The Therapist and the Tuna: Thoughts on Empathy and Limit Setting

Of the many reasons that people cite for getting into the field of counseling, it is rare, if not unheard of, to hear people say “I want to go into the field of counseling because I’ve always wanted to be a strong authority figure.” But at Academy MetroWest, that’s one of the primary goals we have when we begin training […]

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What Parenting Has Taught Me About My Job

On June 4th, my daughter Lucy turns 8 years old. The day after she was born, we were still staying at the hospital. At night, the staff gave us the option of having her spend the night in the nursery or in our room. We opted for the nursery, figuring that we’d have plenty of sleepless nights ahead of us […]

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An Instructive But Possibly Patronizing Story About Yelling

The Wall Street Journal just ran an article about a study on disciplinary strategies out of the Universities of Pittsburgh and Michigan. The authors found that parents can inflict similar harm on their kids by yelling at them as they can through hitting or other forms of physical punishment.  “Harsh, verbal discipline” used on 13 year old children was found […]

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Manners 101

Once upon a time, a long time ago, I went to college. Hofstra University, located in scenic (not really) Hempstead, NY, is my alma mater. I was a liberal arts guy but Hofstra was primarily a business school. Far be it from me to come across as anti-business or even anti-business student but you could always tell the business majors […]

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The Welcome Back Kotter School of Limit Setting

On the morning of September 10, 1975, as my fellow classmates and I streamed in to Iroquois Middle School for another enthralling day of 6th grade, we found ourselves enthusiastically comparing our favorite moments from a sitcom that had premiered the evening before. At least 12 hours after we had all feasted our eyes and ears on it for the […]

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