Kelley Counseling and Wellness

    Written by: Amelia Kelley, PhD, MS, LPC Many people with ADHD find it hard to manage their symptoms of brain fog, forgetfulness, distractibility and physical agitation. Most want to know how to manage their symptoms and, some would like to do this without medication. The HIIT for ADHD Program discussed below has been researched and proven to help reduce ADHD symptoms and improve general wellbeing and focus. Scott, 35-year-old male who suffers from adult ADHD was excited when he tried this program and told his wife, “I feel more awake and alive then I have in years. Even more then when I tried ADHD medication last year!” How did Scott find this alert, excited feeling that helped him become more focused without using medication? He found it by using a home-based, exercise program using high-intensity interval training (HIIT) that he easily accessed on a free website and only had to commit a few minutes a day to completing. To truly under...

Thus far we have touched on developing a sleep schedule and a before bed routine so you are really ready to fall asleep when your head hits the pillow. But what if you are doing these two things already but still having trouble falling sleep? If you get in bed and it takes more than twenty minutes to fall asleep you should get back out of bed. That might sound counter intuitive but there is a good reason to do so, a couple in fact.  First your body and mind need to associate your bed as a place of rest and relaxation. Likely if you have been struggling with sleep your bed may consciously or subconsciously be associated with stress, exhaustion, anxiety, or frustration. To help break that association you need to be sleeping while in your bed rather than laying awake wishing you could sleep. So after twenty minutes if you are still awake, get up.  Now that you are up you need to do something slow down and relax so when you return to bed you can sleep. Maybe that wou...

Last week we touched on the importance of developing a sleep schedule. That is a great place to start but that is not the only thing that will help you get the healthy sleep you need.  Developing an evening time routine that helps with winding down can also be very beneficial. This will look different for different people, the important part is to develop a routine that works for you. Individuals that are struggling with not being able to "turn off" their brain to fall asleep may benefit most from developing a wind down routine. Do you need to start winding down 30 minutes before bed? An hour? Two hours?  Find what works for you, it might take some time to find that sweet spot but it can make a big difference in the quality of sleep that you get.  As I said this will look different for each person but here are some ideas to get you started: - take a hot shower - do some light stretching - bedtime yoga practice ( here 's a great 7 minute ...

In this mini-series we will explore strategies that can improve sleep. One thing my colleagues and I hear often is that people are struggling with sleep. Sleep is essential to functioning at ones best! So if you aren't getting the sleep you need, you aren't able to be the healthiest version of yourself. Sleep impacts many aspects of mental and physical wellbeing, from metabolism to judgment to immune system health. WHERE TO START? Develop a sleep schedule! Going to bed and waking up at the same time each day will strengthen your body's natural tendency to regulate your sleep-wake cycle. This means that on weekends, weekdays, vacations, etc. you should be going to bed at relatively the same time and waking up at relatively the same time. Once you have started purposefully trying to do this you will eventually notice that you start to become tired at that predetermined bedtime and you will start waking up without that alarm because you body has learned the patter...

Enough Here is a reminder for anyone that may be struggling right now. You are enough.  It is important to remember that you have to give yourself credit for what you ARE  doing, as opposed to thinking negatively about what you are not doing.   If we focus completely on the negatives of our situations, it may feel like we are never good enough, never pretty enough, never smart enough, never happy enough, etc.  However, this is all relative, and measured based on opinion.   When thinking about Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences  (see more here ), one can see that there are so many different ways to be "smart".  So, to assume that you are not smart because you score highly on musical intelligence as opposed to logical-mathematical, is simply a matter of opinion and what you place value in.  We must learn to recognize our own strengths and see the positives within ourselves, and not compare outwardly to the strengths of oth...

My passion is working with adolescents but I also work with adults and a common struggle I have heard is never having down time due to the constant needs of family. Having kids and a family can be wonderful but it can also be very draining if you are not getting the rest you need. When kids don't get enough down time they can become cranky, overtired, and generally difficult to handle. When adults don't get enough rest, patience is more difficult, stress levels rise, and managing even simple tasks can be a chore. There are many ways that this can be addressed but my favorite way and a fairly effective intervention is implementing feet on the bed time in your household. Feet on the bed time is exactly what it sounds like. It is a given period of time each day during which your feet must be on your bed (and preferably the rest of you). Each family member is to be on their own bed for whatever amount of time you decide engaging in a quiet activity or napping. Obvio...

Do you constantly worry about the needs of others?  Are you so flexible with your schedule that it leaves you with absolutely no free time? Do you constantly feel like you are running from one place to the other with no breaks? Do you skip breakfast because you are too busy to eat?  Are you sacrificing everything for your friends, family, job, education, etc.? If so, it is time to learn what the word "self-care" means.   Self care is defined as "care for oneself" (Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, n.d.).  That seems simple enough, however, after considering all of the examples above, are you really doing a good job of taking care of yourself?   Self-care is also defined by what you consider to be important for your own well-being. This can be broken down into basic areas of concern. The following chart is a great representation of some of the various aspects of self-care.   So after looking through those aspects of self-...