Mental Health Door Decorating Ideas

This year to raise our holiday spirits, RMH decided to have our first ever door decorating contest. Here are our entries.

Reindeer Stable

Nila & Tristan

Chiefs Kingdom

Cassie

Gingerbread House

Lacey

Movie Night

Summer

(Look for your favorite RMH staff members in classic holiday movie scenes.)

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Rachal

Festive Wreath

Christine

Happy Holidays from the Penguins

Cherie

Trek the Halls

Arin

This has added some cheer to our hallways, capping off a very unusual year indeed. All of us at RMH would like to wish all of you the happiest of holidays.

We look forward to helping our clients in their mental health journeys throughout the holidays and into a hopeful New Year. If you would like to make your mental health a priority in the new year, please feel free to contact us to arrange an appointment with one of our caring professionals. You can fill out the new client application online at www.renewedmentalhealth.com or call our offices at (417)626-0212

Merry Christmas.

The Staff at Renewed Mental Health

The holidays are a time of great excitement, but this can be a minefield for people on the autism spectrum. Schedules and routines are often wildly changed. New sights and sounds can be overwhelming. Boisterous parties with loads of unfamiliar faces add new social challenges. But, there are ways to navigate the holidays in ways to minimize the stress and hopefully maximize the joy the season can bring.

Preparation is important. Having plenty of time to set their mind to the coming changes can help put an autistic person at ease. A calendar of upcoming events planned well in advance can give them heads up.

Decorations around the house can be a big change. Try taking them shopping to help pick out decorations. Being involved in decorating can help give a sense of ownership to the changes. And once holiday decorations have been put up, you may need to create rules about those that can and cannot be touched. Be direct, specific and consistent. You may want to spread out the changes over time, adding new decorations slowly over several days.

It's okay to be choosy about which invitations you accept. You may want to avoid situations where rigid social patterns will be expected.

During get-togethers have an escape plan. If you are visiting others, ask your host if they can set aside a quiet place you can use. Prepare them for the fact that you may need to leave early should the need arise. If you are having visitors, have a space set aside for the person with autism as his/her safe/calm space. For individuals with more significant challenges, practice using the quiet spaces in a calm manner at various times prior to your guests' arrival. Take them into the room and engage them in calming activities (e.g., play soft music, rub his/her back, turn down the lights, etc.). Then when you notice the individual becoming anxious, calmly remove him/her from the anxiety-provoking setting immediately and take him/her into the calming environment.

It may help to go over photos of people who will be around for the holidays but they may not encounter frequently. Share photos and stories of them while talking briefly about each person.

If there are special dietary needs, prepare your hosts well in advance. You may need to carry some acceptable foods with you just in case. And even if they are not on a special diet, be cautious of the amount of sugar consumed. And try to maintain a sleep and meal routine.

Practice traditions like opening gifts, taking turns and waiting for others, and giving gifts. Role play scenarios with your child in preparation for him/her getting a gift they do not want. Talk through this process to avoid embarrassing moments with family members. Talk about how to handle sticky situations such as disappointing gifts and children's belief in Santa. One way to help with the disappointing gift scenarios is to actively curate wish lists well in advance of the holidays and distribute them to your loved ones.

Prepare family members for what to expect. Give them strategies to use to minimize anxiety, behavioral incidents, and to enhance participation. Give them resources such as this.

Take care of yourself. The holidays are a hectic time. Take time to recharge your own batteries when you can. They're also a time of great expectations. It can be disappointing when your child cannot participate in activities you've dreamed of engaging your children in all their life, such as the Joplin Christmas Parade, or visiting Silver Dollar City.

On a bright note, once a person with autism has experienced the holiday season a few times, they can become some of the most enthusiastic participants. When they know the rituals and traditions the changes themselves become predictable. Rituals may offer appealing structure to children who thrive on order and routine.

Remember, the holidays should be a time of love and understanding. Celebrate the little victories, and let go of the disappointments. Enjoy the time together and the love you share.

If you feel you need professional help in dealing with these emotional issues, feel free to call our offices at (417)626-0212 to arrange for an appointment with me. I have several years experience working with individuals on the autism spectrum, as well as family members who support them.

Thank you,

Rachal Bales, MA, LMFT

Thanksgiving weekend is just a week away. Many people will be getting together with family for a nice, long, four day weekend. Here are some thoughts on how to fill that time.

Have a movie marathon

The holidays are a great time for nostalgia. Pull out your favorite movies, pop some corn, put on your PJs and revel in a personal film fest.

Recommendations: Home Alone 1&2; The Star Wars Saga; Planes, Trains & Automobiles; You've Got Mail

Board games

Games are a great way to entertain a group. They can give people who have a hard time making small talk something to focus on while remaining social. I recommend finding a cooperative game like "Forbidden Island" to add a team feeling. Just stay away from Monopoly, it's just a fight looking for a place to happen 😉

Recommendations: Forbidden Island; Scrabble; Settlers of Catan; Ticket to Ride; Chinese Checkers

Decorate

Maximize your time to enjoy your holiday décor. Putting up lights up while you have slightly warmer weather and the time off will let the world enjoy your hard work a few more nights. Putting up a Christmas tree is a great chance together one more time while family is still in town.

