Ehsas.Mind Healing Center

24/10/2021

Low self-esteem means not thinking much of yourself as a person, or not holding yourself in high regard. If you have low self-esteem you might not feel confident or capable, may feel anxious, and may criticize yourself harshly. Psychologists think that underneath feelings of low self-esteem are the negative beliefs and opinions we hold about ourselves. Some people know that their negative judgement of themselves is too harsh, other people hold onto these beliefs so strongly that they can feel like facts. Fortunately, there are helpful psychological approaches for improving your self-esteem.

13/10/2021

#*UNHAPPY PEOPLE HAVE HABIT OF CHARACTER ASSASSINATION. #*

Character assassination is the deliberate, malicious, unjustified and sustained effort to damage the reputation or credibility of an individual. Character assassination is the slandering of a person usually with the intention of destroying public confidence in that person.
There are people that take maximum delight in ruining other's reputation. These set of people have what I will like to call ‘Destructive Tendencies’. They oil their own ego by pulling other people down.
False allegations are the most chronic form of mental abuse. When people can’t kill your dreams and purpose, they will try to assassinate your character. There are some people that your spirit will always irritate their demons! Once they realize hating isn’t working they start telling and spreading lies about you. People are assassinated once but ‘Character Assassination’ kills daily! Character assassination is a form of emotional violence against others.
Unhappy and incompetent people draw up conclusions based on what others tell them about someone. It is a lack of social intelligence that makes people draw conclusions on others based on what other people say about them. I know you’ve heard about emotional and financial intelligence, but there is something called social intelligence. This is the kind of intelligence that keeps you sane even when others are trying to pollute your mind against someone else until you have thoroughly confirmed the veracity of claims before you.
Unhappy and unsuccessful people gang up with others to hate someone: they always hate and feel jealous about someone whom they can,t compete.– Someone said, “If you don’t see it with your own eyes, or hear it with your own ears. Don’t invent it with your small mind and share it with your big
mouth”. Never join the multitude to hate someone else.
Instead of working on their incompetency. they always use others as weapon in other people’s battle:
Unhappy people will hate you at workplace or office, just because you don’t behave and gossip like them.:
They judge and tag people with out knowing the whole story: Someone once said, “Beware of the half-truth. You may have gotten hold of the wrong half”. Don’t judge other people’s choices without understanding their reasons.
to create false impression infront of office head .they say something bad about you or judge you as if they know you since long but remember, don’t easily get affected. Remember this, dogs bark if they don’t know the person. People who are intimidated by you talk about you with hopes that others won’t find you so appealing.; these kind of people carry a negative spirit, and a negative spirit is contagious. The real problem is not that they are unhappy about others, but they are unhappy with themselves.
So my dear unhappy and incompetent people.Stop the destructive habit of talking about people behind their back. Talking badly about someone else while they aren’t there to defend themselves says more about you than the person you’re talking about. When you have issues with people, try and discuss it with them. Stop discussing it with others. Someone once said, “Don’t talk about me until you have talked to me”. Stop spreading false information and rumours about others.
Rumours are carried by haters, spread by fools and accepted by idiots! Stop creating walls of contention, rather help build bridges of understanding among people..
****A word to wise......

26/09/2021

18/06/2021

Why simple daily activity can be so difficult

Many individuals with ASD and PDA have weaknesses in the area of the brain (prefrontal cortex) responsible for the executive functions of attention, concentration, setting goals, appraising, planning, organizing, initiating, monitoring, and sustaining attention on task until completion. When these skills are adequate, we move through daily activities with relative ease. When one or more of these functions are weak, the person usually has problems initiating and completing daily activities.

Even though the person can be very bright and appear competent to complete what is expected, these skills are a hidden disability that results in others, and the person, questioning their motives, seen as lazy, resistant, and oppositional. With PDA, we often see anxiety as driving the child's avoidance, but these weak executive functioning skills often underlie some of these challenges. We need to be aware of these ten steps and how taxing and exhausting it can be for those who struggle with initiating and completing activities.
If you click on the slide below it will give an example of what these ten steps look like for a simple activity like dressing.

