Self-Care—A Needed Respite!

Happy Spring! I do hope you have been taking advantage of our wonderful weather. Today we went to see the “super bloom” at the Santa Rosa Plateau. We took the hike to the vernal pool; it was so pretty, and we saw flowers everywhere. It was such a lovely day with the lush plants, and it was nice to feel the sun on my face--trying to soak up that needed Vitamin D. I do enjoy the extra daylight we receive this time of year, and I appreciate having the day off to recharge and practice some self-care. In fact, I am taking a few extra days off for a mini-vacation this week. I have a couple of small projects I am working on but my I am going to spend as much time as possible outside hiking, sailing, and swimming. Tomorrow’s hike will be in Anza Borrego State Park and I’m hoping to get out there early enough to see the flowers and the Big Horn Sheep.

I do hope you are also building self-care time into your life as well. Can you remember your last vacation?  What did you do? Where did you go? We so need our breaks and vacations to help us prevent burnout and to remain effective therapists. I know some therapists are fearful about taking a vacation because they feel the clients won’t come back or they might have an emergency while the therapist is gone. This could happen, but most of the time my clients are happy that I am taking a vacation. One of my clients stated, “Good for you, enjoy your self-care time.”  My clients know that this time I am only gone a week, and then I will return. I gave them two weeks’ advanced notice and who they should contact if they do have a true emergency. It is rare, but I like for my clients to have a “just in case” number; I think it also provides them peace of mind too.

Do you have your therapist tribe in place? A person or two that can cover for you when you take a vacation or need a break? If you do not, I would encourage you to find a couple of therapists in your area that could take that responsibility on. It is a little more work, but usually, when I cover the week, it is pretty quiet. However, I had a couple once that came in because they just felt they fight too much if they can’t get in to see a therapist. They were a funny couple, and it wasn’t a true emergency, but they begged to come in to see me.  They spent most of the session telling me what they had learned from their therapist and how great he was and only about 5 minutes telling me about a fight they had.   

Here are a few self-care ideas for you that I might also be doing this week.

• Read a good book
• Meditate (Yes, I do this daily)
• Get a massage
• Exercise
• Inhale a nice fragrance--try peppermint, citrus, or frankincense
• Take a new route to work
• Go cloud watching
• Fly a kite or take time to play

Until next time, be well.

Sherry

The 3000 club meetings have resumed and we are meeting on the 4^th Saturday of the month. Upcoming topics include: Practice building, 5150 training, sexual addiction and more. Stay tuned via Facebook; IE-CAMFT page.

The Weeds Will Wait

Today, as the rain comes down and I look out the window and see the many weeds popping up in my garden in the backyard I think briefly about going out and picking them, but well, it’s raining and frankly it’s not that important. Instead I settle for reading and playing boardgames with the family which is more fun than weeding any day. 

In our practices, we have clients that come into our offices in despair and sorrow and they are looking to feel better and relieve themselves of the pain that may have followed them for half a lifetime or more.  We have an important job to do: help our clients clear their weeds from their gardens of life. But as healers we must also watch out for our burnout and overwhelm. If we are not careful we set up ourselves to become exhausted. We don’t even realize it then take on “just one more client,” or stay that extra hour because that is the only time this couple can come in. Or yet, maybe we take on a client that isn’t in our specialty because the clients tell us that they have called six therapists and they are either full or don’t return phone calls. 

When we as therapists fall into this trap we are hurting both the client and ourselves. We must take care of ourselves first before we can hold that sacred space that each client requires. We must take our time to recharge our batteries, to take a walk, spend time with family, friends, or better yet, a vacation to have some personal down time. When was the last time you had a really great belly laugh where you laughed so hard your sides hurt?   We all need that type of recharging.

Recently, my uncle passed away he was 99 ½ years young.  He was a great adventurer. He was a WWII pilot, a manager, and a maker of wonderful wooden toys for children; the hardy, last a lifetime, fun kind of toys. He was a wonderful storyteller with a great big belly laugh. He once told me a story of my dad and him accidentally burning down the entire Laguna Beach pier when they were young boys; at that time the pier was completely made of wood. He also said that it wasn’t their fault but their home-made boat had a fuel leak that both brothers blame on each other for not checking. No one was hurt and the pier was rebuilt with their help.  However, when he tells the story they just laugh and laugh. I hope you are creating those types of stories in your life and career, hopefully minus the burning down of things.

