Ask a Counsellor

Do you think it’s possible to care too much for/about someone? If so, how do you care less?

Question: Do you think it’s possible to care too much for/about someone? If so, how do you care less?

Answer: I hope I’ve understood the question correctly, and will do my best to answer. I hope what I’ve written will apply to your circumstances.

At the outset, it is helpful to qualify what “care too much” might mean. Rather than a specific amount, any relationship requires just the right kind of care for each person to thrive. One measure of the right kind of care is that there is a shared understanding of the kind of relationship it is (friend, mentor, lover, professional, etc.) and that each person adheres to the boundaries suitable to that relationship and to each other’s preferences. When there isn’t that clarity or a shared understanding (for example, a friend wants to become a lover and that desired change is not reciprocated) things can get very messy emotionally.  One party feels they are not getting the care they would like, which in turn gives the feeling that they care too much. 

It seems strange to argue against caring for someone. However, there are circumstances where the actions that follow from that caring interfere with the well-being of both people. For the person wanting more it may feel challenging to respect the boundaries of the person they care about, and they may become overly focused on the other person at the expense of living their own life. The other person can feel smothered and disrespected, and doesn’t feel cared for at all. Neither person thrives. 

So that leads me to the second part of your question: How do you care less? It can be challenging to let go of the hopes, preferences, and imagined future that we have for a particular relationship. But truly caring can require the effort of honouring the other’s preference. One strategy people often try is not thinking about the other person or the relationship. Our brains are just not designed to make that possible and you can anticipate that you will have thoughts that might, over time, even feel intrusive. Here are some alternatives, and I encourage you to consider which are right for you:

-honour your sadness and expect a kind of grieving period where you will need to take care of yourself: treat yourself well for sleep, nutrition, movement; spend time with people with whom you have healthy relationships; choose to do things that make you feel good whether you do it alone or with others, invite friends to join you and avoid isolating yourself (even when that seems easiest).

-spend some time reconnecting with, or developing a sense of what is important to you. What is a meaningful life to you and what would you be doing tomorrow if you were living in line with those plans and values? Take small steps toward that each day.

-find a trusted person or a counsellor to talk through what happened, explore how you felt and what you thought, and use the experience to learn more about yourself.  You might discover you want to learn more about what constitutes a healthy relationship and what you personally hope for and need. If you need that listening ear late at night, you might try talking to a Distress Centre volunteer. 

-be kind to yourself when your mind keeps returning to the relationship. You might want to set some limited time (no more than half a page a day?…twenty minutes a week?…you need to decide) to write about your experience. I say limited because it will allow you to do the kind of thinking that moves you towards some understanding and acceptance, without getting stuck in a whirl of repeated thoughts. When you have given the amount of time for writing/thinking that you decided would be helpful, shift your attention to something that is engaging and meaningful to you. When relationship thoughts interfere, notice them and remind yourself you’ll write about it later (or talk about it to a friend or counsellor) when you choose, and then shift your attention again to other things important to you until you are back at your scheduled writing time. If this sounds simple, it is not. You will need to take a compassionate do-and-repeat approach toward yourself. 

-after giving yourself some time, decide if you can be in the relationship under the terms the other person has set. It may be in your best interest to break off contact if you find that the kind of caring you want to give won’t be accepted. Staying in the relationship could interfere with you developing a new and more mutually caring relationship.

I hope this has come close to speaking to your concern. Thanks for sharing your question. Odds are, it will be of interest to many Ask a Counsellor readers.

Sincerely,

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

Online Learning Challenges

Thanks for your question. It has been a while since someone submitted one here. You are the first of the Fall semester! Welcome. My first response is: don’t drop out before seeking some support. You have time to catch up, learn the online ropes, and see if some new strategies will improve things for you before the deadline to withdraw. If it is really not working at that point, it is sometimes the wisest thing to drop some or all of your classes. But for now, please read on…

Specific advice about what to if a student is having difficulty with online classes would require more understanding about what is going on. The challenges are common but also varied: low motivation, procrastination, reduced learning because you are not able to discuss course content as much, feeling lonely and disconnected, and anxiety, perhaps because of the uncertainty of online academic performance, are some examples. As well, personal challenges that are otherwise manageable, can be magnified because of the social isolation, increased screen time, disruption of routines, or the inability to do some of the things that supported our well-being because of COVID-19 restrictions. So I hope the general advice below will be helpful.

