so much more vulnerable to depression than men, and is there anything we can do about it? Here’s everything we know. Why Are Women More Likely to Have Depression? Around 12 million 一 some numbers say 1 in every 10 一 American women suffer from depression, a number that’s twice as large as the…

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Saya Des Marais 01/24/2022

5 Essential Ways to Take Care of Yourself This Holiday Season

How will you take care of yourself this holiday season? The holidays can be merry, festive, and jolly 一 but they’re rarely so 100% of the time. “‘Tis the season to be jolly,” but for many people, it’s also the season to be stressed, anxious, sad, or overwhelmed. During this time of year, it’s more important than ever that you practice meaningful self-care practices to protect your mental health and get through those tough family gatherings with grace and your sanity. Here are 5 essential ways to take care of yourself this holiday season, from putting up boundaries in your schedule to not overindulging in the desserts. Avoid overscheduling. The holiday season can get chaotic quickly if you say yes to every invitation. Family is…

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Saya Des Marais 12/26/2022

4 Self-Care Practices to Disconnect from Work

As technology evolves, disconnecting from work often seems impossible and finding a healthy work-life balance is more difficult than ever.

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Gina Messina, Ph.D. 02/12/2024

6 Ways Women Can Reduce Their Holiday Stress

The holidays are a festive time full of hustle and bustle and good cheer. Nonetheless, somebody has to put effort into all that merry-making, and the added pressure can cause inordinate stress. Not surprisingly, women are more frequently affected, as they already do two hours more of household chores on a good day. Anyone would get frazzled. Not everyone can count on their sweetie or kids to sweep them off to a day spa to unwind. What can you do that won’t cause even more anxiety by maxing out an already strained budget? Here are six ways women can reduce their holiday stress. 1. Schedule Time for Self-Care Please banish the idea that self-care is selfish. Remember, you can’t pour from an empty pitcher. Running…

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Mia Barnes 12/19/2022

6 Meditation Mantras to Cope With Life’s Stressors

Meditation mantras offer a remedy to the growing pressures of today’s fast paced environment and might be exactly what you need when life gets challenging.

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Mia Barnes 11/13/2023

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