A Shock to the Medical System

Much has been made of the recently published study, which was based on a large number of clinical trials, that anti-depressants have no more effect than a placebo (a sugar pill with no chemical properties).  What is striking about the research is that it examined four of the leading anti-depressants – the three best known in Ireland are prozac, effexor and seroxat. 

Contrary to what many might believe, I am quite disappointed to learn of the study’s findings.  I never had any difficulties with medication as a symptom reducer; my issue is that drugs are a substitute for what individuals – depressed or anxious – need to do for themselves. 

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There Are No Bad Teachers

In any profession – parenting, teaching, medicine, psychology, sociology, business, etc – there are individuals who are not attaining their potential.  There are many reasons why this may be the case.  It does not help when we label such individuals as ‘bad’ teachers, ‘bad’ parents, ‘bad’ managers and so on.  Individuals come into a profession with a certain level of emotional, social and intellectual maturity and the measure of their professional effectiveness rests on the solidity of their interiority.  No teacher wants to block the progress of any child but unresolved insecurities and fears can lead to responding in ways that are protective of ourselves but detrimental to the child’s progress.  When I reflect on my own days of primary and secondary teaching I cringe at many of my responses to children.  Ironically, the students regarded me as a ‘nice’ teacher but I know now that my low self-esteem meant that I was not there for the students in the mature ways that they deserved. 

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Freedom to Party

Children have the right to be children and not be loaded with age-inappropriate responsibilities.  One mother was taken aback when her daughter exclaimed with some exasperation ‘Mum, I’m only four.’  This response alerted Mum to the fact that her expectations were unrealistic and needed to be tailored to the child’s age-level.  If children have the right to be children, so, too, teenagers have the right to be teenagers, but a teenager’s definition of their right may differ markedly from that of parents, teachers and other adults.  Belonging to a group is an important part of being a teenager and the ‘right to party’ is an aspect of this need to belong and be accepted by his or her peer group.  When such partying results in drunkenness, destructiveness and riotous behaviour, then ‘rights’ become ‘might’ and, of course, cannot be tolerated.  One of the challenges that teenagers face and struggle with is that parents are legally and morally responsible to their well-being up to age eighteen years.  After that, teenagers are one hundred per cent responsible for themselves; (of course age is no guarantee that they are psycho-socially ready to take on such responsibility!).  Parents who are wise and mature start that responsibility-giving process at the earliest stage by creating opportunities for age-relevant responsibilities and maintaining boundaries between the world of the child, of the adolescent and of the adult.  When this process is maintained, teenagers ‘right to party’ is accommodated in mature ways by both the parents and the young person.  However, when such effective parenting has not been present, then teenage rebelliousness is likely to emerge and literally ‘all hell can break loose.’  I have worked with families where children and adolescents are grossly verbally abusive of parents, are destructive or property and threaten, rob, steal and lie to get their own way.  In such a situation, it is the parents who urgently need help and support to create boundaries around their own responsibilities as parents and maintain those boundaries in the face of what can be an onslaught of threats from their teenage offspring.

There is a wise rule of thumb that needs to operate with teenagers and that is ‘freedom and responsibility go hand in hand’; the more responsible behaviour shown, the more freedom is given.  However, if this is true for teenagers, it needs to be also true for adults.

A new book written by a Montessori teacher, life skills lecturer and mother of five children and grandmother of eight children addresses ably the issue of responsibility and freedom, as well as many other pertinent responsibilities.  The book is called The Conscious Parent: becoming a Reflective and Creative Parent and the author is Clare Healy Walls, a native of Cork.  The book’s philosophy is very much influenced by Marie Montessori’s ideas and educative approach, as well as Clare’s own life experiences.  Clare defines responsibility as ‘the ability to respond.’  She says that if a person is responsible for a situation then he or she should provide a response suitable for that situation.  She believes that parents need to ‘fully understand what being responsible means before they are able to understand their responsibility to children.’  The distinction she makes of ‘being responsible to’ rather than ‘being responsible for’ children is important because many parents feel that society makes them ‘responsible for’ their children.  However, Clare pulls no punches when she declares: ‘We are not directly responsible – the child is responsible.  But we are responsible to help children be responsible for themselves.’

In order for children to become responsible, Clare rightly points out that children require freedom, which ‘allows children to learn to respond to situations in a responsible manner.’  A child requires freedom to be able to take responsibility.  Clare asserts that ‘a free person will by nature be self-responsible.’  Nowadays, there is a confusion between providing children with ‘licence’ to do what they want and freedom.  The difference between these two is when children are given ‘licence’ they are not required to take responsibility for their choices; whereas when children are given ‘freedom’ taking responsibility is integral to their actions.  Clare points out that ‘if a parent or other adult interferes by removing that freedom or interferes by imposing limits that allow no flexibility, then the child loses interest in responding with a solution.  They give up being responsible.  They hand over control for their lives to others.’  She reminds parents not to forget that children enter life full of desires and excitement to manage their own lives.  The echo of this innate desire is the toddler’s assertion: ‘I want to do it myself.’

Dr. Tony Humphreys is a Clinical Psychologist and Author.

The Illusion of Immortality

The late and beloved John O’Donohue remarked that one of the tragedies of modern society is the illusion of immortality. When I first read this observation by John I was initially taken aback, as I believed that he strongly believed in immortality.  It was only on a second reflection that I realised his meaning – that in our current lives we are very much led to believe that we are going to live forever.  We are not encouraged to reflect on the meaning of life, on death and what happens following death.  People clutch onto their possessions as if in holding onto their wealth they can hold onto life itself.  The sad reality is that the illusion of immortality in this life has led to people identifying themselves with what they do, achieve and acquire. 

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No Rose Without Thorns

I don’t know how roses became associated with the expression of love or attraction and especially on St Valentine’s Day and on Wedding Anniversaries.  Metaphorically, the rose is a perfect representation of a couple relationship. According to J.E. Cirlot’s A Dictionary of Symbols, the ‘single rose is, in essence, a symbol of completion, of consummate achievement and perfection.’  The beauty of the rose symbolises all that is potentially precious, whole and fulfilling about the relationship.  However, every rose has thorns which represent the vulnerabilities and insecurities that each person brings to the relationship.  Inevitably, these fears take the form of aggression, passivity, possessiveness, jealousy, hiding of feelings, sexual control, poor communication and become thorns in the side of each partner respectively.  Nevertheless, these thorns provide the opportunities for what couple relationships are ultimately about – each partner’s intimacy with self.

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