Why We Love Horror and True Crime
It’s that time of year again where we (pre-COVID) should be lining up outside of haunted houses, spending hours crafting scary costumes and hosting Halloween III movie parties. All to scare ourselves (and others) silly. But why? Why do we like being scared? What draws us to the dark side of things where people are stalked, maimed or even killed? This delight in discomfort goes waaaay back. Clearly the Victorians were having a heyday with it with stories of Jack the Ripper, Frankenste […]
Highly Sensitive People- It’s In The Genes!
It should be no surprise with the rapid advances in genetics these days that they have identified a gene that may help to explain what a lot of folks call the Highly Sensitive Person. A researcher at the University of California Berkeley, Dr. Levenson, postulates that a variation of the serotonin transporter gene on chromosome 17 may may account for people who feel their emotions very acutely. This serotonin transport gene can have two common variations– the “short allele” or the “long a […]
The Care and Feeding of Your Wave (or Loving Your Angry-Resistant Partner)…
Some time ago I published a blog on the “Care and Feeding of your Island/Avoidant Partner”. For those of you unfamiliar with the Psychobiological Approach to Couples Therapy (PACT), “Islands” and “Waves” are the terms coined by Dr. Stan Tatkin to help people understand attachment styles and how they show up in romantic relationships.”Wave-ish” partners have a few hallmark qualities that can help you identify them. They tend to like to talk, especially at night as they ar […]
How To Get Your Partner Into Couple’s Therapy
I get this question a lot. So I decided to write a blog post about it. Now, of course first you need to realize that you cannot control another person. Believe me, I have tried and tried hard. I like to say that I am just stubborn enough and strong-willed enough and persistent enough that if anyone COULD control another person it would be me. And I have always failed every time I tried. So please realize that. You cannot force another person to do anything, least of all couples therapy. […]