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What Clients Teach Me
the blog
![Aging: Assumption Versus Reality](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5f72ac791b34c544edab0f62/986e318e-f641-403d-acdd-7fafef9fd116/unsplash-image-PzGiZBpv72Y.jpg)
Aging: Assumption Versus Reality
Today’s blog is about aging, gracefully or not.
Aging is not necessarily a graceful process. This blog is about the unexpected and expected changes that happen to our physical, cultural, social, familial and mental health as we age.
Today’s essay is my reflections on what I learned from my clients but also what I continue to learn about myself as I age. For many of us, aging includes an examination of life, well-lived or not, paying respect to our past which leads to a deeper spiritual understanding of our existence. Aging is about loss, new freedoms as well as spiritual growth.
![For Families of People Diagnosed with a Mental Illness](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5f72ac791b34c544edab0f62/1611183651502-X6E7OF8LJBFUZ6MF37C3/image-asset.jpeg)
For Families of People Diagnosed with a Mental Illness
Many of the families I have worked with are fine and strong advocates for their family member. Just lately, however, it feels like many of my clients are hitting a brick wall as far as support for family members, either adults or children, who have a mental illness.
The stress on families is longstanding and chronic. Even when things are going well for their loved one there is a worry that the family member might not be able to get the help they need at the right time. There is also a strong concern that once given a diagnosis and medication that either the medication might be incorrect or the diagnosis wrong.
![Anger: a natural response and a universal emotion](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5f72ac791b34c544edab0f62/1606944547775-FK2GK16SRFG21VUWNV7J/image-asset.jpeg)
Anger: a natural response and a universal emotion
Anger is a natural response and a universal emotion:
Above all else you have to learn to love yourself then the very things that fuel your fire won’t matter. (Quote from S.K.)
Today what I have learned from my clients is the difference between anger the emotion and anger as a patterned response.
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