Category Archives: Relationships

10 Rules for recovery after an affair.

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Emotional Affair

Recovery after an affair.

The common perception is that once the affair is discovered the couple is headed for divorce. The truth is that up to 70% of married couples stay together, for a variety of reasons, after they discover that partner was having an affair.

Among those who do divorce, many will later regret making that first impulsive decision.

Your family and friends may be telling you to kick him, or increasingly her, to the curb. But should you call it quits? What does it take to recover from an affair? How can marriage counseling play a role in mending the pain?

1. Don’t make sudden decisions when you discover an affair.

Give both of you time to think it through. You have a lot of time and emotions invested in this relationship. You owe it to yourself to see if it can be repaired before you junk it.

2. Both of you need to process how the affair affected you.

Both partners in the relationship may need therapy to work through their feelings about the affair, their relationship, and how it reached this point.

Therapists recommend that the non-affair partner write a letter to the affair partner telling them how they feel and how this has affected them. This is the kind of letter you need to write but do not need to send. Process these feelings first in your own therapy. Eventually, you may be able to read this to your relationship partner and help them to understand how this has affected you.

3. You need to create empathy for the non-affair partner.

Many people who have had affairs have very little understanding of how this has affected their partner. They will say in counseling that they have ended the relationship and that should solve the problems. Having them listen to the non-affair partner talk about how they were hurt by the affair and what feelings this created in that person can increase empathy and understanding.

4. Avoid staying together after the affair and ending up living two separate lives.

Some couples arrive at this point as a result of unspoken feelings. They will stay together for the children, for the economic needs, or because of the problems of splitting assets. What they don’t plan on is having an emotionally close relationship ever again. Most of these efforts fail as the two people involve find that they are living a life devoid of love and affection.

Even if the couple plans to try to make this relationship work, avoiding having those tough talks about their plans goals and future may result in a relationship that feels like to unrelated people living in the same house.

5. Rebuilding trust after an affair is a long hard process.

The most devastating part of finding out your partner had an affair is the feeling of betrayal of your trust. It takes a long time and lots of effort to rebuild that trust. You need to let each other into both your lives and make sure neither is hiding anything. Do not tell your partner you are going to get gas for the car and then turn up several hours later with leftover takeout food. If you plan on several stops tell your partner if plans change, call them and let them know, or stick to the plan and make a second trip some other time.

6. Do not use counseling or therapy as a way to get even with your partner.

Trying to use marriage counseling as a way to get even with the affair partner makes things worse. No amount of beating them up will erase what happened and it will result in fresh wounds that may never heal.

7. Give the non-affair partner all the information they need but no more.

Many partners want to know every detail, what did you two do in and out of bed. It is important to stop keeping secrets but beware of giving more details that requested. Non-affair partners can suffer from symptoms similar to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. After hearing about sexual activity between the partner and the affair partner the non-affair partner can experience intrusive thoughts. They may imagine graphic images of their partner engaged in sexual activity with another person.

8. Make post affair counseling a repair effort.

Give the partner that had the affair a chance to show their intentions. Do they do small things to make it right but quickly slip back into old behaviors? Let them know that you hope for and expect the best but they will need to prove their desire to change and make it right by making visible changes in their behavior.

9. Get extra honest with each other to rebuild trust.

Affairs are about the fights you never had. If there are problems in the relationship talk them through. Work on expressing your feelings, being careful to ask to have your needs met rather than run your partner down. “I feel disrespect when you do not help clean up after dinner.” Not “You are such a pig!” You never clean up after yourself!”

One key characteristic of affairs is the need to keep secrets. The non-affair partner sometimes feels then may have contributed to the affair by not asking what the other person was doing and feeling. Some people who have had affairs tell me that they felt they had a sort of permission to have the affair a “don’t ask don’t tell” code.

Couples may need to have a lot of those talks about sex and relationships they did not have before they entered this relationship. Women frequently have a different definition of an affair than a man will. She thinks that flirting and emotional closeness with another woman is cheating. He may think that anything short of intercourse is OK. That attitude and some alcohol have led to a lot of one night stands.

