Are Your Workplace Stressors Stressing Out Your Family?

In my prior two blog posts, I discussed the bullying boss (Career: Are You a Bully at Work? and Dealing with a Difficult Boss) and how to use Square Breathing (Learning to Relax: Square Breathing) as one way to de-stress at work. Now, I'd like to focus on what you can do if your work stressors are having a negative impact on your family because you're coming home feeling irritable, cranky, worried or in a bad mood. 

Are Your Workplace Stressors Stressing Out Your Family?

Bringing Home Your Work Stress Without Even Realizing It
Without even realizing it, you could be bringing home your work stress in such a way that, without you even saying a word about your job, your spouse and your children are picking up that you're either angry, worried or frustrated and this might be affecting their moods as well. Of course, this isn't your intention. So, what can you do about it?

Are You Bringing Home Your Work Stress Without Even Realizing It?

There's no one-size-fits-all solution to try to inoculate your family from the detrimental effects of your workplace stress. Of course, managing your own stress is optimal with regard to taking care of yourself and your family. 

But what about those times when you come home after a stressful day, and you haven't had time to go to the gym or yoga class before coming home? You get home, you're tired and stressed out and the moment you walk in the door, your spouse, your children, and your barking dogs are all vying for your attention. 

At that point, you might feel so overwhelmed that you're tempted to go right back out the door and keep walking. So, what do you do?

If you're already on your "last nerve," you might lose your temper or do something that you'll regret later. 

Even if you manage to be responsive to your family, you can still feel overwhelmed and they'll often sense your irritability or anger. 

Your anger, frustration and irritability often have nothing to do with them. But you might, unintentionally, take it out on them, adversely affecting your relationships.

Transitional Time Between Work and Home

When clients talk to me about this sort of scenario, I often suggest making an agreement with their families to allow them a certain amount of time to transition from work to home. 

This can mean different things to different people. It usually starts with your being mindful that you've left your workplace and now you're home. 

I know that's not as simple as it sounds, especially since you're walking around with the same mind that's feeling anxious or frustrated by workplace stressors. But being mindful of where you are now--at home--is a start. It's bad enough that you might be under a lot of stress at work, you don't need to prolong it by carrying it around with you and bringing it back home.

So, the transition starts in your own mind. Then, make an agreement with your family agree that, barring an emergency, you need some "time out" before you're bombarded with whatever is going on at home. 

This might mean that you take a calming shower or bath or you spend a few quiet minutes to yourself--or whatever works best for you. The point is that whatever helps you to distinguish, on an emotional level, between when you were at work and where you are now, at home, will allow you to take that space that gets you through the transition.

When you're discussing this "time out" that you need, being specific about the amount of time (15 minutes? a half hour?) is better than giving vague notions about what you need. And don't expect that you or they will get it perfectly the first few times. Habitual patterns are often difficult to change. You might need to tactfully reinforce your agreement with reminders.

The Importance of Self Care

Now, you might wonder why, if I started this blog post by discussing how your workplace stress could be affecting your family, I've been focusing on you and not your family. 

Well, the point is that you need to take care of yourself first before you take care of your family. It's just like when you're on a plane and flight attendants demonstrate safety measures: They always tell you to put your oxygen mask on first before you put the mask on your child. 

Why? Because you'll be absolutely no good to your child if you haven't taken care of yourself first. So, the same applies in the workplace vs home situation: Take care of yourself first by de-stressing and you'll be better able to help your family.

Not only will you be accomplishing your intention of de-stressing yourself and taking care of your family, you'll also be showing by example that taking care of oneself is important and there are simple and effective ways to do it.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist with expertise in clinical hypnosis, EMDR, and Somatic Experiencing. I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

A Bullying Management Style Creates a Negative Work Environment

When clients come to see me about work stressors, one of the most common complaints I hear is that they work in stressful and negative work environments with bullying managers. In addition to hearing about bullying managers, I also see clients who are in managerial positions who feel frustrated with employees. 

A Bullying Management Style Creates a Negative Work Environment

There's no doubt that managers often have to deal with difficult employees. However, very often, these same managers have no insight into how their negative style of management and communication affects their dynamic with employees.

A Bullying Management Style Creates a Negative Work Environment

One of the biggest mistakes managers make with employees is having dictatorial or bullying style of management. Managers who are bullies usually think the only way they can get their employees to work is through intimidation. They create a negative work environment by treating their employees like they're children. Often, they have no awareness or insight that this is what they're doing until we begin discussing in their therapy sessions why their employees seem unmotivated and less effective than employees in other units.

