Hello friends,

Hello Friends,

Holy smokes, do I have news for you! TWO opportunities to get some support during this time of uncertainty. I know you’re all overwhelmed. I know burnout is real and fatiguing. The only way to address burnout is through connection, support, and practical tools. When we come together as a community and acknowledge how challenging the last 20 months have been, then some healing and reconciling can begin. So, with that being said, here are two opportunities for support. FREE and FREE!!

“Amy, no one had told me that ‘it’s ok to not be okay’ until you did. Thank you for reminding me that we’re human.”
Chief Medical Officer (after Summer Wellness Workshop)

Mark your calendars! The first bit of support is through a free workshop on November 10 at 6pm. Beyond Burnout: Navigating your way through trying times as a provider. In this workshop, we’ll discuss symptoms of burnout, what’s contributing to burnout and how to address what we’re going through. I promise you, I’m not going to give out nuggets that focus on eating better, getting sleep and taking a vacation. I mean, that’s all-important, but I’m going to give you tangible things you can do to address overwhelm. Let’s be honest, we need to focus on what’s possible and practical. And more importantly, when we only focus on a few parts of self-care, we miss the big picture! We’re going to walk through actionable steps you can take to address overwhelm and find more purpose in your work.

Register for this free workshop here.

Join us! Many of you have joined us for Refresh – our monthly meetings for providers to gather as a community, gain tools around resilience-building and gather resources to support your patients. Well, Refresh will now be known as The Provider Lounge: A Community to Build Resilience. The Provider Lounge is a community of like-minded medical providers that want to focus on building resilience in their patients and themselves. If you’re looking for a place to find purpose, create meaning, and respond with practical tools that build buffering forces for whatever our patients face, this is the community for you!

The Provider Lounge is also an online portal for providers. In it, you can access tons of content that build resilience for your patients including scripts, videos, resilience interventions, and cards for connection.

For now, The Provider Lounge is free! Come to a meeting and check out the portal. If you want access right away to see what’s going on inside, just reply to this email and I’ll send you a login so you can join us. Our next community gathering in The Provider Lounge will be Thursday, November 4 at 12:30 pm. And yes, all meetings are taped so that, even if you miss us, you won’t miss the gems!

Join us via Zoom on November 4th at 12:30 pm for The Provider Lounge.

OK friends, I hope you feel like help is on the way. I’m working hard to make myself available, provide resources and free support as much as possible.

See you November 4 and November 10th! Mark your calendars now!

Speaking of free and easy…. did you know that 90 seconds of deep belly breathing has been shown to decrease cortisol by 30%??? Yep – breathing is straightforward and simple – but we don’t always take time to do it.

So, deep breaths friends, help is coming!

With compassion,

Dr. Amy

Hello Colleagues,

Wow. The past few weeks have been exhausting. Or, shall we say, even more exhausting? Between returning to school, vaccine mandates and staffing shortages, not to mention increased hospitalizations due to COVID, I know so many of you feel like you’re drowning.

You’re not alone.

Because you’re short on time and a lengthy email is the LAST thing you have time for right now, might I offer you a few reminders to address overwhelm?

1.     Get connected – on any level – in person, online, in a group, with your body, with an incredible friend. Connection is the NUMBER ONE factor that will address burnout.

2.     Breathe – it’s simple but effective. Research has shown that just 90 seconds of deep, belly breathing can reduce your cortisol levels. Take off your mask, find a space, and breathe deeply.

3.     Tap out – take a break, even if it’s for short periods of time. In 90 seconds you can breathe. In 5 minutes you can stretch. In 15 minutes you can eat a meal and try not to rush. In 30 minutes you can watch a sitcom and belly laugh. In an hour you dive into a creative task like knitting, singing, or drawing. In a half-day, you can go for a hike or visit a friend. In a day you can get out of town and disconnect from work. You get the picture…

4.     Feel your feelings – I know, you’ve stopped reading… “If I feel my feelings, I’ll go into a black hole and never come out.” It’s not true. Acknowledging feelings actually help them subside because they’re recognized. Once a feeling is recognized, you can decide what to do with it – cry? Set it aside for now? Write it down? Talk to someone? Run? Share it? That feeling needs to be felt all the way through, or it will pile up and come out in other spaces.

