Mental Health Insights

Join Craig Foust, Nicole Oliver, Pete Sandoval, and Kristen Craren as we explore what healthy relationships look like. All of us look at relationships from different angles and give our own view on what "healthy relationships" look like and how to work towards them. We hope you enjoy!

Talking to people you care about is hard. How do we get better at it? Kristen Craren joins me in answering this question and helping you understand a little about the importance of relationships. We hope you enjoy!

During this episode, I talk to Chad Welch about how important mental health work is with active and retired military. We also start to explore purpose and meaning in our life and how that propels different issues therapist treat!

This one skill will help you have a better marriage. Imagine reducing fighting, arguing, disagreements, and tension by just having make sure you do this one thing. This will be part 1 in a series to help you improve your relationships!

Forgetting important things is awful. We have all been in that gut wrenching moment when we realize we forgot something important. Today, Nicole, Sheila, and myself talk about how to improve your memory so you don't get into those situations as often. I hope you enjoy the episode!

5 Steps to Handle Big Emotions Do you feel like your emotions overwhelm and take over when situations get tough in your life? You are not alone. Anyone can get overwhelmed from strong emotional tides and sometimes it may even feel like our life is ruled by our emotions. In this podcast episode, I talk about 5 ways to help you start to break down those big emotions and stop those overwhelming feeli...

Making Your Resolutions Stick It is hard to stick to goals and resolutions. The sense of defeat from trying to improve  can be devastating. In this episode we talk about how to make habits, resolutions, and goals easier to be successful with. This is a topic Pete, Nicole, and myself really enjoy talking about and I hope that you find it helpful for your own pursuits as well!

The Crushing Loneliness of Social Anxiety Social anxiety is an isolating condition that can be overcome. You can be confident when walking into a social situation when you address your social anxiety. This condition makes avoiding any social situation normal. Learning social skills and being more comfortable in talking to others can go a long way in helping you develop lasting relationships. Socia...

Psychosis is a scary experience, and it is largely unknown why it occurs in some and not others. We do know early warning signs, how reduce chances of psychosis, and how to start the road to recovery.  Jennifer Gerlach with True Story Counseling  talks to us about psychosis and how to help recovery. She also talks to us about warning signs and some factors that influence if someone will...

Surviving The Holidays    The holidays can be a hard time for many people due to the high time demands, stressful family encounters, and tugging expectations. We unpack these difficulties and start to talk about how to address each issue to help you get through the holidays. This will help you enjoy the holidays instead of dreading them!

How Does Nicotine Affect Mental Health?   Nicotine is a drug that has been around for many years and the cravings and withdrawals from it are well known. How bad is nicotine for you, what does it do, is it that hard to stop and what are the different forms of nicotine use are all questions I will talk about in this episode.    I will also share some of my experience working with adolescent that us...

Understanding Opiates and Addiction Opiates are some of the most powerful and deadly drugs and there is good reason. They affect our brain and body in a powerful way by tapping into natural internal systems we have. Learn how opiates impact the body and brain and how to help with opiate addiction. I hope you enjoy this episode and find it helpful!

How Do Therapist Resolve Trauma? Join Craig Foust, Nicole Oliver, and Pete Sandoval as we talk about how therapist approach working with trauma and helping healing occur around traumatic experiences. Trauma therapists use several techniques such as EMDR, somatic experiencing, accelerated resolution therapy, and couples therapy to help with trauma. Each of these methods taps into natural ways the b...

Due to an error with the the original episode, a good portion was cut out. This episode is a solo episode to go over some of the key areas we covered to make sure the information is still available and to help with a smooth transition to the next trauma episode in the series! I hope you enjoy!

Sometimes moving from place to place is a part of life. Sometimes we move because we want to and other times not so much. Join me as I talk to Christina with Mindful Coping Solutions  and Lauren with Venture Wellness  about their recent move to St. Louis. As mental health professionals, these two have a different take on how to make moving a little easier! I hope you enjoy!

I go over how cocaine affects the body and brain and some of the ramifications of its use. I also talk about some signs to spot possible cocaine use, I hope this is helpful!

This episode is to help you understand depressants, stimulants, and hallucinogens/dissociatives. I also talk about how these drugs can impact mental health on a basic scale and will go more in depth when we start talking about specific drugs. I hope you enjoy!

A continuation of our addiction series where I talk about how alcohol use affects mental health. This episode also talks about benzodiazapines since they are similar in how they work. I hope you enjoy!

Today we talk to Sarah Wilson  about her work with dogs and how that informs her some of the family dynamics. While Sarah focuses on altering unwanted behavior of the dog, she talks to us about how dogs are reactive to the dynamics in the home. This is a fascinating episode that has me looking at my dogs and wondering how their behavior can inform me about how I am at home with my family. I a...

Join Craig Foust , Nicole Oliver , and Kristen Craren as we talk about how our past experiences impact us today. While the context is with trauma in mind, our own past experiences have deep impacts on our feelings and behaviors presently. We hope you enjoy our exploration of this topic!

Join Craig Foust , Nicole Oliver , Kristen Craren , and Pete Sandoval  as we talk about what trauma is, how it occurs, different types of trauma, and how trauma affects people. We hope you enjoy!

Join a few therapist as they talk about ways to manage your stress and anxiety. They share their own ways of managing stress and some ways their clients have found to be helpful. In this episode, Craig Foust with Life Care Counseling , Nicole Oliver with Integrative Neurocounseling , and Kristen Craren with Craren Family Services . I hope you enjoy it!

This talk from the addiction series, will focus on marijuana. In this episode I will talk about how marijuana works in the body and brain and what effects can occur due to ongoing marijuana use. I will also talk about the difference between THC and CBD. I hope you find this helpful!

Your stress response is a beautiful thing in the right circumstances. Just like many parts of ourselves, the stress response is something that can adapt to our experiences and our genetics.  In this episode, Nicole and I talk about the stress response, how it works, and signs of what it may look like if the stress response is over active. We hope you find this helpful!

Join me in this solo episode as I talk about addiction and habit loops. These pieces are a part of all of us and starting to understand the basics can help us alter our own behavior. I hope you enjoy!