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Author Archives: Dr. Lagrotte
Can you recover from an affair?
When clients come to my office, I get tears, anger and this question “Can we recover from this?” My answer? Yes! Yes you can but it’s not going to be easy and there’s a lot of work that needs to be done. Here’s the checklist that I tell my clients.Read More
Why do people have affairs?
So, here’s the story you hear all the time. Two people meet, the attraction is so intense that they cannot keep away from each other and they have an affair, they cheat. Okay, flash to reality and anyone that’s been involved in an affair knows that isn’t really how it happens.
Here’s a more likely story that you might relate to.Read More
Patience
The beginning of school is always a time of rushing, getting things ready and adjusting to a new routine. For me, as I’m sure for a lot of you, it’s also a time for holding on to your patience as well as your sanity! I have 2 girls in school now, yes I made it. My youngest just started Kindergarden and I am finally at that stage where I have my days to myself! Ah, if only it was that easy!Read More
Staying Calm
I have always imagined myself as a calm person and I strive to live that way. I have had two incidents lately that have questioned how I can stay calm when other people are so upset? I am struggling with this because I do believe that staying calm, listening to my inner voice and going slower will help me in the long run.
Here are some ways that I am going to practice to stay calmRead More
End of Summer and the Empty Nest
I’ve had a nice relaxing summer so far. My two children are enjoying camp and I am enjoying them at camp! My youngest is starting kindergarten in the fall and I always said that I was so excited to get to this point in my life. Oh, all the things I can do with them both in school. See, I didn’t rush preschool and last year my little one went to vpk with a pick up at 12 pm. As rushed as my days were, I enjoyed the time I had with her and she sure learned patience by waiting for her older sister in car lines with me!
Fast forward to today when I just used her school id number to link her lunch account with her older sisters. Okay, that was real for me and I’m so excited for this time for her and also a little sad that my little girl is growing up. As I write this, I know that others are experiencing different levels of excitement and sadness with their children going off to school, whether it’s college or just leaving the house. The real empty nesters are getting ready to experience life without tending to every one of your child’s needs.
Welcome back to adulthood! What, you are sad, unable to get out of bed, do not know what to do with your days? If this is you, then let’s talk.
As happy as you are for your children to leave the house, they’re still leaving the house and you’re still at your house. What does this mean for your relationship? Are you wondering how you’re going to handle the silence in the house? Does your partner/spouse annoy you with just being in your space? Did you spend all of your time and energy on your children and then you look at your spouse/partner and realize you don’t know who they are?
These feelings are normal and they don’t need to lead to separation or even divorce. Here are some things that you two can do to spice up your relationship!
- Go on a second honeymoon.
- Pick up a hobby together.
- Find an exercise routine for both of you.
- Work on your relationship through counseling.
- Make sure you go out on dates and make your relationship special!
If this isn’t working and you feel you need more help, I understand and this is what I do. I help couples, such as yourself, to reconnect, learn how to be intimate, like each other and communicate so the other one understands.
You can and should enjoy this time of your life and I look forward to helping you get to your ideal empty nest dream!
Growing a Relationship with Growing Children
We had another great seminar last Friday. Here’s the video for those that were unable to attend. See you next time!
Teaching and learning how to be disappointed
Okay, this is a very personal blog but that is what this is for to talk, learn and to listen. I had the pleasure of learning so many lessons this morning dropping my children off at camp that it had to be remembered and shared to experience life as it comes.
My children love “mommy camp” but as we all know, I work and need time away from them so I have them signed up for camp a few weeks this summer. Today was the first day back at camp after 2 weeks of “mommy camp”. As we were approaching the door, the tears started and they got worse and worse. I did my usual things to try to calm them down. I say them because the older one was upset and the younger one was upset because the older one was crying. Yes, lovely right, you are trying to make one stop crying and the other starts.
Well, at a point I decided I had to leave. I got the promises, the guilt, the everything and realized I had to make a run for it. Why, because I had things scheduled that I could not miss which now I am so thankful for and grateful once again for my wonderful supportive husband because once I got to the parking lot I called him in tears mind you and he was great! Said all the things I needed to hear and the best part is that he is right.
We need to let our children be uncomfortable and experience life and learn how to deal with disappointment. As adults we deal with disappointment all the time but why do we, at least I think that we should shield our children from it. I knew once I left they would calm down and have fun, but it was so hard leaving. I believe with the support of my husband I did the right thing and taught them and myself a valuable lesson today on how to deal with disappointment.