Bullying Often Results From Emotional Security 

More often than not, their own emotional insecurity is what drives their bullying style of management. They don't feel confident that they can get the best from their employees unless they use their position of authority to try to infantilize their workers. Without a doubt, this creates resentment, which leads to a demoralized and unmotivated staff. Not only is it counterproductive with regard to what the manager is trying to accomplish, at times, in the worst case scenarios, it can lead to lawsuits for the manager and the company in the more egregious cases. It's usually a lose-lose situation.

Bullying is an Ineffective Management Style

In the short term, a bullying or negative manager might be able to intimidate employees to do what he or she wants, especially during this protracted recession where there's a shortage of jobs. But, in the long term, bullying and intimidating employees is not an effective way of creating a productive and positive work environment. And, even for the most hard boiled manager, who might not care if the work environment is positive or not, it's usually not effective with regard to advancing his or her own career with senior management if the manager perceived as someone who bullies employees.

So, if this negative and punitive style of management tends to be ineffective in the long run, why do certain managers persist in doing it? Well, there are so many reasons that one blog post is insufficient. But one reason, as I mentioned previously, is that this style usually comes from a deep sense of personal inadequacy. The bullying manager tries to cover up his or her emotional insecurities by trying to intimidate subordinates.

Bullying and "Divide and Conquer" Tactics

Another reason is that, rather than taking the long view with regard to creating a positive work environment, which requires more of an effort as compared to barking out orders to employees, the bullying manager is short sighted. His or her goals are short term. Rather than focusing on team building, the bullying manager will often engage in "divide and conquer" tactics among employees. These managers often have deep seated fears that creating a team approach would lead to a "mutiny" against him or her.

The Bullying Boss as "Lord of the Manor"

Lack of the appropriate skill set and inexperience are also contributing factors that contribute to a bullying style of management. Often, the inexperienced or unskilled manager feels that the only thing he or she has to rely on is the managerial title. He or she behaves like the "lord of the manor" engaging in a feudal style of management. Too often, senior management doesn't invest the time, money or effort involved with training these managers. As a result, a bullying manager often relies on the only thing he or she knows when it comes to authority relationships--the parent-child relationship. Of course, this leads to resentment. In the worst case scenarios, it leads to sabotage, both overt and covert.

Bullying Managers and Personality Disorders

Bullying managers often have personality disorders where they come across as inconsistent, verbally provocative, unable to manage their anger, engaging in black and white thinking and, in the worst cases, being emotionally unstable. When a personality disorder, like borderline personality or narcissistic personality, is involved, this is a much more serious problem. A manager who lacks expertise in managing employees, theoretically, can go for training. But a manager who has a personality disorder needs professional psychological help. In companies where there are numerous complaints about a bullying manager, senior management will often mandate this manager to seek professional help or risk losing his or her job.

Getting Help in Therapy

If you have a bullying style of management and training has not been effective in helping you to change, you could benefit from seeking help from a licensed mental health professional. 

If you're motivated to do the personal work required to change, you can work through the underlying issues that contribute to an ineffective, bullying style of management.

If you're an employee who has a bully for a boss, you could use the support of a licensed mental health professional, especially if this situation is triggering old unresolved trauma, to feel empowered to take action.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR therapist, and Somatic Experiencing therapist. I work with individuals and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Relationships: Have You and Your Partner Stopped Having Sex?

As a New York City psychotherapist who sees both individuals and couples, one of the biggest complaints I hear from people who are in long term relationships is that the passion has gone out of their relationships (see my article:  Relationships: Overcoming Sexual Incompatibility).

Relationships: Have You and Your Spouse Stopped Having Sex?

Of course, we know that relationships change and that, for instance, a 20 year marriage usually doesn't have the same kind of sexual excitement as when the couple first met. The familiarity of seeing each other every day, dealing with life's ups and downs and settling into daily routines takes away from the early romantic idealization and excitement.

After many years, couples need to find new ways to keep their sexual lives interesting. But this isn't what I'm referring to in this blog post. What I'm talking about is the marriage or long term relationship where sex is completely gone. There is no sexual intimacy and the couple are living like roommates or brother and sister.

Why Does Sexual Passion Disappear in Long Term Relationships?