10. Avoid the problematic use of drugs and alcohol.

Drugs and alcohol lower inhibitions. People with an untreated substance use disorder are at increased risk to engage in affair behavior. Drinking and using places encourage sexual activity. People who abuse alcohol and drugs may accept those kinds of behavior as a part of the “Partying” lifestyle.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Grieving bad relationships?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Grieving a bad relationship.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Do you grieve over the end of a bad relationship?

When a relationship ends we all grieve, each in our own way. Grieving is a process and that process can be different for each person. It makes sense to grieve over the loss of someone we love, but many people find themselves going through a period of grief at the end of a bad relationship, and the stages of grief they go through can be a lot like the process for the loss of a loving relationship.

This has occurred not once or a few times in my clinical practice. If it was one person I would not be telling this story out of respect for their confidentiality. But this has happened frequently in the lives of people I see and it is reported in the research on ending relationships.

Bad relationships happen in the romantic area and they happen in our families of origin. There is pain from that unfulfilling relationship whether it involved an unloving or abusive parent or a romance gone bad.

New relationships often start with huge hopes and expectations. A large number do not live up to those expectations. We invest a piece of our heart in every intimate relationship we have ever been in.

Couples get together, with or without the benefit of marriage. They expect this relationship to make them happy. Then the reality sets in they are not happy in this relationship. Many times they find they are miserable.

There may be abuse, addiction, domestic violence, and arguments. In the course of those conflicts, people say things to each other that they can never take back. The relationship hurts.

Ending the relationship does not end the pain.

You may have grown up in an unloving home. The parent was addicted, abusive or just unable to provide the affection you wanted and needed. Depressed parents, parents with their own mental or emotional issues may not be able to give those things they do not have themselves. The cycle of emotional unavailability can pass down through generations.

Children who were abused by parents, placed in foster care to protect them, still may miss that parent.   More than one of these youth, upon reaching adulthood will leave the foster care system to return to the family that abused them.

What they miss is not the reality of unloving parents but the loss of that dream that someday somehow they will be reconciled to those parents and find love.

Couples often grieve not for the loss of the relationship that never was good but for the loss of that dream that in this relationship they might find the loving other that would make them happy.

What many find out is that this other can never make them happy, happiness is an inside job. No amount of effort will make some troubled relationships whole. Often times ending a relationship is the best thing for both people involved. Other times they end the relationship and discover that they are still unhappy.

When any relationship ends, good or bad what we most grieve is the loss of potential, the end of the dreams that someday, somehow this relationship will meet our needs. We grieve when we lose a good relationship and we grieve when the troubled ones end.

We grieve mostly at the end of each relationship over the loss of what might have been.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Tobacco is the ticket to mental illness and addiction

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Smoking cigarettes.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Tobacco and Mental Illness.

Early Cigarette smoking is strongly linked to developing a mental illness or an addiction

The younger you start smoking the riskier it is. In our efforts to teach kids about drugs and addiction we have been neglecting to focus on the one drug that seems to be the ticket to later-life mental illness and addiction.

That drug is nicotine.

Most young people with a drug or alcohol problem began to smoke between the ages of 11 and 13. Early use of alcohol is also a factor. For now, let’s talk about the impact of smoking cigarettes on teen’s development of a mental illness or an addiction.

Among adult smokers, over 80% began smoking in the early teen years.

What has gone unnoticed for so long is the connection between this early smoking, the development of addiction to other drugs, and the development of a mental illness.

Fortuna Et al. reported on a study of adolescents in a residential substance abuse treatment program. You need to have developed a serious problem to get into residential treatment in most places these days. What they found was disturbing.

An occasional smoker, those “social” smokers, can develop a dependency on Nicotine in as little as 4 weeks. Kinney reported in a drug treatment book that after smoking just one cigarette, once they light up that second time, a young person has an 85 % chance of becoming a daily smoker. That is an extremely addictive substance.