5.     Focus on what you can do now. You can’t solve the problem of yesterday and you cannot predict tomorrow (or even later today). But you can be present in the next moment with your patient, your colleague, your MA, or your partner. That’s the only moment we can control.

Gentle reminders friends. This is not an assignment, nor a task to achieve. It is how you will survive through this mess. Simply take an inventory of the ideas and choose one to be more intentional about during your day. Just one small action.

With compassion,

Dr. Amy

First of all, thank you so much to ALL OF YOU who responded to the last blog post– I felt the love! I’m going to incorporate all of your questions throughout this series but especially during Week Five – Reader Spotlights and Questions. So keep your comments and emails coming!!
 
Second, I promised you some great content; and today we’re covering How to Reframe Discipline.
 
Define It.
When we think of the word “discipline,” what’s the first word or thought that comes to mind? If you’re like most people, we think of the word “punishment.” We ask ourselves questions like, “How do I make this punishment SO BAD that my child will never engage in this behavior again?” Or, we think “How do I bribe, create incentive, or manage changes in this behavior so that it stops happening?”

Discipline, by definition, means: To train or develop in instruction and exercise, especially in self-control.”

 
WAIT, WHAT??? Yes, discipline is actually a practice of instruction and exercise. This means, you’re the teacher of behavior! If I tell you, I’m disciplined in the area of psychology – you would know I’ve been a student of psychology and I’ve been trained in that area. If I tell you, I’m a disciple of X – you know I’m a student or follower of something.
 
So, that means that when it comes to defining discipline, I’m referring to HOW you train and develop self-control and HOW you train and teach your child (the student) about self-control and behavior.
 
Wow…..now we’re talking about something entirely different.
 
Name It.
Now, I want you to take a moment and write down the TOP THREE behaviors you most often feel frustrated or overwhelmed by. What are three behaviors that, if your child or student stopped engaging in, your life would get easier. Write them down. Better yet, leave them in the comments below so we can showcase in week five – we’ll problem-solve together!
1.
2.
3.
 
Reframe It.
Great, now I want you to think about the behavior in an entirely different way. Suppose you said, “hitting” or “yelling” as the most concerning behavior you see in your child. And if you’re on the same page as me regarding our new, shared definition of discipline, then you know, that instead of STOPPING, BRIBING, CORRECTING OR SCARING YOUR CHILD OUT OF THIS BEHAVIOR, you must, instead, focus on a different way of training or exercising self-control.
 
So, ask yourself this… If my child is engaging in X behavior (hitting or yelling), what SKILL does it show that he/she has not yet learned? What behavior must still be learned so that my child will stop doing X behavior. For instance, if I don’t want my child to hit, yell or engage in aggressive behavior, what skill must they learn? Or what have they NOT learned yet that they need to acquire?
 
Revisit It.
Here are some possible answers. If my child is hitting, hurting or yelling at others, the SKILL they’ve not yet developed is…..

• Self-control

• Problem solving

• Non-violent ways to express anger

• Verbal ways of identifying feelings

• Non-verbal ways of expressing frustration that are safe

• Who to find when I’m upset

• Models of positive behavior

 
Revisit your top three concerning behaviors and write down the skill your child must still learn.
 
Now that you see this behavior as a “skill set yet to be learned” aka, a “new discipline to follow,” you can revisit the behavior.
 
Find ways to teach the new skills such as problem solving by using words, walking away to avoid hurt feelings or finding an adult who can help him/her. Play games, take turns, model problem solving during play – all of these activities teach the new behavior or discipline. Then, reinforce that behavior with words of praise and encouragement.
 
To close, this isn’t easy. It’s a new way of thinking about behavior and discipline. But we can all get better with greater intention. And when we’re more purposeful about our approach to children’s behavior, we gain more meaningful connection.
 
That’s a wrap folks! Thanks for learning together.