Why does sexual passion disappear in so many long term relationships and marriages? Well, as you can imagine, there are probably nearly as many "reasons" as there are relationships.

Often, when couples come to see me about this problem, one person in the relationship is very unhappy about this and the other is okay with it. To begin with, this in itself is a problem because, for the person who is okay with a sexless relationship (and might even be relieved not to be having sex any more), there's often little motivation to change. The one possible motivation is that he or she doesn't want a breakup.

Common Reasons Why Couples Stop Having Sex 

Some of the more common reasons why couples stop having sex include: unresolved anger and resentment by one or both people, power struggles in the relationship, problems with children, financial struggles, unresolved childhood sexual abuse, infidelity, sexual incompatibility, medical problems, anger about in-laws, and so on.

If the lack of sexual intimacy has gone on for a long time, one or both people might start to question whether there is still a viable relationship and if they should stay together. Of course, there are many things that create a bond between two people in a committed relationship. It's not all about sex. But the lack of any sex is often an indicator that something might have gone awry in the relationship.

Ruling Out Medical Problems

If you and your spouse are in a sexless relationship and this is bothering one or both of you, you owe it to yourselves to seek help. Ruling out any medical causes, such as erectile dysfunction (ED)for men or pain during sexual intercourse for women is usually a good place to start. Very often, medical problems can be related to emotional problems, so it's not an either-or situation.

Getting Help from a Licensed Mental Health Professional
But once medical problems have been ruled out, seeking the help of an objective licensed mental health professional, who works with couples, is the next step.

An objective professional with expertise in working with couples will have no particular agenda in terms of a couple staying together or breaking up. I mention this because people often think that couples counselors always try to keep couples together.

Have You and Your Spouse Stopped Having Sex?  Get Help

But most couples counselors work to help the couple come up with the best possible solution for the couple, whether this is staying together or working out an amicable separation. The point is not to continue to drift on in a state where one or both people in the relationship are unhappy but do nothing about it.

About Me

I'm a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individuals and couples.

I've helped many people to resolve problems, including lack of sexual intimacy, in their relationships, so they can have more fulfilling relationships.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Want to Change? Start By Accepting Yourself As You Are Right Now

It might sound counterintuitive, but the best way to achieve lasting change is to accept yourself as you are right now. After all, you might say, you can't change and remain as you are at the same time. But, if you think about this for a moment, you might see that this isn't what I mean. The key words in this blog post title is "start by accepting."

Self Acceptance and Change

What Does It Mean to Accept Yourself as You Are?

But what do we mean when we talk about "accepting" who we are? Does this mean we're complacent and we're not exploring ways to improve? Does "accepting" mean we've given up or we feel hopeless? Not at all! If anything, it's just the opposite! But why?

When we accept ourselves at a certain point in time, we're acknowledging what is. We're not in denial or pretending that things are different. We're not wallowing in self hatred or calling ourselves a "failure" because we're not where we want to be. On the contrary, we're starting at the point where we're saying, "This is where I am right now. I'd like things to be different, and I'll work towards that goal. But, for now, this is where I am."

Why is It So Important to Accept Yourself as You Are?

So, you might ask why it's so important to start by accepting yourself as you are? Well, for one thing, if we want to make changes we need to acknowledge the current situation. Otherwise, how will we know what we're changing from? We need a starting point. 

Secondly, very often, when we don't start by accepting ourselves as we are, we become so negative about ourselves that we sabotage our own efforts to change. The "voice of negative prediction" starts to haunt us: "You'll never change. You've tried it before and you failed. You'll fail again because you're a failure."

Let's take a common example: As part of their New Year's resolutions, many people make a commitment to lose weight. One of the obstacles that gets in the way is that people who want to lose weight start out by being very self critical about their body image. They berate themselves for being overweight, compare themselves unfavorable to others, and then dwell on all the reasons why they're not going to succeed. This negativity and self criticism sets them up to fail because they get to the point where they say to themselves, "Why bother?"

How much different it is when a person comes from a place of self acceptance. Instead of being self critical and feeling shame and self loathing, they feel nurturing towards themselves. With this positive attitude, they're much more likely to be nurturing towards themselves, thereby increasing the likelihood that they'll stick with their healthy weight loss plan.

Self Acceptance Can Be Challenging

Getting to the point of self acceptance can be challenging. Ingrained negative ways of thinking can be hard to change. 