Among teen smokers in residential substance abuse treatment, the problems with mental illness were significant. Those with depression and anxiety, both common across the lifespan, they were twice as likely to develop nicotine dependence as those without a mental illness.

People with Bipolar Disorder and or Schizophrenia are three times more likely to be nicotine dependent. Even the rates of smoking among those with ADHD are reported as significantly higher than those with no mental illness diagnosis.

Being the victim of, or being exposed to trauma, domestic violence or other abuse and neglect also correlate with an increase in smoking and nicotine dependency.

It is worth noting that from the design of these studies we can’t be sure of the exact nature of the connection. Does smoking increase the risk of developing a mental illness? It looks likely. It also looks likely that those with a preexisting mental illness are more likely to take up smoking. Either way teen smoking is a whole lot more troubling than anyone recognized in the past.

What Fortune et al. did conclude in their study was that a teen’s cigarette smoking significantly increased the risk of them developing a serious drug or alcohol addiction. They also report that those with co-occurring disorders, addiction, and a mental illness are much more likely to become nicotine dependent if they start smoking.

In this study, the only drug that teens had used first more often than smoking tobacco was smoking marijuana. We have known that route of administration significantly impacts the way the drug affects a user. It seems to me that any drug that is smoked can lead to dependency faster than other routes of administration. Even so, the conclusion that more teens with co-occurring disorders began by smoking marijuana is a concern.

Alcohol use was a close third in the drug that teens who later developed an addiction had used first. This suggests that parent use, societal approval, and ready availability are all factors in teen’s first picking up a drug and then in progressing to a more serious substance use disorder.

Most of this kind of research looks at those who develop problems and then looks back at what route the followed to get to addiction. We can’t be sure what percentage of teens that smoke cigarettes, do marijuana, or drink alcohol will go on to develop a substance use disorder or a mental illness. Still, it seems clear that those who do develop an addiction or a mental illness, most of them started abusing the readily available substance at an early age.

In studies of teens in drug treatment, Fortune et. al especially notes this, smoking is so common, almost every teen is a smoker, it is hard to see the differences between the smokers and the nonsmokers.

Lawrence et. al, looked at the connection between smoking and mental illness in a large sample of youth, not in treatment. Their conclusions were similar. Teens with a mental illness were far more likely to start smoking at an early age, smoke on an everyday basis, and be heavy smokers. They clearly identified a link between teens who smoke and mental illness.

It is important that in addressing teen mental health issues and substance abuse issues we not overlook the role of nicotine and early smoking. We also need to keep an eye out for the emergence of increased marijuana use as the first indicator of a teen mental health issue.

Other research and treatment protocols have looked at the need for a different form of treatment for those whose primary drug of choice was Marijuana and who had self-reported this as being a problem. For more on drug-specific treatment of Marijuana look at the SAMHSA publication on Brief Counseling for Marijuana Dependency (BCMD.) This publication is free.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Does an affair mean you should divorce?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Divorce.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

7 things you need to know if you stay together after an affair.

One partner has had an affair, should you divorce? Should you stay and try to work it out?

Here are some of the things that you need to think about, talk about, and work through in counseling before you decide whether to stay together or separate.

1. Do you and your partner share any common values, goals, and interests?

What do you have in common other than having been sexual partners?

Having common values and goals for your life is a great predictor of long-term compatibility. In the first intoxicating insanity of love, we often do not ask questions about the values that underlie our potential partner’s desires and dreams.

No matter how hard you try to support your partner’s dreams and goals if you have different values the results are uncertain.

Any couple should expect to have tough times. Affairs are one of the toughest. So are deaths in the family, particularly the death of a child. Addictions are another severe crisis.

When a couple is thinking about the decision to stay together or part ways, now is the time to have those discussions about your values. That discussion can bring you closer together or help you make the decision that this relationship is not salvageable.

2. How will you feel about yourself if you stay?

What does it mean to you if you go?