MRU has established some great resources to support students’ success during these strange times. I’ll begin with Student Learning Services. Our colleagues there have designed workshops that speak to common challenges of online learning. If a student’s stress is about their academic performance because their learning is suffering in the online learning environment, then a workshop or an appointment with a learning strategist is the way to go.

At Student Counselling Services we are booking video and telephone appointments instead of seeing students in person. Notwithstanding some technical glitches here and there, sessions online seem to stand up to some of the research on this: It can be just as effective. Many students don’t need a personal session. So we have other ways students can access the resources we offer. Here is a sampling:

Attend a webinar workshop to learn about managing stress, addressing procrastination and low motivation, engaging in personal discovery to support career decisions, and managing anxiety and worry. In all of these, the counsellor can speak to the stresses related to online learning and social isolation. Please check out our calendar.

You could also attend one of the following online groups to get regular support and have a sense of community. Check out the descriptions online:

Indigenous Women’s Group

Global Wellness Community

Pride Centre: Wellness Wind Down

A-Team for high functioning students on the Autism Spectrum

Student Support Webinars (every 2 weeks on Fridays)

SMILE support group: Students with Mental Illness in the Learning Environment

As well, if students are wondering if a mental health appointment with a doctor might be the right step, or they want information about accessing a psychiatrist or off-campus services appropriate for their concerns, Health Services has a mental health nurse who can provide information in a virtual appointment.

Finally, a student who is unsure of where to seek help can self-refer to the Office of Student Success for early support. Someone will contact you, get some idea of what you are going through, and help you find the right resource. There are many others at MRU ready to lend support!

I hope this is a good start to exploring options.

Sincerely,

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

Wellness Services: Student Counselling Services

Seeking counselling for non-MRU youth

My daughter is 16 years old and I am looking to get her counselling. Do you offer counselling for teenagers who aren’t part of Mount Royal?

Hello,

We only offer counselling to MRU students. However, I would be happy to share some off-campus resources that you may wish to check out. I’ll share two options and the third is a call centre where professionals will be able to share more information about other services that might meet you daughter’s needs.

Calgary Counselling Centre: Their counsellors guide individuals, couples, families and youth through their concerns.

The process begins with the NEXEN Call Centre: where you can call or go online to complete your counselling form. Upon completion of your counselling form you will receive a call to set up an appointment within three to five business days.  Day, evening and weekend appointments are available.

Counselling fees are determined on a sliding fee scale, according to annual family income and ability to pay. There are no financial barriers to counselling services provided by the Centre. (403-691-5991 or http://www.calgarycounselling.com/ )

Eastside Family Centre: The Eastside Family Centre offers services for youth and families experiencing emotional upset that may arise from a variety of situations ranging from parent/adolescent conflict and mental health disturbance to domestic violence, financial stress and/or employment loss.

Service is available on a first-come, first-served basis with no appointment required. It offers no-cost, walk-in counselling, and focused counselling with a qualified professional that may include psychiatric and clinical consultation. It also provides no-cost, legal advice in collaboration with Calgary Legal Guidance and outreach and school services based in highly accessible centres throughout the community. (403-299-9696 or http://www.woodshomes.ca/site/PageNavigator/programs/crisis/programs_eastside.html )

Access Mental Health is connected to many local community resources, and they will be able to share more options. They can also streamline the process for accessing specialized mental health services. You can access this service by calling 403-943-1500 (Ext 1 – child and adolescent services; Ext 2 – adult and senior services) Monday to Friday 7:30am -7:30pm.

I hope that gives you a start. All the best to you and your daughter.

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

 

Can perceptions of mental health be shared in a reference letter?

Questions: Is it appropriate and/or allowed for a professor to discuss their perceptions of my mental health on a reference for grad school?

Hello,

Thanks for your question. I suspect the question and response will be of value to others. My first response was to want to speak to confidentiality in counselling (we never share information about students without a student’s signed consent), but realized you were talking about perceptions a professor has about your mental health.

There are several problems with your professor commenting on your mental health in a reference letter. First, since your professor is not qualified to assess your mental health status they cannot speak to this. Even if they are also registered mental health professionals, they are not in this role when they are preparing a reference letter. Second, if there was a diagnosis of a mental illness that the professor knew about, this says nothing about your ability to do grad school. Many people diagnosed with a mental illness are able to thrive and have great success in University because they have found effective treatment and ways of coping. Third, when there is a psychiatric disability there is a duty to accommodate that person and to explore how they, with some possible adjustments, are able to meet the learning requirements. What that accommodation actually looks like can be different because of specific program requirements that will limit the kind of accommodations that are possible and appropriate.