If you're struggling to make positive changes, but you're stuck in old negative patterns, you could benefit from seeing a licensed mental health professional who has expertise in helping clients overcome these obstacles.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR therapist, and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples, and I've helped many clients overcome obstacles to living a more fulfilling life.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Overcoming Creative Blocks with Clinical Hypnosis

As a New York City psychotherapist, I often work with artistic clients who are trying to overcome creative blocks. Writers, actors, composers, and artists often struggle with blocks in their creative endeavors. The tendency is usually to struggle and try to push yourself through this phase. 

Overcoming Creative Blocks

Sometimes this works for some people but, often, it backfires because the more you push yourself, the more frustrated you become. And the more frustrated you become with your creative block, the more likely you'll become self critical. The more self critical you are, the less likely you'll be able to overcome your creative block.

We often associate creativity with artists and writers, but we're all creative beings no matter what we do. We use our creativity everyday to problem solve or come up with ideas in our personal lives and at work.

The Odyssey
I just finished rereading The Odyssey (Homer). When I read it the first time as a teen, I didn't appreciate it nearly as well as I did this time around. 

Aside from the fact that my current reading of it was from a much better translation (Fagle), as an adult who has had much more life experience than the teen I was when I read it the first time, I appreciate so much more Odysseus' spirit to survive, his wily nature, and the wonderfully creative solutions he comes up with whenever he encounters life and death situations. His creative nature saved his life as well as the lives of his loved ones.

When we're blocked, for whatever reason, it's hard for us to think "out of the box." We're too stuck to explore and discover new ways to look at a situation or a problem, and we might not know what's keeping us stuck. 

Maybe it's an unwillingness to look at a situation from a different perspective. Maybe we're in a rut and can't see beyond the immediate circumstances. Often, we don't know why we're creatively block.

Clinical hypnosis, also known as hypnotherapy, can be very helpful in overcoming creative blocks. Hypnosis helps us to access our creativity on an unconscious level. And the best part is that we don't even need to know the reason why our creativity is blocked for hypnosis to work.

If you're experiencing a creative block that you've been unable to overcome on your own, you could benefit from seeing a licensed mental health professional who is trained in clinical hypnosis.

About Me

I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR therapist, and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Relationships: Overcoming Fear of Rejection

As a psychotherapist in New York City, I see many people who would very much like to be in romantic relationships, but their fear of rejection keeps them from getting close to potential partners. It's an emotionally painful place to be--wanting to be in a loving relationship, but too overcome with fear (see my article: An Emotional Dilemma: Wanting and Fearing Love).  This ambivalence keeps many people "stuck" and unhappy.

Overcoming Fear of Rejection

It's not unusual for people who fear rejection from potential romantic partners to have a family background where they were emotionally neglected or abused.

Often they don't realize that their fear is based on memories of what happened to them as children in an either neglectful or abusive household.

The fear is so strong and feels so immediate that they believe that their fear is based on the here-and-now rather than the past.

Other people repeat their childhood experiences in their adult life by unconsciously choosing romantic partners who were hurtful and rejecting of them.  They don't realize that they're repeating this old pattern.

After getting hurt several times in different relationships, they become too fearful to get involved again.

Overcoming Fear of Rejection

Fear of Rejection and Lack of Self Confidence
Their fear often keeps them from socializing, so added to their fear of rejection is a lack of self confidence about interacting with others because they haven't developed the necessary social skills.

As a result, when they do make an effort to meet others, they come across as socially awkward and uncomfortable.

This, in turn, causes others, who pick up on their discomfort, to feel uncomfortable with them and also, possibly, causes people to shy away from them, which brings about the self fulfilling prophecy that they will be rejected.

Psychotherapy Can Help You to Overcome Your Fear of Rejection
Psychotherapy can be helpful to break this cycle, which begins with fear of rejection.

Overcoming Fear of Rejection

If you find yourself trapped by your own fear of rejection, you owe it to yourself to work with a psychotherapist who has expertise in this area.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.  

I work with individual adults and couples.

I've helped many clients to overcome their fear of rejection.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, you can call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Are Your Fears of Being Alone and Lonely Keeping You in an Unhealthy Relationship?

Fear of being alone and fear of loneliness can very powerful emotions. When we make decisions, or fail to make decisions, based on fear of being alone, our emotions can cloud our judgment. Unfortunately, many people stay in unhealthy relationships because they're afraid to be alone. These same people often unconsciously choose unhealthy partners because they want someone who will be dependent on them and who won't leave them.