So, book that vacation, set up that play date for your kids, slow down some, and enjoy what you have built. Share your stories with us, your children, and your friends. Laugh and laugh hard.  The weeds will wait.

Sherry Shockey-Pope, IE-CAMFT President

“Scream from the peaks, hold hands through the dips, laugh through the loop-de-loops, and enjoy every twist and turn – – for the ride is better because you share it together.” Author Unknown.

The last few months there seems to be a great deal of uncertainty building. I feel it, my friends feel it, my clients feel it, and maybe you do too.  This past month, a great deal of my time has been trying to help calm my clients’ anxiety and to help them feel safe enough to work on healing. My staff also report that their clients are feeling the uncertainty as well. In my office, the ringing phone has been a consistent reminder that people are scared and want help. I have taken many calls this past couple of weeks where the caller has asked desperately “Are you taking new patients? I have called other therapists and everyone is full.”

When I worked for a local county many years ago; we would have good cash flow years where we could create new and wonderful programs, add staff and ultimately help many people in our community. In other years, the budget was terrible and we reduced programing, couldn’t purchase any supplies, and fewer people received help. I remember one year I was even given a layoff notice.  That was a scary time.  While I am not trying to be political here, I do see some scary times ahead. I also know that we will get through this, somehow. Each day I get up, I meditate, workout, and I ready myself. I take stock in what I can do to make changes, I set my intention to do great work, to be even better than I was the day before. I am not looking at others to be in competition, but for strength and encouragement. How I choose to live my life matters, and it matters to my family and friends, but also it matters to my clients. Therapists matter and what we do matters. We need to be able to support each other to stand up together and be the voice for those who do not have a voice. We need to help heal this broken world and this is a daunting task, I know. I am proud of our therapist tribe. I see the tireless work that you are doing in our communities. I commend your actions and request that we do a little more. We are going to need a lot more action in the coming months and we may at times need to become political. Especially as services for our veterans, children, women, and families are stripped, the pay we receive for our work is reduced, and the healthcare system becomes harder and harder to navigate. I would encourage you stay informed, to speak up when you see or hear of injustice, and to support one another. For that is how we heal our communities. 

Respectfully,

Sherry

Another opportunity this year for a great conference is “THE EVOLUTION OF PSYCHOTHERAPY: A CONFERENCE.”

Speakers include: Daniel Amen, Aaron Beck, Judith Beck, Claudia Black, David Burns, Steve Frankel, Stephen Gilligan, Tipper Gore, John Gottman, Julie Gottman, Sue Johnson, Jack Kornfield, Harriet Lerner, Peter Levine, Cloe Madanes, Bill O’hanlon, Esther Perel, Martin Seligman, Francine Shapiro, Dan Siegel, Bessel Van Der Kolk, Irvin Yalom, and many others.

 The 3000 club meetings have resumed and we are meeting on the 4^th Saturday of the month. Upcoming topics include: Practice building, 5150 training, sexual addiction and more. Stay tuned via Facebook; IE-CAMFT page.

Happy New Year, I hope your 2017 is filled with great health, happiness, and prosperity.

In my practice and even amongst my friends I keep hearing people say that they want to put “2016 to bed” and are looking forward to 2017 to be a better year. As I look back at 2016, I felt that the year was not too bad for me, personally, I was able to accomplish most of my goals with only a few setbacks and a couple failures. However, you know what they say about failures, “they’re new opportunities to learn.” I would attest that is true, but I do tend to be a fairly upbeat person. I am looking forward to 2017 with great anticipation of the possibilities of what we can accomplish together. I know our program schedule for 2017 is packed with wonderful speakers and in February we are again having Dave Jensen come to speak about Law and Ethics. This is a great way to get the 6 hour CEUs, have lunch, network with fantastic therapists, and learn. It is always a great day and I hope you will join us.       