What your professor is able speak to in preparing a reference, is knowledge of your performance. This would all be with reference to your actual behavior. This could include questions such as the following: Did you hand things in on time? Was the quality of the work up to the standards required by graduate studies? Can you work independently?

I am going to refer you to the Office of Campus Equity and Meaningful Inclusion with any further questions about this. Khaula Bhutta is a human rights advisor who works out of this MRU office. She will be able to say more about your options for handling a situation where your professor is including, in your reference, perceptions on your mental health. Her email is kbhutta@mtroyal.ca.

I wish you all the best in resolving your concern.

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

Grieving the loss of a relationship

Do you have any advice for grieving someone who is still alive, but who doesn’t want to have contact anymore?

Grief after a loss can come over us in waves that often crash over us at unexpected times. Although the experience of grief is often recognizable by those who have experienced a loss, the process of healing from the loss can look very different from person to person and between different situations.

First, I’m  sorry for the loss  of the relationship. You describe your experience as grief, so I suspect you can confirm what I have said above about grieving. The process of healing is often called mourning to distinguish it from the experience of sadness that can come out of the blue. Mourning is a more purposeful process of healing from a loss, and I think you are asking about what strategies you might be able to use for that healing process.

When people come to grief counselling, the process of finding what will be helpful for healing comes out of a collaborative exploration. Since this is more of a one-way conversation, I will share some ideas. However, I offer them with the thought that you are the one who will know which of these might be helpful. What is actually helpful will truly be known only once you have tried some of these strategies.

As always, MRU students are welcome to attend at counselling (U216) and book an appointment or use the Walk-In Blocks of time offered every afternoon.

  1. Healing, physical or emotional, takes energy. What are you doing to take care of yourself? What energizes you and how can you do more of that?
  2. Acknowledge what you are grieving. Sometimes it is not only the person, but the ‘hoped for future’ that adds to your grief. Journaling about this might be one way to acknowledge what you are grieving.
  3. Explore what healing might look like for you:
    • What have you learned about yourself in this relationship that will never be lost to you? What has it taught you about what is important to you?
    • What will be ongoing in your life: what activities that give you pleasure will you continue to engage in? What hopes for your life do you continue to hold? What do you value that is still the case and how can you live out those values even more strongly?
    • How have you healed from other losses? What might you be able to repeat from that in this situation?
    • What ceremonies might you create that mark both the ending and the new beginning. You might write a eulogy that honours what was good and what you appreciated about the relationship, one that also says goodbye (perhaps wishes the person well wherever they go), and that also honours the way your life will go on and that your happiness can not be taken away by one person no longer being in your life.

Engaging more purposefully in saying goodbye to the relationship and marking a new path for yourself, may help you to heal from the loss. Over time it may also make it easier to manage moments when the sadness hits you or if you bump into the person. At these times, try to acknowledge the grief for what it is: a sign that you can love and have lost something of value. Allow yourself some time to feel the feelings and then shift your focus to the kinds of things you do that matter to you: caring for yourself, being with those who are significant to you, pursuing your goals for your life and career, living out your values. Those who have gone through grief say that a balance between being with the grief for a time, and then going back into ‘doing’ mode, is often a helpful.

I hope some of these thoughts give you some ideas about what you can do. All the best,

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

Finding Valentines Day Events for Singles

Post: It’s almost Valentine’s Day, and I’m single and feeling extremely sad and very lonely.  I’ve only been able to find one event to meet other singles on Valentine’s Day, which awkwardly happens to be in a lingerie shop.  

