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Keeping College Admissions In Perspective
If you’re a senior in high school or the parent of a senior in high school, the end of March is more about college admissions than the beginning of spring. The recent college admissions scandal is just one example of how parents can become overwhelmed and over-involved in the lives and decisions of the high…
Read MorePlanning a Wedding? Here’s Why You Should Go to Premarital Counseling
Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT helps individuals, couples, and families with communication and relationship skill building. She is trained in Emotionally Focused Therapy and highly skilled at coping with stress, anxiety, and depression. You just announced your marriage engagement. Congratulations! As you prepare for your wedding, be sure to place premarital counseling near the top of your to-do…
Read MoreHow to Find Joy, the Lasting Happiness
Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT helps individuals, couples, and families with communication and relationship skill building. She is trained in Emotionally Focused Therapy and highly skilled at coping with stress, anxiety, and depression. Years ago, a wise friend advised me, “Don’t let anyone take away your joy.” I was in a rough place, experiencing some struggles as a…
Read MoreHow to Deal with “Smonday” Stress
Do you ever have a great weekend only to end up feeling super low on Sunday evening? This experience is so common that it’s become an unofficial syndrome, the “Sunday Saddies” or “Sunday Scaries.” Recently when someone on Facebook asked, “Does anyone else hate the end of the weekend?” a friend of mine suggested that…
Read MoreWays to Practice Gratitude Without a Gratitude Journal
Are you feeling more worried lately? Have you experienced a drop in the number of pleasurable experiences you have? Are you feeling all around less positive than last year? You’re not alone. A recent Gallup Poll indicates that in the past year many Americans have experienced a decline in their sense of well-being. Fortunately, research…
Read MoreCoping with the Las Vegas Shooting: How to Respond When We Feel Powerless
It was the first thing we heard yesterday when we woke up here in Eastern Standard Time. There had been another mass shooting, this time in Las Vegas at an outdoor music festival. It was the worst shooting in our national history, said the news. After the devastation and continuing crises in Florida, Texas, and Puerto Rico, the…
Read MoreGetting Through January: Self-Care Apps to Help You Feel Happier in the Winter Months
Nothing feels as long as the months between the holidays and the sunshine of spring. Cloudy days, dark afternoons and bare trees call for making self-care a priority more than ever. If a winter cruise is out of the question, here is a tool kit of free apps to help you get from January to April. …
Read MoreA Guide to the Holidays for Imperfect Families
Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT is a staff therapist and office director at Council’s Voorhees and Lawrenceville, New Jersey offices. She also teaches in the Post Graduate Program and is the Director of Clergy Training. It’s okay to admit that your family is not perfect. Even I have had my moments of dreading family gatherings. I…
Read MoreTips on practicing good communication
Staff Therapist Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LFT is skilled at helping individuals, couples, and families with communication and relationship skill building; LGBT issues; reducing and coping with stress; sex issues for couples and individuals;recovery from affairs; and anxiety and depression. “They taught us how to square dance in school but they never bothered to teach us how to communicate…
Read MoreWhy Most Relationship Problems Can’t Be Solved
Relationships naturally ebb and flow. Even for the most intimate and closest of partners, communication can break down and devolve into conflict, leading to resentment and stress. How do you keep love alive even when you disagree? You probably have a few regular issues in your relationship that come up on a regular basis. One of you…
Read MoreMeet Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT, Featured Staff Therapist for December
Every month, Council for Relationships highlights one of our staff therapists on the blog. Read our interview below with December’s Featured Therapist Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT. Why are relationships important? I think that being in relationships is baked into our existence as human beings. When things go well for us at our beginning, we experience…
Read MoreHealing Moral Injury – Four Steps That Help
War demands that people do things that are far outside of civilian life. The ethics, rules and moral code of everyday life are suspended so that the goals of completing a mission and bringing battle buddies home safely can be accomplished. A returning warrior’s inner sense of being a good person can be shattered by…
Read MoreThis means opening our hearts; A how-to guide
In Dallas this week the President asked us all to open our hearts to one another. He asked us to remember that each person brings their own inner story to the stories of protest and violence we’ve experienced, seen or heard about this past week. It’s not an easy thing to open our heart to another…
Read MoreThe Hidden Wound of Moral Injury After War
Iraqi war vet, Tyler Budreu wrote “They say war is hell but I say it’s the foyer to hell. I say coming home is hell, and hell ain’t got no coordinates.” (in Packing Inferno) What could lead Budreu to say this? In the past few years, the idea of “Moral Injury” has emerged to describe…
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How to extend your vacation feeling after coming home
Wanda Sevey, MDiv, LMFT, is a staff therapist and office director of our Lawrenceville and Voorhees, New Jersey offices. She is an ordained minister in the progressive United Church of Christ and is trained in Emotionally Focused Therapy and Relationship Enhancement Therapy. Every summer I wish I could make it last just a little longer….
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New Beginnings – January Doesn’t Have to be Breakup Month
Marking a new year with a new beginning is so common that I was surprised on December 31st when a local newspaper journalist called and asked me “Is it true that January is the month when the highest number of relationships end?” After my conversation with her I went to the urban legend fact checkers…
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When Holidays Are Blue
It has been a privilege for me to accompany people on their evolving journeys with grief and, despite what department store and elevator music is telling us, this is not always the ‘happ-happiest’ time of the year for everyone. All of us have experienced some kind of loss in our lives. If we have lost…
Read MoreThe Benefits of Being Thankful
It started a few weeks ago. Every day a few more catalogs arrive, each one enticing me to overspend my holiday budget. Even worse for me, when I open my favorite online newspaper I see links to hundreds if not thousands of recipes for holiday meals and treats. For some of us, the invitation to…
Read MoreNavigating Difficult Family Dynamics During the Holidays
No matter how old we are, how successful we are in life, or how experienced we are in dealing with relationships, the stress of holiday get-togethers can be a challenge. During this time of year, it’s a good idea to have some strategies in place for coping with the difficult moments so that you can…
Read MoreWhat “We Need Help Communicating” Usually Means
It’s not unusual for couples to notice that they’ve drifted apart after a few years of being together. They gradually notice that they love one another but no longer feel ‘in love’ and miss the closeness they once shared. They remember that when they first met they could spend hours talking and listening to each…
Read MoreIt’s Just Marriage
We’re quickly arriving at a moment in time when we won’t be talking about “gay marriage” anymore because there won’t be a distinction between “gay marriage” and “marriage.” When the Supreme Court declined to take up the issue of same sex marriage last week the effect was to let stand state laws that will lead…
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