WiseSOVA - Page 2 of 118 - Parents Supporting Our Valued Adolescents: A place to learn, get your questions answered, share your strength, and be positive

Taking the First Step: Deciding to Seek Professional Help

The SOVA Project is happy to feature this blog post written by one in our team of fantastic SOVA Ambassadors—these are young people who help create meaningful blog posts from adolescents’ perspectives. We hope you can use their post to start a conversation with your adolescent.

The process of going from experiencing symptoms of impacted mental health to getting the treatment you need is a unique journey that takes everyone on a different path. Personally, seeking professional help didn’t seem like a viable option for years after I knew I was suffering from a mental illness that was making my day-to-day life miserable. Continue reading Taking the First Step: Deciding to Seek Professional Help

Media Can Help Us Realize How We Feel

I grew up always being overweight, I was that kid that tried every diet in the book, or every form of exercise and still wasn’t able to drop the weight. During what may be my entire childhood, I binge ate when no one was home – I have accounts where I would eat tubs of raw cookie dough, or containers of ice cream when no one was home; after school and alone time was just dangerous for me. Continue reading Media Can Help Us Realize How We Feel

Being Gentle on Your Anxiety

Just this morning, I had one of the biggest exams of my time in school. Since I am in physical therapy school, this exam was a practical, in which I would be asked questions on the spot and have to answer and demonstrate techniques learned over the past year. Despite having studied hard and put in the work, my anxiety crept in. I had racing thoughts the night before such as “What if I didn’t study enough? What if I completely blank? What if I fail?” These thoughts are detrimental to myself, and I had the awareness to tell myself to stop thinking in this way. Continue reading Being Gentle on Your Anxiety

Video Games about Mental Health

More often than not, people have a negative view of video games and its relationship with mental health. Video games are often associated with addiction and seen as a poor coping mechanism. Those who play violent video games tend to be more likely to show depressive symptoms too. Continue reading Video Games about Mental Health

Finally Getting Offline

I have found myself staring at a screen for endless hours of day. Now, with online school, we, students, are constantly on our laptops. Whether it is to read, type papers, watch videos, attend Zoom classes, or even watching Netflix, I have recently been feeling consumed by a screen. After so long, I get a piercing headache and I know it’s from the excessive use of the technology that we have today. Continue reading Finally Getting Offline

Struggle with Self-Acceptance

So as I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I struggle with binge eating, depression, and anxiety. Some days it can be SO mentally draining. A lot of my closer friends don’t share the same struggles that I do, or none at all. Thinking about this during some of my lows make me wonder, “why me?” Continue reading Struggle with Self-Acceptance

Feeling Lost and Without Direction

Anyone else out there indecisive about their future? I know I am. I picked to go to college for business school because I could go into any industry easily without needing additional education. Basically I was indecisive. I am now graduating in the spring and have gathered two majors that are fairly different. And I can’t choose which field to go into!

One of my industries hires full-time workers very early, like now, and the other won’t have job opportunities up until February or March. So I am now, finally, faced with a choice. A choice that I have procrastinated for years, which just places more pressure on me.

In my search of a dozen or so online job boards, I have found some jobs that would have been totally satisfying for me that don’t even require a college degree, so I am even doubting my choice to go to college while conversely beating myself up for not having enough ambition. Or at least, not the right kind of ambition.

So what do I do?

First, I asked myself how long I could take the job search before I just couldn’t take any more. After some introspection, I set a goal. I want to accept a job offer by the end of the calendar year (December 31). So that means I will likely go into the industry that hires early. Okay, well no one’s career goes in a straight line their whole life. Making this decision now certainly doesn’t discount my skills or opportunities in the other industry. It just means I have to work a little harder to keep my finger on the pulse (ie. being active in professional associations, reading the right news, making professional connections, etc).

So as of drafting this blog, I do have one job offer on the table, and I’m hoping for another in a couple weeks before I have to make my decision. While neither is perfect, I have realized that perfection just doesn’t exist. There is no one gig that will fit all my checkmarks. And even if there was I certainly wouldn’t find it fresh out of college in a pandemic.

Cheers to good enough!

Is your child currently going through an important decision-making process? Are they in the process of applying to colleges? How would you talk to them if they are worried about making the “right” choice?

My Experience with Telehealth Medicine

Over the last couple of weeks, I have had the opportunity to start using telehealth services in order to better look after my health. My workplace has a partnership with an application (which also has a website version) called Doctor on Demand. On top of being able to connect you with general physicians, there are also options for psychiatrists and therapists. Given that the next psychiatrist I could see would be in months and that I was going through a lot of things that needed help sooner rather than later, I decided to give the app a try. Continue reading My Experience with Telehealth Medicine