What other events are happening in Calgary for singles to meet other singles?  I don’t want to be alone anymore.  It feels like a couple-dominated world, and all the couples events seem really cool and fun, but I don’t have a partner to go with.  Sigh…

Response:
Valentines Day can be a rather difficult, or potentially an even painful time, for many people who are not currently in a romantic relationship with anyone. One of the challenges is the bombardment of advertisements for events, experiences and ideas that seemingly only couples can do on that day. There is often also a rise in social media of posts and “snaps” from people within our social networks and popular media, celebrating couple-hood. It is almost impossible to escape from it! What that can is an increased sense of isolation and loneliness, a sense of being excluded from something that might be perceived as exclusive, and a hypersensitivity to anything regarding relationship status.
In a city of 1.24 million people, I can certainly understand feeling sad and lonely when you can’t find an event to attend in Calgary that is for people not in a relationship. It seems to make intuitive sense that there should be events specifically designed to connect people…perhaps celebrating good friendships, loving family relationships, and new possible friendships or romance. To respond to your post, I am curious if it would be interesting to expand on what you might be searching for on that specific day, the coming weekend, as well as how to continue to move forward in your life as a currently single person.
Firstly, coming from a sex-positive perspective, it might end up being a fun, enjoyable and informative evening at the event at the lingerie shop! Sometimes it’s exciting to take a deep breath and do something just slightly outside your comfort zone for an event geared to meeting people and go in with openness and curiosity. I also appreciate that it might be a bit awkward, so if you are wanting to get out to an event that night, you might want to search for events that are not just specifically marketed for “singles meeting singles”. Calgary Meetups has some groups geared towards people who are single or those who are interested in meeting different people around shared interests. We did a quick search of meetups and found a games and mingling option. As well, Avenue Magazine Calgary, provides six options for Valentines Day. Finally, your Students Association has three events posted on Valentines that provide opportunities to meet others. Another possible strategy is to focus and partake in activities or events in which you are genuinely interested, as this just raises the likelihood that you meet people you will connect with. So perhaps these are some interesting options worth trying.
Those suggestions are not intended to take away from how challenging it can be to meet new people within our current networks or to join pre-existing groups within Calgary.
Romantic love and connection may often take a longer time to both find and develop. To make it through Valentines Day specifically, you might want to choose to make it about celebrating, appreciating and acknowledging the various people that you do have in your life or, importantly, yourself. This might include reaching out to friends, family, co-workers who might also be struggling through this day and creating a day or night to really highlight your own interests, values, and connection to each other. Although it might seem that many events are geared specifically towards couples, they are often in no way actually limited to couples. So, why not just go, appreciate and enjoy the event or activity for itself with one of these people already in your network? You might decide to take February 14 as a day or night to do those things that you have wanted to do, and for which you have not made time.
In considering moving forward and finding love, please take a read on a previous blog post: Finding true love for Valentine’s
Sincerely,
Danni Lei, R. Psych. and Mirjam Knapik, R. Psych.

Already involved and still feel lonely

Question: If someone is already involved as a volunteer and has some minimal interactions with others before/during/after classes but still feels very lonely, what would you recommend to help them feel less lonely?
It sounds like you have already taken some steps to feel more engaged with other people who might share the same values and interests. If you are volunteering on campus, it is a great way to begin making connections, and these can bring more opportunities to connect, and so on (and I thank you for volunteering!). Often, focusing on activities and interests that are enjoyable (hobbies, sports, your studies, etc.) can lead to an increase in positive thoughts and feelings. Hopefully your volunteering is enjoyable.
But being with people does not always address loneliness. Sometimes feelings are complex and loneliness can include shades of sadness, and depressed emotional states interfere with feeling connected with ourselves and others.  As well, when we experience intense emotions, such as grief, we can feel alone with our suffering. Loneliness can also emerge when we are fearful of sharing the kinds of things about ourselves that could lead to deeper and more meaningful connections that can dispel loneliness.
Although the complexity of a feeling such as loneliness makes it difficult give specific advice, I hope the examples above help you to consider what might be getting in the way of feeling connected so that you can address these barriers. As well, you already identify some possible room for change when you describe minimal interactions with others before/during/after classes. Are there opportunities there for feeling more connected by creating study groups? Time spent supporting each other to learn, and then chatting over a coffee break, might help to better know others and be more known by others.
I hope this is helpful. As always, you are free to come into counselling to talk more about your specific experiences and ways of addressing your concerns.
All the best,
Mirjam

Questions about courses and requirements

Question: If I want to have a BA degree in english, do i need to take social 30-1 in my highschool classes?

Response:

Thank you for your question. I am going to guess you are currently in high school and are thinking about coming to Mount Royal University. If that is so, this is great and I hope to welcome you here in the near future. The Student Counselling Centre at MRU helps students with personal challenges, provides support in career and life decision making, and helps students overcome barriers to academic success. So with your question the real experts on our campus are the Academic Advisor for accepted students, and the people in Recruitment for entrance requirements. Each university and program can have somewhat different requirements, so this may require some searching.