Are Your Fears of Being Alone Keeping You in an Unhealthy Relationship?

The following scenario is a fictionalized account of many similar accounts with all identifying information changed:

Tom:

When Tom met Carol, he felt a strong instant attraction to her. Looking back on it years later, he realized that part of this attraction was that he saw her as a "damsel in distress" and himself as the "knight in shining armor" who could rescue her. Carol was attractive, smart and funny. They clicked immediately, and they began dating shortly after they met. Tom knew, even then, that their was something very familiar about Carol, but he wasn't sure at the time what it was.

Almost immediately, Carol revealed that she was living on the edge. She had a good job, but she didn't know how to manage her money. She was behind in her rent and her landlord was threatening to evict her. Her credit card bills were piling up, but she always had a new outfit. In short, her life was a mess, but Tom was sure he could help her.

Within six months, Tom convinced Carol to move in with him. At first, they were both very happy. Tom began managing Carol's money and paying off her bills. When her creditors wouldn't extend her any more credit, Tom placed her name on his credit cards. When she decided to start her own consulting company, he encouraged her to quit her job and he financed her business. He took care of the financial responsibilities so she could focus on the creative aspects of her business.

But after a while, it became evident that Carol wasn't working on her business. Instead, while Tom took on extra projects at work to help support them and finance her business, Carol spent most of her time on the Internet instead of working on her business. She was easily distracted and had many excuses for not doing work, which began to annoy Tom.

He tried very hard to get Carol to focus on her business. He even started networking among his friends and colleagues to try to drum up new business, which he was successful in doing. He hoped that by showing Carol that these efforts produced results, she would become motivated herself. But although she appreciated his help, she continued to make excuses for not making more of an effort. Worse still, Tom's colleagues began complaining to him that Carol wasn't following through on their projects.

After a while, Tom felt that he was making all the effort to support them, keep their apartment tidy, and advance Carol's business, and she was making almost no effort. He felt resentful and angry. They began to argue. Then, in exasperation, Tom suggested that they seek professional help, but Carol refused to go. So, Tom went on his own.

It didn't take long for Tom and his therapist to draw parallels between his relationship with Carol and his earlier relationship with his mother, who was a severe alcoholic and nearly always in crisis. At a young age, Tom took on many adult responsibilities, especially after his father left the family.

By the time he was a teenager, his mother was almost completely dependent on him. It was not unusual for Tom to help his mother walk home from the bar, help her to get into bed, and then cook and tend to his younger siblings.

Tom's biggest fear back then was that something bad would happen to his mother, something that, even with all his efforts, he couldn't prevent. Given the severity of his mother's drinking, this wasn't an irrational fear.

Somehow, through Herculean efforts, he managed to take care of his mother and younger siblings, work part time and get good grades in high school. He was often exhausted, but he was determined to do whatever he could to rescue his mother and his brothers and sisters.

Shortly after he graduated college, his mother got into a fatal car accident while she was in a drunken stupor. In the past, Tom had always managed to hide the car keys from his mother. But on this particular day, he forgot and left them in plain sight. After he left the house, his mother found the keys, went out for a drive alone and crashed the car into a pole.

For years after that, Tom blamed himself with many "if onlys." His worse fear came true and he felt he didn't do enough to prevent it.

When he began dating, he tended to choose women who "needed" him. These relationships usually ended in a lot of emotional pain and frustration, and he usually blamed himself for not doing enough. He hated being alone, and he'd usually get involved again fairly soon to avoid feelings of loneliness.

Now that he was in therapy, Bob had to confront his fear of being abandoned and the codependent dynamic in his relationship with Carol. He began attending Al-Anon for additional support. And he and Carol started couples therapy.

With much hard work, both individually and as a couple, they changed the dynamic in their relationship. Carol took on more responsibilities, and Bob learned how not to over-function for Carol. Over time, he also worked through his childhood trauma and his fear of being abandoned.

Fear of abandonment can bring about many unwanted consequences in relationships. Many codependent relationships are based on fear of abandonment.

Getting Help

If you suspect that you might be suffering from fear of abandonment, you owe it to yourself to get professional help.

Getting help from a licensed mental health professional, who specializes in working with trauma, can free you from your fears.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist. I work with individual adults and couples.

I've helped many individuals and couples overcome their fear of abandonment so they could lead fulfilling lives.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during regular business hours or email me.