The first few weeks after the discovery of an affair you may be asking yourself all sorts of questions about you. How did you make this mistake, is it your fault that the partner cheated.

This is a time to get in touch with yourself. Some people can never forgive or forget. This is an especially difficult problem for those who have been the victim of abuse or neglect in the past. If you already had “trust issues” this crisis may be beyond your ability to accept.

Think this through carefully. If you can feel good about yourself for the decision to stay, then give this a chance. If you feel you can never forgive yourself for letting them get away with this then your own mental health may demand that you leave.

3. How will you feel about being alone?

Are you likely to get into another relationship to fill that void? If you do start a new relationship they will have a sexual and relational past.

Being alone can be a scary situation. If you are fearful about that think carefully about your ability to stay single for any length of time after you end up separating.

Each partner you pick will come with a past. People fresh out of a relationship, those who are afraid to be alone, are at extra risk to start a relationship with a person who has their own set of problems and their own emotional baggage.

If you have a lot of time invested in a relationship, be careful that you do not leave one partner because they had an affair only to enter a new relationship with someone who is single because of their affair.

There are reasons why people are single. Think about what attracted you to this certain partner. Will those same things be attractive in a new partner? What are the chances that you will pick a new partner that may cheat or have an undesirable sexual past?

4. Did you contribute to this in any way?

Will you change or will you pick a new partner and go through this again next time? If you had a role in these problems, say you did not have those discussions about problems with your partner before they started the affair you will probably contribute to the same sort of problems with the next partner.

It takes two healthy people to have a healthy relationship. If you are healthy and both you and your partner are willing to work on mending this breach, you have a good chance of ending up with a great relationship. If only you will stay and do the work.

5. Is he or she reliable in other ways or is this part of their pattern of being unreliable.

If this is the only significant problem in your relationship then it may well be mendable. If this partner has a history of not coming through when you need them, they are not likely to change just because you know about the affair.

6. Besides being lovers, were you two really life partners?

If you have things in common, you like the same things, have the same hobbies, and want the same things out of life, consider staying together and mending the problems in the partnership.

If the only thing you had in common was the sexual part or if the emotional closeness you had is gone and neither of you is willing to do the work to get it back, then the chances are good that you will never be life partners.

Two people living separate lives under the same roof is not much to settle for.

7 What other serious problems does your partner have?

If your partner has other serious problems, addiction, alcoholism, or gambling, an affair could be the smallest part of the problems you will have to face. Criminal lifestyles can sweep you up. So can most any other addiction.

All of these are things to consider before making your decision to stay or go. It can help to talk this through with a Marriage Counselor or trusted advisor.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Internet affairs.

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Are internet affairs real affairs?

Internet affairs?
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

The internet has changed the way we interact with others forever. Social Media, Blogs, and member sites have opened up new possibilities for connecting with others. It has also resulted in a whole new set of conflicts for couples. Internet created or maintained affairs are one such problem.

The way in which one partner in a relationship uses the internet has serious implications for a couple’s relationship. The mental health profession is still sorting out the effects of internet issues on relationships. One area that is particularly troublesome is how far is too far when it comes to interacting with members of the opposite sex.

Some of the internet affair questions being asked are:

When does talking to others online slide over into a virtual affair?

Is it really an affair if they never get together and exchange bodily fluids?

Does it matter if the person you are talking to is real?

Can you fall in love with an avatar or someone who never exists outside the internet?

The internet has altered the affair landscape and has created a whole new set of problems for couples and families.

In the past affairs required two people to meet in real-time and space.

The major places where affairs originated were between two people who were working together, people who met out at a bar, or things that might happen when a person was away from home for an extended time. So in the past either there was a high chance that the non-affair party would find out or might know the affair partner. Otherwise, the affair would be a brief occurrence while one party to a relationship was away from home.

The internet has made it easier for people to meet, and to continue interacting with each other. It has opened up the possibilities for affairs for those who were predisposed.