Mount Royal offers free admission information sessions and campus tours throughout the year. Just click on these links for further information.

Sorry I can’t answer your question, but I hope you will find your answer (and more) with this information.

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

Information about volunteering

Submission: Hi, I need to get in touch with MRU counseling to talk about volunteering.

Thanks for visiting the SCS website and our blog page. I suspect you already know that volunteering has become recognized as an important component of students’ time in post-secondary. It offers a chance to develop skills, personal qualities, and knowledge that is valued on applications for jobs and grad school. Not only that, it can be a meaningful, satisfying, and fun experience that helps students find their passion and life paths. Although your submission sounded like a personal request, the purpose of the Ask A Counsellor Blog is to share questions and answers with others. Since I’m sure others would benefit from this information, here it is on this website.

Student Counselling Services does not have volunteer positions at this time, but there are numerous opportunities on our campus. To review these, the best resource is the Career Services volunteering page http://www.mtroyal.ca/EmploymentCareers/CareerServices/Students/vol_experience.htm

There are opportunities to volunteer both locally and abroad, and there are additional links that give you more information about volunteerism.

I was going to include another local website, but see that more have sprung up since I last searched this topic. So I encourage you to search the terms “volunteer Calgary” and you will be able to see many more sites that attempt to link people to organizations looking for volunteers.

To get a more personal response or support, students can make appointments with counsellors by calling 403 440-6362 or by dropping in to see us Wellness Services (U216). For general queries, you can ask at our reception desk or you can email studentcounselling@mtroyal.ca.

I hope this helps not only you, but other readers.

All the best,

Mirjam Knapik, Ph.D., R. Psych.

MRU Student Counselling Services.

Cheating: Report or not?

Question: A student claimed an assignment worth 2.5% as his own, and I know it wasn’t his. He told me a few days before that he did not have a chance to do the assignment, and yet, he claimed someone else’s work as his own. After he claimed the paper and sat back down, I asked him if that was his since he told me he didn’t do it. He confessed to me that it wasn’t his but he didn’t want to lose marks for not doing the assignment. The question is, should I tell my prof that that assignment isn’t his? Or should I let it go because I have no proof?

Thank you for your question. It sounds like a tricky situation and a difficult decision regarding what to do next. As counsellors, we are famous (infamous maybe?) for not giving specific advice but instead encouraging people to consider as many options as possible and then choosing what is best for them. There is a variety of information we can consider when making a decision about what actions fit best for us including: what we THINK about the situation, what we FEEL about the options available to us, and the VALUES we hold that might guide the decisions we make. Here are some questions you can consider that could help you decide what to do:

First, what do you think/feel/value about plagiarism? Is it something that bothers you or something you think/feel/value needs to be addressed in some way? Would it make a difference if the assignment was worth 25% instead of 2.5%? I wonder how it might feel if this student gets a higher grade than you at the end of the semester?

Second, what do you think/feel/value about bringing this to your professor’s attention? I wonder how the decision to share this information with a professor or not might impact you. How might you think/feel to release information that might impact this student? What would you think/feel about keeping the information about the plagiarism to yourself? Would the impact on you change over the next few days or weeks? I also wonder if knowing about the plagiarism and sharing or not sharing might impact the relationship with this other student.

Third, I wonder how the decision to share this information with a professor or not might impact your class. I was not sure from your description whether the work belonged to another student in the class but if it did, I wonder what the impact might be on the person who did complete the assignment?

Finally, I wonder how the decision to share this information with a professor or not might impact this student. I wonder what you might think/feel/value about talking to the student directly about this issue and assessing how they would feel about coming clean themselves? Is it possible that the professor might figure out that this assignment was not written by the student in another way? Sometimes it can be difficult to make a decision if we are unsure what the impact would be. You can access information from the Mount Royal website about what would happen if a professor became aware of plagiarism: http://www.mtroyal.ca/CampusServices/CampusResources/StudentConduct/TipsforStudents/

I invite you to use the information from your answers to the above questions to create a pros and cons list of reporting the plagiarism or not reporting it. It might feel like a clear decision after looking at the list or you might feel like you’re trying to pick the “best of the worst” option. Either way, you may feel like you have spent time exploring the options and made an informed decision.

If you’re still feeling stuck, feel free to attend a session with one of our counsellors to explore this situation in more detail.

Take care,

Jennifer McCormick, M.Sc., R.Psych.