03/06/2021

There’s a special kind of feeling
When I think about you, Dad
It’s a pleasure to remember
All the happy times we’ve had
There’s a special kind of caring
That is meant for you alone
There’s a place somewhere
Within my heart
That only you can own
Missing you always,

07/05/2021

06/05/2021

° Mental health crisis..

∆ The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major effect on our lives. Many of us are facing challenges that can be stressful, overwhelming, and cause strong emotions in adults and children. Public health actions, such as social distancing, are necessary to reduce the spread of COVID-19, but they can make us feel isolated and lonely and can increase stress and anxiety. Learning to cope with stress in a healthy way will make you, the people you care about, and those around you become more resilient.

° Stress can cause the following:

° Feelings of fear, anger, sadness, worry, numbness, or frustration
° Changes in appetite, energy, desires, and interests
° Difficulty concentrating and making decisions
° Difficulty sleeping or nightmares
° Physical reactions, such as headaches, body pains, stomach problems, and skin rashes
° Worsening of chronic health problems
° Worsening of mental health conditions
° Increased use of to***co, alcohol, and other substances
It is natural to feel stress, anxiety, grief, and worry during the COVID-19 pandemic. Below are ways that you can help yourself, others, and your community manage stress.

° Healthy Ways to Cope with Stress..

- Take breaks from watching, reading, or listening to news stories, including those on social media. It’s good to be informed, but hearing about the pandemic constantly can be upsetting. Consider limiting news to just a couple times a day and disconnecting from phone, tv, and computer screens for a while.
- Take care of your body.
- Take deep breaths, stretch, or meditate external icon.
- Try to eat healthy, well-balanced meals.
- Exercise regularly.
- Get plenty of sleep.
- Avoid excessive alcohol, to***co, and substance use.
- Continue with routine preventive measures (such as vaccinations, cancer screenings, etc.) as recommended by your healthcare provider.
- Get vaccinated with a COVID-19 vaccine when available.
- Make time to unwind. Try to do some other activities you enjoy.
Connect with others. Talk with peopleexternal icon you trust about your concerns and how you are feeling.
- Connect with your community- or faith-based organizations. While social distancing measures are in place, try connecting online, through social media, or by phone or mail.

° Helping Others Cope..

Taking care of yourself can better equip you to take care of others. During times of social distancing, it is especially important to stay connected with your friends and family. Helping others cope with stress through phone calls or video chats can help you and your loved ones.

If you are struggling to cope, there are many ways to get help. Call your healthcare provider if stress gets in the way of your daily activities for several days in a row.

07/01/2021

Sensory Filtering and Sensory Overload

From what I can decipher from the research on neural connectivity, there are two primary differences in the brain wiring of people with autism. One, the long-range neuro-pathways that connect the different brain centers, allowing them to simultaneously communicate with each other, are underdeveloped. This means the person will have a difficult time rapidly processing multiple information simultaneously. What the neuro-typical brain processes simultaneously and subconsciously, many on the spectrum need to process sequentially and consciously. In other words, what we pick up intuitively (with minimal thought), those on the spectrum need to consciously think it through. As you can imagine, this slows down the processing and becomes very exhausting, leading to the brain becoming overly taxed and drained. Much of our dynamic world, especially the social world, moves way too fast for their processing speed.

Second, whereas the long-range neuro-pathways that connect the different brain centers are under-developed, the short-range neuro-connections within individual brain centers are often overdeveloped, with too many, poorly integrated, but intensively reactive neuro-connections. This leads to taking in too much information that is often intense and overwhelming (e.g., Intense World Theory). The typical brain goes through stages of “pruning,” whereby the frequently used pathways are strengthened, and the rarely used connections fade away. This allows for more refined filtering of unneeded stimulation and more selective attention to meaningful stimuli. Our brain filters out a lot of the irrelevant stimulation hitting our nervous system, so we do not become overwhelmed and can focus on what information is needed to adapt to environmental demands.

For many on the spectrum, this pruning did not occur correctly. There is an over-abundance of highly reactive neurons that are not integrated together and take in too much information (poor filtering) that overwhelms the brain, causing it to be anxious, on high alert and defensive. Whereas the neuro-typical brain has a volume control (turns down the stimulation), people on the spectrum often just have an “on/off” switch with no volume control to turn down the stimulation. The person becomes hyper-sensitive, hyper-attentive, and hyper-reactive. The world is often too loud, too bright, too much. For many on the spectrum, they must “shutdown” (processing starts to turn off) to avoid being overwhelmed. This leads to detaching oneself from what is going on around them.