Visit Santa

Now is the chance to let Kris Kringle in on you're really wishing for. Stop by the mall and get a snapshot with the big guy so you can have them to put on your holiday cards.

Start a craft project

Nothing is cherished like a handmade gift. Crafts can be time consuming, so now's the time to dig in and start making that heartfelt gift or decoration.

Eat up the leftovers

With a fridge full of leftovers, it's time to stuff your face (again and again and again). Here are some ideas of things to do with that leftover bird and all the trimmings. http://www.foodnetwork.com/thanksgiving/leftovers/best-thanksgiving-leftover-recipes

Start Christmas Cards

The US Postal Service delivers more than 17.9 billion cards and packages between Thanksgiving and New Years. Now is your chance to get yours out and on the way. Here is a tutorial on using Microsoft Office to print labels for you. The postal service also has a website with great tools including deadlines, links to purchase stamps, links for ordering free boxes, and scheduling package pickups.

Sleep in.

The next month or so is going to be faced paced and busy. This is your chance to rest up for it. Grab your teddy bear and get to snoozing.

At Renewed Mental Health we are all so very thankful for our clients and the opportunity to help them with their mental health journey. We want to wish them a happy Thanksgiving.

So, Halloween has just passed and it seems that time is steamrolling headlong into the holiday season. We are a mere two weeks from Thanksgiving and I don't feel like I really got full use of the scary pumpkins littering my porch. Needless to say, the holidays can feel overwhelming. By the time it's all over, family dynamics have made tectonic shifts over who said what to whom and why there were three sides of mashed potatoes and no stuffing this year.

If you find yourself having mild (or major) panic attacks at the idea of making it through the rest of the holidays, there might be a few things you can do to soothe your feelings of overwhelm. Hopefully the following list will in some way bring enjoyment to your next 7 weeks.

Ask questions. Knowing what is expected of you can begin a clear path to reaching a goal. Assuming that others will be direct in their communications with you could leave you wondering when others will get things started. Your questions could be the prompt others need in clearing the air about who is doing what, and where.

Say "Yes." Sometimes not having enough to do can leave one feeling aimless and anxious. Having a task to complete can provide direction and focus, which encourage feelings of motivation. Not to mention, it can help you gain a sense of belonging with others who are working toward the same goal.

Say "No." Alternatively, it can be necessary to limit that to which you obligate yourself. It is important to base what you do on the time and resources you have, NOT on what others expect of you. Be clear about what you expect of yourself to others, and set healthy limits. Remember, someone else's lack of planning does NOT constitute an emergency for you.

Use lists and calendars. One of the most important skills I ever learned was to list my daily expectations of myself each morning. Having a list gives you a concrete task organizer that shows evidence of your accomplishments as you check things off. And, calendars are great because you can plan your time far enough ahead of schedule to avoid feeling rushed. It also allows you to verify that you haven't taken on too much for the coming weeks.

Close up , colorful pushpins on calendar

Hopefully this small list can give you a head start to achieving just a little comfort and joy this holiday season.

If you would like to speak to a professional about stress or other issues, call our office at (417)626-0212 to schedule an appointment.

Rachal Bales, MA, LMFT

I don't know about you, but for me the holidays can be overwhelming! My life, and I am sure your lives are busy, and this busyness seems to go into overdrive when the holidays hit. Specifically, October through the New Year in January can be the busiest time for most of us. Although it can be very joyous to see family, eat lots of yummy food, and get gifts; coordinating travel, if you have to, or making arrangements for family and friends to stay with you is stressful. And, there are other factors that quickly stress us out such as our expectations. Most of us hope to have holidays that are stress free. However, many times what can make our moods deteriorate and increase our blood pressure is when things don't turn out as planned. This is only to be expected. How we think influences how we feel and all that influences our behavior. But, they all influence each other as well. Like this:

Being able to recognize how you think, feel, and behave can either increase or decrease your stress. This includes your expectations for how you want or would like things to go. Here at Renewed Mental Health, we strongly emphasize working from a holistic perspective – attending to our thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and our spiritual well-being. In being holistic, we also focus on the body. Since, as you can see from the picture above, our thoughts, emotions and behaviors all impact each other, all of that impacts our bodily health as well. For example, when people start a practice of mindfulness meditation, they often comment on how tense their bodies are. This is because stress can cause anxiety and sometimes depression, and vice versa.

