Tag: Health

Addiction, grief, Homeless

We need to talk about men and mental health

Katrina Russell

In the US men make up 75% of all suicides, while in Europe it is more like 80%. However men are half as likely to seek mental health treatment than women. These statistics are obviously correlated, but why is a bigger question. Are men not seeking treatment and therefore just deciding to kill themselves? Are men seeking treatment but being told by both society and more than likely the feminist psychologist who they seek treatment from that their problems don't really matter because they are some sort of oppressive class that needs to apologize for how they treat everyone else? Are they just diagnosed and handed a bottle full of pills and told that will make them feel better? If that's the case men are also dying from drug overdoses 2-3 times more than women. This may be the reason why almost twice as many men are homeless compared to women.

Addiction, Love, Mental Health, parenting, Politics

No one can do everything, and we need to stop telling people that they can.

Katrina Russell

Telling someone that they can do everything is similar to telling a child that they can have everything that they want in a store. Say you have $300 and you take a child to Target. You can tell them that they can have anything that they want, they just have to choose. Maybe they pick a giant Lego set, and have $100 left to spend and you tell them, "oh that's great, why don't you add a book and a game on top of that". You leave the store and the child is ecstatic.

people wearing diy masks
Addiction, grief, Healthcare, Mental Health, parenting, Politics

Death Happens

Katrina Russell

The problem is no one can stop death. The more we try the worse it gets. People are becoming obsessed with death. With Covid death specifically. People have locked themselves in their house. They refuse to see family and friends. They won't work. They won't go outside in the fresh air for fear it may be contaminated.

Healthcare, parenting, Politics

Freedom is Hard

Katrina Russell

As people we have the right to be left alone and to do as we please. The choices we make then decide the life that we lead. This has become completely turned around by everyone. Most people in our society and in every political party seems to think that freedom means doing whatever one wants without consequence and rights are to have whatever they choose without the needs to work for them

close up photo of woman with her hands tied with rope
Addiction, grief, Law of Attraction, Love, Mental Health

Trauma… the badge of honor

Katrina Russell

I don't see trauma in that way. I certainly don't see bad things that happen to me as a reflection of me at all. I didn't cause my parents to divorce, or my brother to leave, or my son's father to do drugs, or my parents to die. These are things that other people have done that affect me but does in no way embody me. I am who I am despite all of these things happening around me and to me. I am who I am because of all of the things that happen around me and to me. It doesn't do anyone any good to create a persona of trauma and hold onto it so tightly that it drowns you.

Addiction, Giving, Healthcare, Homeless, Love, Mental Health, parenting

We’re not alone

Katrina Russell

Now I read this article about Sesame Street talking to millions of kids about their parents. Millions of kids whose mommies and daddies have to stay sober using nothing but will power. My son is not the only kid I know whose parent has died from the crisis.. my son is not the only kid I know that needed a monitor to make sure he was safe when his Da was using.

Addiction, Healthcare, Love, Mental Health, parenting

My relationship with an addict

Katrina Russell

Two years ago I finally said enough was enough. He was out of my house for the third time, and back in jail for assaulting his mom when I told him that he had to go to re rehab. Not a 2 week or 30 day dry out, but a real program that really worked on the heart of his issues. He refused. His mother agreed that as long as he had dried out and promised to stay sober that was all that mattered. I knew that one of these days things were going to go to far and I didn't want my son or me anywhere near it.

Addiction, Healthcare, Homeless, Love, Mental Health, parenting

Why is mental health so taboo?

Katrina Russell

 I am a believer in medication when needed, but I also believe that it's a band-aid to help take the edge off so that you can do the real work with thoughts and actions. We are our brains. Our emotions come from chemicals released in our brains.. our thoughts activate those chemicals being released. He had an overwhelming amount of "stress" (cortisol) hormones and low amounts of "happy" (dopamine) chemicals in his brain. He would try to fix that with drugs, and for the short term they would help, but he had no one to help him through the rest of the process when he was younger and still forming. 

Addiction, coaching, Health, Healthcare, Love, Mental Health, Motivation, parenting, Wellness

I am an opiate widow

Katrina Russell

 I was never married to Neil. I wasn't even with him at the time of his death, but I was his family. I was his person.. and I was his widow long before the last hit killed him. Opiates stole his life. They stole him from us. I am an opiate widow, because opiates killed my family.