The internet has also blurred the line between what constitutes flirting and when has it crossed over into an affair.

In-person, people are often deceived every day. The deceptions are different in kind and in magnitude from, the deceptions that are occurring online.

While someone in the bar may represent themselves as single and really be married, the online deceiver can misrepresent their gender, age, appearance, and life story. People can and do fall “in love” with fictional characters that turn out to not be real people.

If you or your partner has had an internet affair, that does not need to spell an end to your relationship. What you need to do is to talk this out and find ways to be sure it has come to an end and that it is unlikely to happen again.

Marriage counseling can help mend a damaged relationship before it becomes permanently broken. Sometimes individual counseling is also useful in helping the affair partner to understand why they did what they did. It can also be useful to help the injured party cope with all that anger and hurt.

The virtual, internet affair, and the on-line hook-up that results in a real-world meet-up are not the only ways in which one person’s internet usage may damage their relationship. Last week we looked briefly at 5 ways in which internet usage might be damaging your relationship. You may want to check out that post also.

Has internet usage affected you and your relationship? Would you care to share that experience?

If you think that you could use some help with internet usage issues or affair behavior issues please contact me and we can talk about how counseling might help you get through this situation.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Are internet affairs real affairs?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Computer

Internet.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Are internet affairs real affairs?

The article this post originally sent you to no longer exists. For more information on this and related topics please see:

Affairs

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Why do people act in Passive Aggressive ways?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Passive-aggressive.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Why must they act Passive Aggressive?

Passive Aggressive Personality Disorder used to be a recognized mental illness. Then in the DSM-4, it was reduced to a condition that may need more study, and most recently it has simply disappeared from our way of thinking of mental illnesses.

Remember that there are times when a person gets criticized for adopting this form of behavior, maybe even referred for psychiatric care and then other people may be praised for adopting some form of passive reaction to an injustice.

So let’s look at why some people may adopt Passive Aggressive Behavior and why we are no longer so sure that it should qualify as a mental illness.

There are legitimate reasons people do not just come out and say what they mean. There are also reasons people may choose to say nothing but fail to carry through on things they were told to do. Passive-Aggressive behavior can be the result of some of those reasons.

People become Passive Aggressive when they have no power or control.

Children, especially if they are in an abusive or non-loving home, may not feel they can say no to their parents. They get out of things, not by saying no or discussing things but by taking excessive time or doing things wrong. If they break enough dishes mom may stop asking them to do the dishes.

The same behavior makes sense in the boss and employee situation. Sometimes you can’t tell the boss no, so you just do not get around to doing things that would be a waste of time anyway. Not everyone does this. Some employees are very conscientious, but the worse the boss in terms of giving arbitrary orders and not allowing people to disagree the more likely this becomes.

Some people use Passive Aggressive behavior more often than others.

If you came from a family where it was not acceptable to disagree with the parents or worse yet where you were not supposed to have any feeling unless they were sanctioned by the adult, you are more likely to hide your anger and then express it in Passive Aggressive ways.

Mental health clinicians used to think that there were things we called “Personality Disorders” and the presumption was that people who had these were always like that and that they were hard to treat and never changed. These premises have recently been called into question. Turns out that people can change their behavior when the situation changes.

One other thing that cuts against the validity of there being such a thing as Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder is that it is mostly used in situations where there is a weaker person who is unable to disagree with a stronger person or in a close situation like a marriage where sometimes we want to avoid both doing what the other person told us to do and also avoid making this into an argument.

One characteristic that has been used to differentiate Passive Aggressive behavior from something like passive nonviolence is the level of anger or hostility that the person using passive-aggressive behavior is experiencing.

When the non-doing stops being a way of avoiding conflict and becomes a way to harm someone else without having to accept the responsibility that hidden or veiled aggression can drive the most rational person to open hostility.

One aspect of Passive-aggressive behavior that has received a lot of attention is the times when it appears to be motivated by contrariness or oppositional motives. When a youth adopts the position that they will avoid doing whatever the adult asks them to do just for the sake of asserting that the adult cannot control them this can escalate to severe problems.