I wanted to share with those of you who take insurance of a change coming up for 2017. Cigna and Magellan will now pay for “teletherapy.” This is important as some clients in our practices cannot make it to our office on a regular basis. Or maybe your specialty is so sought after you are receiving referrals from up and down the state. If you are paneled with each company or if your clients have a PPO plan, telehealth is 100% covered. Just remember that we can’t use Skype or Facetime for this service but there are plenty of HIPAA-secure video platforms out there that are easy to use. Another update I wanted to share is the State of California Board of Behavioral Sciences, affectionately called BBS, has also updated the Statutes and Regulations relating to the Practices of Professional Clinical Counseling/ Marriage and Family Therapy/Educational Psychology/ Clinical Social Work. The highlights I found interesting included as of January 1, 2018, the term “Intern” will be changed to Associate for MFTs and PCCs, bringing MFTs & PCCs into the same terminology as Social Workers and providing the general public with a better understanding that they do possess a Master’s level education, they are just collecting hours to sit for the boards. The second highlight is the change of practicum hours to include direct client contact and delete equivalencies; prohibit out-of-degree remediation of “assessment” and “diagnosis” in core content areas.  This regulation was passed partly due to some online universities not requiring direct client hours in practicum classes. You can find the complete handout from the BBS@   http://www.bbs.ca.gov/pdf/publications/lawsregs.pdf

Are you one to make new Year resolutions? I am not the type to set up resolutions. However, I do have goals that I work towards monthly, but I don’t set the goal just because it’s a new year.  If you are the type to make resolutions what types of resolutions do you intend to make? Are they big resolutions or small ones? Do you actually keep them or do they change over the year? I would be interested to know your thoughts.

Lastly, I hope that in 2017 you think about some local chapter service.  It really doesn’t take that much time and with “many hands make light work” as my dad used to say. This is true and just think about the great people you will meet by your service.

Let’s make this year a fantastic success

Sherry

Happy December, happy holidays and happy end of the year. This is it, we are almost ready to close the 2016 chapter of our lives; only a couple more weeks. I hope 2016 was a prosperous and healthy year for you all. In my practice, we added staff and saw more clients this year than ever before. The need for services in our community seems to be never ending, and the slow December to catch up and get stuff done seems to be a thing of the past. Just last week marked the first anniversary of the San Bernardino shootings. We have received a few calls from people in the area or those that had witnessed the shooting that are still having a hard time. I understand from the Press Enterprise and personal accounts that some companies including the State of California are informing people that they no longer can receive services, medication, or take time off when life gets hard. That they “should be over it as it’s been a year.” Or “you should not be affected any longer because you didn’t work for the county.” Or “It was the County that was the target.” Obviously, these people do not understand trauma very well. I teach some of the new social workers for San Bernardino and they are frightened about the anniversary and effects it has on the people of this community. A client asked one of my clinicians if her unsettled feelings were normal! I was astonished.  In my book, there is nothing normal about a shooting here or anywhere. Our feelings are what tell us we are in danger, that something is wrong, that our environment is unsafe. My office and home are about 10 miles away from this incident; it affected me. I can’t imagine going to work at the site every day and not having some feelings about it. I would encourage you all to reach out to your clients and to our community to help those people that are not getting the support they need. If any of you need additional support, call me and let’s talk.  Sometimes what we do is hard. We can share a coffee and some time. Call me.

On a lighter note, IE-CAMFT chapter members please come to the Holiday Party that is coming up on December 10, 2016. It really is a fun event and a great way to enhance friendships. It very easy to do, just register on the IE CAMFT website like you do for the monthly seminar.  Then pull out that old holiday hat and bring your $15.00 gift for the exchange and you’re ready to go.   We will have great food, music, and fun, all at no charge.

Lastly, I wanted to thank the IE-CAMFT Board for all that you do to make this organization work so smoothly. I cherish each and every one of you for your unique contributions. If you are not on the board I would encourage you to come to one of our board meetings and see the inner workings. I would also encourage you to volunteer a little time. We can always use a few extra hands.

Again, happy holidays to you and yours…looking forward to a healthy, prosperous and joyous 2017.