Mind Chicago therapist, Abbas Chinoy, AM, MDiv, LCSW, was featured on the Just Mental Health Podcast in January 2022! Listen to his conversation on spirituality, mental health, and flying kites with the hosts, Em and Steph.

Black History Month is a time of year that we can reconnect and recommit to justice in mental wellness, as well as honor and highlight a truthful history.

There’s much to love about Thanksgiving - the food, time with family and friends, and cranberry sauce. But our favorite part of Thanksgiving is the opportunity for gratitude.

Movement not only improves your health but also your emotional well-being.

When you start a neuropsychological evaluation at Mind, the first question you will hear is “What do you want to know about your child?”

From vacations to camping trips, parents are eagerly seeking new and creative ways to reconnect with their children after a challenging year and a half. In fact, some of those families are trying their hand at improv. Yes, you heard right, I said IMPROV! If you instantly recoiled, I understand. Improvisational theatre sounds intimidating. However, I’m going to provide you a simple introductory technique to help you enjoy this fun and meaningful activity and deepen your relationship with your child. But first, let me tell you a little about improv.

As parents, we do our best to respond to our children’s needs - from loving support to setting boundaries. Although we may be doing the best we can, many of us become lost in comparisons, overwhelmed by frustration, and/or consumed with worry (I know I have!). When we are caught up in these thoughts and emotions, we can lose sight of what is happening right in front of us with our child (and ourselves). We step into a reactive space, making choices from a place of strong emotions and persuasive, unhelpful thoughts. We may also make choices from a place of fear, preventing our young people from experiencing the difficult emotions that are necessary for growth, grit, and resilience.

Reading improves well-being - that includes graphic novels. These visually appealing works can help kids cope and develop better psychological wellness.

Being on the computer for hours and hours can take an enormous toll on our motivation and mood. Virtual depletion interferes with task initiation and time management, making us feel inefficient and stressed. And for young folx, this debilitation makes it tough to muster up the energy to complete homework, independently work during ‘asynchronous’ times, and participate efficiently in breakout groups.

If you are a parent or caregiver of an anxious child, there is no doubt that you are effortfully trying to support them. You have given words of encouragement, answered their many "what if" questions, and eliminated anxiety provoking cues. You may have noticed that although these strategies help reduce distress in the short-term, anxiety hasn't gone away, and, in fact, you may have even observed it getting much worse!

During the month of September, we have focused on different ways to reduce emotional vulnerability and improve emotion regulation by utilizing the coping skill SEEDS. We have introduced and reviewed how Sleep, Exercise, Executive functioning, and Diet are important to children’s emotional health and are helpful topics to address as children transition back to school. If you have not been following along yet, be sure to check out our most recent blog posts on these exciting topics!

As we continue our month of SEEDS, the focus this week is Diet. (“Diet” should really be replaced with “Balanced eating,” but SEEBS didn’t make for a good acronym.)

The 2020-2021 school year is starting off unlike any in recent memory. With schools pursuing in-person, virtual, and hybrid learning models, children and families are adjusting to new rules and altered routines in an unfamiliar and uncertain landscape. Navigating so many changes at once can be overwhelming.

Whether you are in-school, hybrid, or distance learning, movement and exercise may look a bit different this school year. Getting your kids and teens moving, suddenly requires more planning and organization on the part of teachers, parents, and students - as if finding the motivation to exercise wasn’t hard enough before.

With summer nearing its end, families are preparing for the start of the school year. Whether your child will be learning in person, via e-learning, or a combination thereof, some preparatory measures can set your child, teenager, or college student up for success.

There is a big debate about the value of tests, especially high-stakes standardized tests like the ACT or SAT. Concerns about undo stress, the tendency to “teach to the test,” inherent cultural biases, and the (mis)use of test scores to re-allocate funding away from marginalized communities are valid and real.

The decision to pursue neuropsychological testing for your child, teenager, or young adult is not always an easy one. It can be a lengthy, expensive, and demanding process. Not to mention, you might have pursued multiple other evaluations and interventions, but your high hopes for “an answer” and substantive change were met with vague, incomplete, and ineffective remedies.

How much screen time is too much screen time? If this isn’t the question of the year (or the century), I don’t know what is. Although the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends limited screen use for children under two years old and no more than 1 hour per day for children two to five years old, it feels nearly impossible to adhere to these limits in the face of e-learning and social distancing.

So, how do we know where to draw the line?

It’s summer. The kids are finally out of school – or whatever that was children were sort of doing from April to June. Now, instead of setting your child’s daily school schedule, making sure they are paying attention to the teacher on the screen, and fighting with them to complete their homework, we can finally get back to normal. Okay, not normal, but you get my drift.