Frankly, much of what was getting called Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder looks way more like Oppositional Defiant Disorder when we see it in youths.

Passive Aggressive Personality Disorder shared so many features in common with other personality disorders and with depression and anxiety most professionals only used it when a parent or spouse said that was what the client was doing.

Most of the things we have been thinking of as personality disorders include a lot of antagonism towards others. Sometimes this is because the person’s life experiences tell them that they will not be treated fairly if they openly disagree or resist the will of others.

So while you will still read about Passive-Aggressive people, mental health has largely concluded that this is not a mental illness but is a way that some people cope with not being able to express disagreement. In other words, Passive Aggressive behavior is a symptom of some other problem rather than being a particular treatable disease.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Are you the Passive Aggressive type?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Couple fighting by not fighting

Passive-aggressive.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Who is the Passive-Aggressive?

There has been some discussion recently on the internet and elsewhere about people who are “Passive-Aggressive” how you deal with someone who is Passive-Aggressive and so forth.

What exactly is a “Passive-Aggressive Person” and how might this passive-aggressive personality be affecting you?

Turns out there are at least two somewhat different activities going by the name of Passive-Aggressive behavior.  On the subject of Passive-Aggressive Personality, psychology and mental health are not on the same page. There are not just separated and divorced on this one but living in different time zones.

Psychology has studied the way people may behave and do they have Passive characteristics or Aggressive characteristics. They used to think of these two as on opposite poles of the same axis.

Then it was suggested that some people combine both into a Passive-Aggressive style of dealing with conflicts. There were also some studies of whether these were stable traits, people did this all the time, or were these states, that the person might use a particular way of behaving in response to a specific situation and at one time but not another.

Mental health started looking at this as a potential mental illness, Passive-Aggressive Personality Disorder, which was causing problems in people’s social lives or in their work settings. The result of these two different perspectives is that the two fields came to differing views about Passive-Aggressive personality.

How did we get to a place where some professionals are writing about Passive-Aggressive people as if we all know what that is and why, while other groups have told us to drop the idea altogether?

Is a passive-aggressive person all bad or are there times when this is a useful way of behaving?

The idea that there are “Passive-Aggressive people” seems to have originated during World War Two when officers noticed, and then they complained, that they might give orders but the men just did not get around to doing what they were supposed to do. The result of this behavior was that the men got out of doing things and sometimes they communicated to a superior officer that they did not like that officer.

One example of this might be an officer who had the men dig a ditch one day and then had them fill it in the next. I suppose that the officer could argue that this is teaching discipline and is keeping the men active and fit, but the men soon caught on and found that there was no reason to put much effort into this ditch to nowhere.

This concept, of the person who is told to do something but then deliberately does it poorly or not at all, has also been applied to employees in the work setting. Some bosses like to think of themselves as generals or in other military terms. They talk about commanding their employees. You can make a good argument for the need of people in the military to carry out an order regardless of whether they agree with the order or not. It is harder to see why bosses give some orders that just make life harder for their employees and do not create any extra production.

The result of these irritating directives from management can be work slowdowns, stoppages, or people who just forget to do things. Sometimes it is hard to tell the difference. Some jobs take longer to do than planned. Sometimes people do forget. So the interpretation of “is this a Passive-Aggressive act” has to do with the motivations or intent of the employees, not with the resulting action or inaction.

This Passive-Aggressive idea was expanded to include children who did not do what adults asked. I still see this version in articles about our educational system. The student is told to move something but they drop and break it. Or they get the instructions wrong and go to the wrong place. Sometimes is as simple as them saying yes to doing something but then just sitting in their seat and doing nothing. The complaint by teachers is that the student may be saying yes but their actions are sabotaging the outcome.

One other place this is coming up, and here we are bordering on the mental health arena is in the field of marriage counseling.

