The Best Gifts for Your Mother
Whether you love it or hate it, most people will agree that the mother-child relationship is one of the most significant relationships in a person’s life, affecting your wellbeing throughout your life. »
AIPC, Author at Explore Our Extensive Counselling Article Library - Page 18 of 67's Posts
Counselling Dilemma: A Client’s Sex Reassignment Surgery
Mark, 36 years of age, is directed to counselling by his doctor after Mark decides he wants to transition from male to female, undergo sex reassignment surgery, and change his name to Sonia. Mark reports he has suffered for a long time trying to live as a man when he in fact feels like a woman. »
How to Boost Your Creativity
Your wellbeing can benefit from being more creative. How many different ways can you use a brick? What would happen if dogs could talk? What will our homes and workplaces look like 100 years from now? »
Essential Steps to a New You
Not feeling like you’re living it up to your full potential? Below are some essential tips to get out of your rut and towards renewal. »
Practicing Unconditional Self-acceptance and Compassion
When discussing happiness, one attitude/belief that deserves special mention is the art of accepting ourselves on an “as is, where is” basis. For us to be peacefully in relationship with our own humanness – our own combination of strengths, growing edges and unique quirks – means to have less stress from the source of our own critical voice. You know the voice: the one that... »
DSM-5 Updates: Assessment Instruments
We’ve previously published an article with information and resources to help you understand the differences between the DSM-IV and its latest version, the DSM 5. In this post, we turn our focus to DSM-5-relevant instruments to assess clients. »
Motivational Interviewing and Anxiety
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the United States, affecting 40 million adults age 18 and older (18 percent of the U.S. population) (ADAA, 2014). The percentage is similar in Australia, with 14.4 percent of Australians being affected by an anxiety disorder in any 12 month period (Mindframe, 2012). Even though only one-third of those in both countries seek treatment for the ... »
Take Your Happiness to the Next Level
You’ve ticked off all the items on the “Good Life” list: you exercise daily, have a healthy diet with good general health and sufficient sleep, and your interesting job affords you many luxuries. Beyond that, your primary relationship is going well and you enjoy your friends and hobbies. You say you are satisfied, but secretly you know: happiness still eludes you. What has gone w... »
Chronic Pain: Definition, Statistics and Causes
Chronic pain affects 29 percent of Australians, which means that at any given time nearly three out of ten people are suffering in some way (Stollznow Research for Pfizer Australia, 2010). When we add the emotional, physical, and financial challenges of those who care for them, the percentage of lives touched by chronic pain is much higher. In this article, we’ll define chronic pain, and look at s... »
Suicide: Warning Signs and Prevention Tips
Because most people who die by suicide give warning signals of their intentions, the best way to help prevent suicide is to learn how to recognise – and then respond to – those signs. It may be helpful to think of a continuum, at one end of which is a healthy desire to live life to the fullest, and at the other end of which is a completed suicide. Somewhere on that continuum – possibly in the half... »
Counselling Dilemma: A Terminally-ill Client
You are working with a 65-year-old female client, Mary, who has been coming to see you for six months as she had grief and loss issues around having lost her only sibling, her brother and her husband in a space of a month apart (a year ago). She has a daughter and son who are both married and have two children each. They live in Sydney whilst she is in Brisbane. She has three close girlfriends who... »
The Efficacy of CBT Treatment for Depression
The plethora of studies evaluating the efficacy and effectiveness of CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy) over the last few decades has shown generally solid results for CBT as a treatment for depression (and many other disorders) with different groups, in different modes of delivery, and in manifold settings. There is no controversy on one fundamental finding: there is a vast amount of evidence show... »
