Tag Archives: emotional health

Stress

Have you ever experienced a physical or emotional demand that you felt unable to handle? If so, you have had stress at some level. Often as single parents, we can feel an extreme amount of stress that can adversely affect our health, relationships, and overall quality of life. All people feel stress at one time or another, but the constant activity of single parents can keep us in an almost constant state of feeling overwhelmed-sometimes to the point of despair. Circumstances and our thoughts can both produce high levels of stress. Low levels or not constant levels of stress are … Continue reading →

Emotional Literacy

One of the more difficult challenges in parenting-especially single parenting is teaching emotional literacy. You might think that you do not teach this subject, because you have never heard of it, and you do not consider yourself a teacher. Emotional intelligence or literacy (I also use emotional health interchangeably) is the ability to precisely identify and communicate our feelings. In order to ensure that our children’s emotional needs are met, they must first be able to identify how they feel. Babies cry when they are hungry, or have a wet diaper-they are expressing a need in their unique way. As … Continue reading →

Book Review-Changes That Heal

The book-Changes That Heal, How to Understand Your Past to Ensure a Healthier Future by Dr. Henry Cloud is a great read for people who have been through difficult life circumstances-including divorce. The book is written from a Christian perspective and the four main areas that if cultivated would improve our daily lives. Those areas are: 1. Bonding with others 2. Separate ourselves from others 3. Sort out issues of good and bad 4. Take charge as an adult Beginning to bond with others occurs before we are even born. We hear our mother or fathers voices while still in … Continue reading →

Relational Responsibility

People often say that it takes two to make a relationship work. I agree with that statement, but also understand that it only takes one person to completely destroy a relationship. Betrayal, lies, untruth and other social deviance can wreak havoc on a relationship no matter how mature or experienced both parties are. When living through a divorce it is easy to assign blame to the other person. There might be a lot of truth that the other person was primarily responsible for the breakup of the relationship, but part of the healing process is getting to a point where … Continue reading →

What Happens When Happily Ever After Doesn’t Happen?

For most people, when they said I do, they could not imagine that in time they would be saying-I don’t anymore. So much of our live are intertwined to relationships with others that when one of the deepest, most important relationship we can experience is broken, life does not seem to make sense anymore. The realization that the dreams we had planned to share with our spouse will never occur can be devastating. Often times people try to downplay their negative feelings and grief over the loss of a relationship, but this can be dangerous. Going through a divorce or … Continue reading →

De-Stressing Your Life

Single parents have so many responsibilities, it is easy to become overburdened and overly stressed. Some definitions of stress indicate that not all stress is a bad thing. Positive stress can help people increase creativity and productivity. I do not like stress in any form and do not function at my optimal levels when feeling a lot of stress. Here are some suggested tips for managing stress: Get enough sleep-For adults eight hours of rest a night is the recommended amount. Try going to bed and waking at the same time each day in order to let your body become … Continue reading →