As I was sitting in the parking lot, I had one mother tell me my children were crying and another telling me that sometimes you just have to let them cry. No matter what you believe, I do believe that we need to teach them they cannot get their way all the time and that they need to do what is expected of them just because they are children and parents make up the rules.
So, do you want to know how it turned out? Of course it was great! Picked them up, ate their lunch and I was told, “Mommy, I had so much fun and even met a new friend.” Geez what was I worried about. The bottom line is that for me I need to trust my training and my mommy instincts in order to let my children learn about life!
Emotions, who has them and why?
I saw the movie Inside Out this past weekend with my family. It was a great movie and had an even greater lesson in it which most people would not recognize but me being me, I had to recognize and share with all of you.
So if you know the movie, it is about a girl who has emotions in her head. They are joy, sadness, anger, disgust and fear. Joy is the main emotion and she is always trying to stop the other emotions from overtaking her turn. Well, sadness is the main emotion that joy has a problem with which if you saw the movie, it turns out that joy and sadness get kicked out of main headquarters because joy does not think that sadness should be a part of Riley’s core memories.
Who else believes this? That sadness is a wrong emotion and should not be a part of our core memories? As it turns out joy realizes that whenever she is around that sadness is also there as part of the emotions and that joy and sadness go hand-in-hand together. So, in order to get the emotions back on track once they got back to headquarters, sadness needed to take over and fix everything. Why, you ask would sadness need to fix everything? Because, sadness was and is the correct emotion. Why are we so afraid to be sad?
Sadness is a necessary emotion to help us get our stress out, fix our problems and get closer to the ones we love. It helps us make decisions and learn how to love, apologize and how to try again. When you try to block this emotion from your head you are missing out on so much of your emotions.
If this movie or me teaches you anything, is that emotions are okay no matter which one you feel. Just feel it and work through it and you will get back to joy eventually. If you block out sadness, anger, disgust or fear, then joy will not be real. You need all of your emotions to successfully feel and learn how to share how you feel.
So go ahead and feel sad today, but then feel anger, disgust, fear and once you are done understanding all of your emotions then you can feel joy and really mean it!
Ignorance is for those that do not ask questions
I was talking to a friend about another friend’s son who just found out he has Type 1 diabetes. As a mother, friend and person my heart went out to this family but that as far as it could go because I do not know the day-to-day trials about how to teach a 5-year-old how to check his sugar levels and readjust his eating. So what did I do you ask? I asked questions and found out from another person what it is like to have to check your sugar levels everyday and to adjust to a new way of life. If I did not ask these questions, I felt I would have been ignorant to the situation and was not comfortable with that. I believe the two hardest things any person has to learn is how to say your sorry and really mean it and learn how to ask questions when you do not understand something.
I was also talking to an older lady this morning and she was telling me about herself and her life. She brought up the fact that she was racist and did not like black people. Her reason was that she was raised this way and that was her generation. The reason it came up was because we were discussing doctors and she was seeing a “light skin” black doctor.
Ignorance is everywhere and the way to overcome it is to ask questions, learn new things and to try to accept things into your life. This way of life is how you choose to live it, not how someone told you to live it.
Let’s make changes today and ask somebody that you do not know a question and learn something new today. Let’s get rid of ignorance once and for all!
Can Relationship Counseling Work with Just One Person?
I cannot tell you how many times, I either get a call or see someone in person and the first thing they say to me is, “I have wanted to come for awhile but my partner would not come so I got tired of waiting and came myself.” My answer is always, good for you and I can honestly say that coming for yourself will help you improve yourself and your relationship. Do you believe me? Let’s look at the reasons
1. The ripple effect: I explain this effect a lot and it was introduced to me early in my schooling when you drop a rock into the water and it skims on the surface it creates a ripple. The same thing happens when you start to make changes within yourself, you and those around you will benefit from those changes, sometimes for the better and sometimes it works the opposite way and you realize you are not happy and end things. Regardless, change occurs.
2. Your partner is always present: The goal in couple’s therapy is to stay neutral and listen to both sides equally and give sound advice. Its harder to do with one person but doable. Any of my clients can tell you that I side with the one that makes the most sense but in a couple both sides are right and a compromise is always obtainable with the right way to look at a situation.
3. Adding your partner later: This one has to do with the first two and usual happens if the person in therapy is making positive changes and the other partner wants to come and work. At least one person should be in the therapy room and be working on the relationship.
Coming to therapy is a hard, long decision that most people do not make lightly. When you are angry, you want change but you are unsure how to go about it. Therapy can help untangle things and work-out what needs to really be worked on. Trust me it works whether it’s with one person or two. Just make the call and try and see where it leads you!