When the filtering system is not working correctly, too much stimulation floods the brain, overwhelming the brain centers with too much stimulation and making it difficult to sort out and attend to what is relevant. Three main challenges can occur: (1) Too much information coming in, (2) lack of ability to turn down the intensity (volume) of stimulation, and (3) distorting the stimulation, making it difficult to identify what it is (e.g., hear it but cannot understand it). The brain becomes overwhelmed, panics, and sets off its fight or flight response. When overwhelmed, the brain loses its ability to function; it becomes disorganized, coping skills decompensate, and panic sets in. If overload occurs slowly, the brain may start to shut down to avoid the overload, or if the brain becomes overwhelmed too quickly, it will panic and meltdown. Everyone is different in how this plays out for them, but it is a scary, helpless tidal wave of panic for many of them.

When you combine the poor long-range connections between the brain centers with the overdeveloped, but poorly integrated, short-range connections within the brain centers, you essentially have a brain that has delayed processing due to poor communication between the brain centers and over-sensitivity to sensory stimulation. Essentially the neuro-typical world (1) moves way too fast and (2) too much (too loud, too bright, no filtering). The brain becomes hyper-aroused and hyper-reactive, making the world chaotic, confusing, and overwhelming.

Given this, how do we help? Although many strategies, the few main principles to remember are:

1. Slow the world down! Slow yourself and the world down, giving the child time to adequately process what is expected. Try to match the flow of information to the processing speed of the individual. Allow the child to pace the speed of information. If the child starts to freeze, blank out, increases stimming, or becomes oppositional, then chances are the expectations are too hard, too much, or coming too fast for the child.

2. Turn the world down! Remember that the brain is not filtering stimulation well; it takes in much more than it needs, cannot turn it down, is hyper-sensitive, and has difficulty integrating multiple stimulation simultaneously. Assume that our world is simply too loud and overwhelming for the child, causing the child to be on high alert, defensive, and hyper-reactive. We must be very alert to how much (noise, visual stimulation, smells, busy activity, etc.) and how intense (loud, bright, etc.) the stimulation is that surrounds the person. Then, try to turn it down or provide filters (sunglasses, earplugs, etc.) to block out the intensity of stimulation.

3. Simplify information and expectations: Break tasks and projects down into simple, sequential steps and make expectations clear, concise, and concrete (literal). Use visual strategies if possible and plenty of demonstration, repetition, and guided participation.

4. When in doubt, change our expectations: When things are not going well, and the child is pulling away, being oppositional, or shutting down, assume that our expectations and information are either too fast, too hard, or too confusing for the child. The demands are stronger than their current abilities to handle them. This places the responsibility for change on us, not them. Back up, break it down, slow it down, and offer assistance as needed to match the demands to the processing abilities of the child. Learning will become not only possible but also fun. The world will be less scary and more comfortable to handle. The child will begin to feel “safe, accepted and competent.”

25/12/2020

You're Parenting Right ...

Parents often worry that they are failing their kids. Modern parents hold themselves to higher standards as we guide our children to adulthood. It’s easy to get caught in a comparison trap with other parents or look for outwardly measurable signs of our success.
In my work as a clinical psychologist, there are seven signs I see that tell me a child has an awesome parent.

The seven signs of being an awesome parent
1 | YOUR CHILD DISPLAYS A RANGE OF EMOTIONS IN FRONT OF YOU
Sometimes the timing of our child’s big emotions is difficult. We may not wish to see as much of the big emotions as we do, but your child’s ability to express anger, sadness, or fear in front of you is a good sign that she feels emotionally safe with you.
It worries me greatly when children hide their feelings from their parents. Often, this is a sign of big problems in the parent-child relationship. Avoid shutting down or distracting your child out of her feelings. Instead, pay attention and show appreciation for them.
“I can see from how you’re kicking the wall that you’re very angry. And you’re telling me this is because your sister won’t let you play.” This tells your child you can handle her feelings and you understand her perspective.

2 | YOUR CHILD COMES TO YOU WHEN HURT OR FACING A PROBLEM
I know that a parent is doing an awesome job when their child comes to them as a first port of call for their problems. This means you have provided a secure base that your child can return to when he needs help.
A good way to encourage this is to welcome your child with open arms and listen to his problems, even if small or the problem seems petty to you. This sets up the relationship to be open to communication about things that are difficult in your child’s life.

3 | YOUR CHILD CAN DISCUSS THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS WITHOUT FEARING YOUR REACTION
This is a positive sign of an accepting, open, and flexible parent-child relationship. Some parents unwittingly restrict communication with their child through their behavior, such as over-reacting to thoughts or feelings they don’t like or those that question their behavior as a parent.
Other parents appear so fragile to their children that they don’t want to burden their parent with their thoughts and feelings. I get concerned when parents say, “My child is my rock.” Parents are the rocks; children should never be their parent’s rock.
You can support this by accepting your child’s thoughts and feelings without making it be about who you are. If you need additional support for your feelings, do that with another adult – not with your child.

4 | YOUR FEEDBACK IS NON-CRITICAL AND NON-LABELING
Awesome parents give non-critical feedback about behavior and avoid labels such as ‘bad’, ‘naughty’, ‘greedy’, and ‘lazy’.
If your child eats all the chocolate biscuits before anyone else has a chance to share them, an awesome parent focuses on the behavior: “You ate all the biscuits without sharing. It is important in our home that you share with your siblings. How do you think you could make this up to your family?”
This is very different from saying, “You greedy girl. Go to your room.”

5 | YOU ENCOURAGE YOUR CHILD TO PURSUE INTERESTS AND TALENTS
Pursuing interests and talents helps children feel a sense of mastery and achievement. It can positively engage children through the teen and young adult years, teaching persistence and helping protect against risk-taking behavior. It’s a wonderful thing to excel at something you love.
Sometimes, I see parents directing children’s interests to fulfil unmet dreams and needs of their own. When you force a child to excel for your own reasons, all sorts of things can go wrong, even when they look like they’re going right. This can set children up for feeling like a failure, feeling intense levels of pressure, and feeling controlled.
Also, if they fail and a narcissist parent’s ambition is behind it, children wear the burden of disappointing their parent on top of their own disappointment.

6 | YOU CREATE BOUNDARIES ON BEHAVIOR TO KEEP YOUR CHILD SAFE
Awesome parents guide their child’s behavior by setting considered boundaries and limits. Children without limits and boundaries often end up in a lot of trouble or lost.
Boundaries help children feel loved and valued, even if they don’t like the boundaries some of the time. Some examples of helpful limits include a bedtime routine, respectful language towards family members, and not permitting teens to attend parties where alcohol is supplied.

7 | YOU REPAIR YOUR MISTAKES
Being able to repair relationship ruptures with your child is a sign of being an awesome parent. If you yell, over-react, or call your child a name, it is important to repair that rupture with your child.
Talking with your child about how you wished you had handled the situation can help. Explaining that your big feelings got in the way of you being able to respond in the way you should have also helps.
Although it’s tempting to look for signs of successful parenting, such as reading levels, whether they eat the “right foods,” or win on the football field, successful parenting is about providing a secure base for your child. This creates a place from which your child can thrive. It consists of an ongoing lifelong relationship not contingent on external results, but rather on love, respect, and connection.

20/12/2020

Communicating Love & Acceptance!

If you are a parent or teacher, you are a significant other in the child’s life. You are his protector, provider, and mentor. We have already discussed how individuals with autism experience continuous stress and anxiety over their strong sensory, cognitive, and social challenges. Their nervous systems are continually taxed on “high alert” and on guard. It is tough to feel “safe and accepted” when they are close to fight or flight. Suspiciousness and apprehension permeate their daily routine. For the child to feel “safe” with you and trust following your lead, you need to communicate clear understanding and acceptance while validating their feelings and vulnerabilities. They need to view you as a “companion” and “working partner” with them.

To feel safe in your presence, you need to understand and support their vulnerabilities (sensory, cognitive, social, emotional, etc.) and accept them for who they are. We need to meet the children where they are at. Accept, value, and seek to understand how they see the world and continue to seek understanding of what they are attracted to and feel safe with. These are the children’s comfort zones, where they feel safe and competent. Know what sensory preferences they are attracted to, what interaction strategies they feel the safest with, what tends to calm and soothe them, and what activities they feel the most competent engaging in. Identify, respect, and value these comfort zones to validate the child, helping him feel safe and accepted by you. Only then can he begin to feel “safe,” engaging and sharing experiences with you.

It is important that your child feels loved and loving to feel safe “relating” with you. For children on the spectrum, feeling “loved and loving” often looks much different than for neurotypical children. They may express love by smelling your hair, lightly tapping you, or snuggling tightly into you. They may avoid physical affection but love to chant, repeat the ABCs, or sing with you. Usually, the way to the young ones’ hearts is through their senses. Include yourself in their preferred sensory attraction, and they will become drawn to you.

At first, you may have to follow their lead, become part of their world, and simply “hang with them,”; providing no direction, just being there. Be safe, non-judgmental, and nondirective. Allow them to feel safe in your presence, to feel valued for simply being them. Show enthusiasm for what they value and become part of their play and exploration. Help them feel safe and engaged with you. This may take a lot of work over numerous opportunities to gain their trust. However, the child will not learn to relate with you until he feels safe engaging with you.

18/12/2020

Reading the mental states of others!

Many children on the spectrum are so literal that they rarely “think” about how others are “thinking or feeling.” They do not look past the spoken words to read the person’s perspectives and intentions. What they see and hear is all there is. They often do not consider what other people are thinking and feeling.

To effectively relate with others, we have to look past the spoken words and think about how others are “thinking.” Next, based on our appraisal, we (1) predict what the person will do, and (2) pattern how we will respond. Ongoing interaction consists of continually “thinking” about how the other is “thinking,” predicting his behavior, and patterning our behavior based on this assessment. This ongoing appraising is essential to stay coordinated with the person in the interaction.

Since children on the spectrum do not “think” about how others are thinking (or are weak at doing so), they do not use this knowledge of how the other is thinking to predict and coordinate cooperative interactions. They react to what has literally happened (say and did), rather than appraising, predicting, and projecting what “will happen” in the interaction.

Teaching the child to look past the literal:

1. First, start with thinking about how others are thinking. The second stage would be thinking about how others feel, but this usually means the child has to have a good knowledge and language base for identifying and labeling emotions. Unless the child has gained that knowledge, only start with what the other is thinking.

2. During the day, together, watch what others are doing and talk about what is literal (what you see and hear happening); then talk about what the people are “thinking.” Help the child learn to “look at” the body language and facial expressions and what is going on in the situation, that help us determine what the person is “thinking.” Do it together, mentoring how you do it. Then talk about what evidence lead you to the guess (body language, facial expression, situational factors, etc.). Practice “watch, listen, think (about what they are thinking), then predict (how they will respond).” Use this “watch, listen, think, predict” model for practicing together.

3. There are numerous ways of practicing this. Go to the mall or park and watch others interacting. First, list what you see and hear (literal), then what are they thinking. From this assessment, predict how they will act based on what they are thinking. You can also do this while watching TV or movies, and also while reading stories together. Use picture books to discuss how the characters are “thinking” and use this information to predict how they might respond.

4. Keep it simple at first. Just focus on what the person is thinking. Once they get used to that, then you can move onto what the person is feeling. From there, then you can start guessing at what the person’s perspectives and intentions are. The final goal, over the long term, is for the child to “think” about the other person’s “thoughts, feelings, perspectives, and intentions,” and use this appraisal to (1) predict what the person will do, and (2) pattern how they will respond.

5. When making these appraisals, make sure to discuss what evidence they are using to make a guess (facial expressions, body language, actions, situational factors, etc.) This way, when in doubt, they will have a few tools to use to make an appraisal.

6. As the child gets older and more skillful, the appraisals can also include how others think and feel about you and your behavior. This way, you can get better at monitoring how others are responding to your actions.

Make sure to have fun doing this. Get used to “thinking out loud” as you evaluate social situations during the day. The thinking out loud strategies can be used to teach the child that people have different thoughts, feelings, and perspectives.