The impact on the body is that anxiety can make our bodies tense up and cause our minds to race. Depression often causes us to feel like there's weight on our shoulders. Additionally, when we are stressed, our bodies often produce stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol – especially if we feel frightened or threatened. So, if you have a holiday plan that seems to not be working out, your brain interprets that as a threat; which sets off your threat response system. Or, if you have to deal with a family member or members who you might not get along so well with, this can also set off your threat response system in anticipation (this is called anticipatory anxiety) of possible or probable conflict. Additionally, hormones like cortisol are good for short-term threats like maybe a dog barking at you, and maybe it's not on a leash. But, longer term threats like dealing with obnoxious family members for an extended period of time puts your body on high alert and that means you might gain weight or might have a lowered or suppressed immune system. Why is this? It is because long ago in humanity's hunter and gatherer days, our threat response systems were designed to deal with physical threats. If a saber-tooth tiger confronted our ancestors they would probably have tried running to escape. While running away, it wasn't necessary to have one's digestion intact or one's immune system because all the energy necessary to power these processes of the body was diverted to the limbs of the body to get away from the physical threat of the saber-tooth. But, expecting trouble with your in-laws or other family members, or severe weather conditions while driving, or whatever is stressing you is something your brain is not wired for. Your brain is wired for physical threats, like the saber-tooth, and the kinds of threats we mostly deal with today are social and psychological. When we imagine bad interactions with our family, or driving through ice and snow, our brains don't know that's not actually happening to us. In other words, our brains and our imaginations are so strong even imagining bad things happening sets off our threat response systems (Gilbert, 2014) (this is not bad – just the way our brains are wired, that's all).

So, if we expect bad things happening this holiday season, and we are imagining this to be so, we are really stressing ourselves out! So, what can you do? First, just recognizing when you are thinking this way helps. Second, you might adopt a practice of mindfulness. Here at Renewed Mental Health many of our practitioners emphasize mindfulness as part of our practice as just being with our thoughts in a non-judgmental has the tendency to move them out of our brain space faster. Third, interestingly enough the brain is so cool and complex, that considering weight gain over the holidays, an article was released in the Journal of Neurophysiology in 2014 by Clark et al. (http://jn.physiology.org/content/112/12/3219) that explored the impact of how our imaginations, just by thinking of exercising for 20 minutes daily, actually does help us both lose weight and gain muscle mass! That is no small thing. So, this holiday season try and be mindful of your expectations and your worries. And, if you can't get off the couch, just try imaging walking a path familiar to you near your house for at least 20 minutes. You might be surprised by how much better you feel. And, if you are so inclined come see one of the therapists here at Renewed Mental Health if this holiday stress becomes too much.

May you have a happy, warm, and safe holiday season.

Very Warmly,

Matthew Porte, MSW, LCSW

If you are struggling with holiday stress or the blues we can help you. Call our Joplin, MO offices at 427-626-0212.

With Halloween coming next week, it won't be long until we are plunged neck deep in the often chaotic holiday season. Joplin traffic might be bumper to bumper, but, it doesn't have to stress you to the breaking point. The holidays can be less "Christmas Vacation" and more "White Christmas". Here's a few tips to help you out

1. Start early.

There's a reason the stores start putting out their holiday fare before Halloween. Some people actually start preparations that early, and maybe they're on the right track. Spreading the load of Christmas over a couple of months, picking up a gift here and a gift there, early will make it less of a panic the week before Christmas. This will allow you to spend more time on the fun, family activities as the holiday approaches. There's an added bonus of spreading the cost out over the months.

2. Set a budget.

Money can be one of the leading holiday stresses. It's too easy to go overboard and regret it later. Make a list and try to stick with it. Remember a gift is a token of love and appreciation for someone, not a competition. Something from the heart may not cost as much but mean so much more.

3. Don't overschedule.

It feels good to say, "yes" to every request, and it feels horrible to have to turn someone down during this time of year. But if you stretch yourself too thin you probably won't feel much better. Choose the events and activities that mean the most to you and politely decline others. Take time for yourself. Refresh and refocus yourself and you can put that much more into those activities you care most about.

4. Ask for help

You don't have to do it alone. There is no shame in asking for help. Sharing holiday experiences with friends working together can be fun.

5. Don't abandon your daily routines.

Doing the familiar helps lower stress and provides stability. Keeping up with hygiene and exercise routines will help keep you healthy and more focused. When something you weren't expecting happens you'll be able to deal with it better.

6. Plan on key events early.

Be it the Joplin Christmas Parade, the arrival of Santa Claus at Northpark Mall, the office Holiday shindig, or decorating the tree at home, plan the events you love to attend well in advance. Not only will it keep you on track, but will give you highlited events to look forward to.

Visit this link for a list of Joplin events this year.

7. Be compassionate

Most everyone feels the pressure. Sometimes when something goes wrong, it's easy to take it out on the sales clerk, cashier or other employees you encounter. Instead, be kind they've probably faced several stressed out and grumpy customers that day. Typically the reasons people want to complain to them are not their fault or beyond their control. A smile, and kindness shown to them will usually be mirrored with the same in return. You will probably get better customer service to boot.

8. Enjoy yourself.

It'd probably been a long year and you deserve this time with friends and family. Take time to be together. Relax and enjoy their company. Work on a project together. Put on a favorite Christmas movie or album. Play a game. Remember this is supposed to be a kind, joyous time of the year.