You don’t have to have a crisis to be in therapy. Therapy is not just for anxiety or depression. It’s for hope, helping you cope with everyday life stressors. And a lot of people wait and wait until they get too stressed out, and then they have a hard time getting across what they need. If people enter therapy when there’s no major crisis going on, we have already built a rapport. I mean, imagine yourself in a crisis and you go to a stranger. Right?
~ Colleen Fitzpatrick

Imposter Syndrome

The chief concern I see is imposter syndrome, where high-achieving women have chronic self-doubt. They feel like they constantly have to prove themselves. Imagine feeling like you went through all this school, all this training, and then you start to doubt yourself. It’s a struggle for them every day. You can learn how to deal with it better, but it takes a lot of skill building.

Aging

We look in the mirror and sometimes we don’t recognize ourselves. With perimenopause and menopause, all kinds of things happen – it’s harder to lose weight, your face changes, your relationship with your spouse changes. Parenting relationships change. There are more life decisions to be made. I say to my clients: “We have a pizza. It’s eight pieces. How many pieces are your relationship with your husband? How many pieces are your job?” So we get a visual representation of what is taking up the most headspace.

Parenting & Mental Health

It takes a woman’s brain and body a good eight months to a year to adjust after they’ve given birth. So some people think it’s a luxury to have a house cleaner or a babysitter every weekend or someone who drops off food a couple times a week. That is not a luxury. That’s a necessity in today’s society. Our expectation is just too high of women, especially mothers.

Stress and Anxiety

Seek help, and help doesn’t necessarily mean going on medication. Help can be: Let me rearrange my schedule so I have more free time. Help can be: Let’s get a babysitter every Saturday. Help can be: Let’s get a dog that we could walk. It’s different for everybody. You have to look outside the box for what you can do.

When a Friend is Depressed

I’ll tell you what not to do: chronic positivity. If you say to one of your friends, “You seem pretty sad,” and they say, “I don’t want to talk about it,” then don’t talk about it. Respect people where they are. Respect that boundary. Validate. A lot of times in the beginning, people try to minimize the symptoms when they’re pretty profound. One small thing could trigger everything that has built up.

Technology & Social Media

We have lost the ability just to simply be kind to one another. In America, we are very focused on material things and the comparison game. I advise you get off social media slowly – wean yourself. I’ve been off several years, and it’s been the best years of my life.