One partner will refer to the other as passive-aggressive. Say the wife has a job interview the next day, she is busy getting ready and she asks the husband to stop at the grocery store on the way home.

He gets home late that night and reports he had a problem at work and “forgot” to stop at the store. This may lead to an argument and then either they eat leftovers or he goes to the local fast food for dinner. She is annoyed.

Next morning she goes to use the car for the job interview and finds that the gas tank is empty. She is now furious at him. Her conclusion is that he was late and left the gas tank empty to sabotage her efforts to get a job. Before long both partners may be “not doing” and “forgetting” to get their revenge on the other partner.

So from these examples, we can see why some people may do things that look Passive-Aggressive and that this can be really annoying if you are on the receiving end of this behavior.

This is also a hard thing to cope with because the person who is behaving in a Passive-Aggressive manner has all kinds of excuses for why they did not get things done or why they made a mistake.

Does that mean that someone who is acting in a Passive-Aggressive manner has a mental illness? Why do they do this and how can you get them to stop? And can Passive Aggressive behavior sometimes be a good thing, at least for the person who is using it?

Let’s take a look at all those issues in an upcoming post about the reasons people might adopt passive-aggressive behavior.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Internet affairs? Internet addiction?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Computer

Internet addiction.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Internet affairs? Internet addiction?

The internet is affecting a lot of real-life relationships. Today’s post over at our sister blog counselorfresno.com tells the story of three ways your internet usage may doom your other relationships.

Update – the article this post originally linked to no longer exists.
For more on this topic see the posts about Affairs.

Are you lonely?

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By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Loneliness.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Some tools to combat loneliness.

This is a time of the year when loneliness walks among us and it can swallow up the unwary. There are more people than ever on the earth, the stores are packed, and yet one place loneliness lurks is in the crowd.

Loneliness is a major cause of relapse, relapse to drug and alcohol use, relapse to depression, relapse on any part of your recovery.

Feeling lonely is not about the number of people in your world. It is about the connections you have with those people. As we get older it becomes harder to make new friends. Over the holidays everyone is so very busy. It is easy to become isolated – then depressed.

This time of year people are prone to start evaluating their relationships. Are they what you want? Some family dinners will be full of love, others will be full of recrimination and fault-finding. More than a few will be drunken brawls.

Your romantic relations may be under strain. You might look around and see presumably happy couples and we wonder if your relationship measures up. When we are lonely we can easily believe it is our partner or our family’s fault.

What are some ways to defeat loneliness if you find yourself feeling alone in your relationship or lonely in the crowd?

1. Get out of your routine.

It is easy to stay home and avoid situations where others will be around. We call that isolating. It is a symptom of depression. It can also be a cause of sadness and depression. Getting out and mingling is a good way to put yourself in contact with others if only for a while.

Try to do this with a hopeful attitude. Expect to talk to others and to make connections.

2. Reach out to someone else.

One really fast way to make new friends is to reach out to others. Put your hand out and introduce yourself. Say something kind or nice to someone around you.

Start a conversation with someone about where you are or what you are doing.

3. Spend time at a fellowship.

If you are a member of a religious group make it a priority to attend their functions this holiday. When there participate in something.

If you are in recovery attend a 12 step or other support group meeting. In many places, there are “Alchathons” or marathon meetings. These meetings occur every hour round the clock and provide a safe place for people in recovery to hang out over the holidays and not be alone in their own heads.

4. Reconnect with old friends.

Call someone you haven’t talked with in a while. Send out some emails. Do not let yourself dwell on the people who do not respond or who do not have time to talk. Focus on those people who stop and talk with you.

5. Reach out to someone else who may be feeling down and lonely.

In twelve steps groups, the advice is to call one other recovering person each day. That provides support for you in times of need. You may also find that other person needed the call even more than you did.

6. Do something nice for someone else.

Reaching out to others to help them – be of service – this can make you feel connected to others and far less lonely.

How will you defeat loneliness this holiday season? Do you have any other suggestions, not on my list?

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel