We have inspiring and informative speakers and a beautiful and welcoming space for our upcoming conference. It will be one of the best you've ever attended.  Be sure to join us! 

Here are the links so that you can sign up for the conference:
1. Conference information
2. Conference registration
3. Make hotel reservations here.  The Embassy Suites is extending their special reduced room rates until March 30th for our event. Be sure you register as part of the Empathic Therapy Conference!
4. See below about bringing your musical instrument and any 'Fake Books' you want to share with other musicians. Richard Gottlieb is bringing his bass. We'll have this music informally on Friday evening and other impromptu times over the weekend. (What a lovely idea, Richard!)

Sleep Issues Resulting in Dangerous Psychiatric Drugs Being Prescribed as 'Sleep Aids'--
New Study Documents Up to 5 Times Greater Risk of Death on Sleeping Pills including Benzodiazepines 

Doctors are "calling for a rethink of sleeping pills after large study finds prescribed pills could be associated with up to 500,000 extra deaths a year in US," according to The Guardian.
 
The newspaper states, "Commonly used sleeping pills, or 'hypnotics', such as temazepam [Dalmane] and zolpidem [Ambien], which is prescribed for short-term insomnia, are associated with more than a fourfold risk of death, according to the study published in the BMJ Open journal."

The study was carried out in the US, where up to 10 per cent of the adult population took sleeping pills in 2010. The authors estimate that sleeping pills may have been associated with 320,000 to 507,000 extra deaths in the US that year.  See this link to access the full Guardian article and the full new study.

In a related story, even fairly traditional doctors are being shocked by the number of non-psychiatrically diagnosed patients who are being prescribed dangerous, powerful 'antipsychotic' drugs such as Seroquel, Risperdal and Abilify among others, as 'sleep aids.'  Many patients are completely unaware that they are being prescribed drugs intended and approved for use with patients who are diagnosed with psychosis or 'schizophrenia.'  These atypical antipsychotics can cause metabolic disorders, diabetes, a disfiguring and disabling condition called Tardive Dyskinesia and other life limiting or threatening disorders.  Read the Washington Post story here about off label prescription of atypical antipsychotics as sleep aids, here. 

For more information about antipsychotics and atypical antipsychotics, see our page here:  http://www.toxicpsychiatry.com/antipsychotics/

Trouble Sleeping? Here are Some Tips!
           
Here are some useful tips for for achieving a better night's sleep. Basics should include:

1. Eliminating caffeine after noon (or altogether if one is even more sensitive)
2. Arrange bedroom just for sleeping. Make it an oasis and do other activities outside bedroom (including studying, computer, watching TV, listening to music, etc.)
3. Establish a sleeping time and get to bed at the same time every evening and get up the same time in the morning.
4. Exercise at least 4 hours before going to bed. (Exercise is stimulating and that effect lasts for a few hours).  And doing moderate exercise several times a week is very helpful to establishing good sleep habits.
5. A warm bath an hour before bed may help produce relaxation as the body cools after the bath.
6. If you find you are thinking of work tomorrow make a list and then set it all aside until the morning.
7. Make it a rule to 'wind down' and not talk about stimulating issues a couple of hours before bed (In my house we have a 10 o'clock rule...nothing stimulating to discuss after 10 pm.)
8. A cup of warm milk or some caffeine-free tea can be a nice before-bed habit.
9. If you need an alarm clock to wake up, you may need to get to bed a bit earlier at night.
10. For you younger folks....it is recommended that bed time occur, and morning wake time occur at the same time every day including weekends. If you're struggling with sleep issues it could really help to cut back any late night partying--which is another really stimulating activity.

You get the idea! Baby yourself before bed. Relax. Make it a habit. Sweet dreams.

Bring Your Musical Instrument to the Empathic Therapy Conference!

Our good friend Richard Gottlieb wrote and proposed that he bring his bass to our conference and encouraged me to reach out to other conference participants to do the same with their instruments. 

What a great idea!  We have the Friday night social event with the chocolate fountain, which will now take place with accompanying music.  There will be other casual times when there can be some informal music provided after conference hours, on breaks or in the evenings. 

Richard says, "Bring your instruments and your fake books!" which are easy sheet music of well known tunes. We love music and it will be marvelous to have some great musical energy added to the event.
            
           

DSM V and Ethical Relativism            
by Joanne Cacciatore, PhD
Reprinted from her blog: becoming

For more than a year, I've been struggling, both professionally and personally, with the proposed changes for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual V (DSM V), even writing letters and expressing deep concern to colleagues in the 'mental health' field. Despite an urging from others to speak out, before today, I've remained silent in the hope that reason might find its way into the discussion about grief and the DSM.

The change that most concerns me has to do with the "bereavement exclusion"(BE). In the current manual, the DSM IV, this exclusion means that a person who has suffered the death of a loved one may be diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) no less than two months following the loss. Prior iterations, the DSM III, stated one year.

The new DSM V, with a planned release date in early 2013, however, has again reduced that prescribed time frame from two months to two weeks, further pathologizing the authentic human experience of sorrow. So, a person may, at the discretion of a psychiatrist, social worker, or psychologist, be categorized as "mentally ill" as soon as two weeks following the death of a loved one. While I don't like or agree with either 'time limit', the arbitrary absurdity of "14-days post-loss-then-becomes-depression-label" has ignited a fire in the pits of my being against the DSM machine.

And I'm not the sole adversary.

This change occurs against a historical DSM backdrop of salient criticism relative to the medicalization of normal human emotion, clinical hubris, cultural incompetence and insensitivity, and ethical misuse of such nosological systems.
Read the rest of the blog, here.
           
Dr. Joanne Cacciatore is one of our featured presenters at our upcoming Empathic Therapy Conference where she will be discussing the DSM V issues in general and bereavement issues relating to DSM V. Dr. Cacciatore specializes in counseling those affected by traumatic losses, most often the death of a child. She is Board Certified in Bereavement Trauma by the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress and the National Center for Crisis Management. She is also Board Certified through the American Psychotherapy Association.  Her therapeutic interventions include Mindfulness Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Narrative Therapy, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, Logotherapy, and various post traumatic stress therapies, such as Repeated Exposure Therapy. She is an Assistant Professor and researcher at Arizona State University. As the founder of the Center for Loss and Trauma/MISS Foundation, she is an advocate of “green” mental health care and holds memberships in: the American Psychotherapy Association, the Association for Contemplative Mind in Higher Education, the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, and the National Center for Crisis Management. She is regarded as an expert in traumatic loss and child death in families, and has been counseling and aiding  individuals and families since 1996.  She spearheaded and now directs the Certificate of Trauma and Bereavement graduate program and is a faculty affiliate in the Family Communication Consortium at ASU.  She received the prestigious Hon Kachina Award in 2007, and the Sr Teresa Compassionate Care Award in 2008. She is a mother to five children, now mostly grown, she notes, “four who walk and one who soars”.

  

***************