Counseling News from the Week of April 10, 2026
Explanation: Although I scan the Internet primarily for counseling articles, in the process I run across quotes and interesting facts that I sometimes include in these first two sections. If you’re just interested in the counseling articles, you can skip these first two sections and go directly to the section called Counseling Articles. HV
Interesting Quotes
"Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud."
Maya Angelou
“Adventurer—he that goes out to meet whatever may come. Well, that is what we all do in the world one way or another.”
H. Rider Haggard, "Allan Quatermain"
“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, "The Little Prince"
"There are two ways of exerting one’s strength; one is pushing down, the other is pulling up."
Booker T. Washington
"In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate."
Isaac Asimov
"Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead."
Meyer Wolfsheim in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby"
“Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.”
G. K. Chesterton
A home without books is a body without soul.
Marcus Tullius Cicero
“I was taught that the way of progress was neither swift nor easy.”
Marie Curie
Fascinating Facts
Items from this section copied to next week to allow all counseling items to be posted.
Counseling Articles
The Neuroscientist Who Found the Complete ‘I’ in Her Brain After Suffering a Stroke
This article starts with the story of a neuroscientist who experienced a stroke in an unusual part of her brain that left her a totally changed person with no memory of her former self and her education. It took her eight years to totally recover. She writes about her experiences during those years, and she and other brain scientists have developed theories about how we can use insights about those different parts of our brains that give us the potential for greater control over ourselves. A long article, but one with fascinating insights that we may be able to use in therapy in the coming years.
Click here to read the full article
The Biblical Roots of Civil Disobedience
Fortunately here in the United States we may not be called on to exercise civil disobedience because we are being commanded to do something immoral, but that could be the case sometime in the future. This article discusses the ancient situation in Egypt where a wicked pharaoh demanded the midwives (we don’t know whether they were Israelites or Egyptian) to kill all male babies born to Israelite women. This article discusses how they responded, and what principles we can draw from this story about a biblical basis for civil disobedience.
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The Mystifying Syndrome That Makes People Spontaneously Drunk
This is from the New York Times, so I’ll summarize its major points. There is a rare syndrome, now called “Auto-brewery syndrome” which often causes people to appear intoxicated, receive DWIs and may cause them to blow elevated scores on breathalyzers even though they have had no alcohol.
When we eat food, the body converts that food to small amounts of ethanol, which is normally dissipated rapidly. But in people with auto-brewery syndrome those enzymes go into overdrive, and cause the production of large amounts of ethanol, enough to cause the symptoms of intoxication. Besides legal and driving problems, this syndrome can cause relationship problems.
Diagnosis is difficult because the syndrome is rare, sometimes people don’t have the syndrome but are secretly drinking, and also because people respond differently to intoxication.
Treatment is challenging because many people who are eating the same foods are not experiencing auto-brewery syndrome. Research has found that many with the syndrome had previously been treated with antibiotics.
One treatment that has helped some people with the syndrome is to cut out sugar and carbohydrates and to have treatment with antifungals.
Click here to read the full article
Gen Z women are embracing the 'tradwife' trend, study finds
A short interview with Lara Trump about something covered in last week’s newsletter by researchers, but this from a more personal perspective, about how many Gen Z women are rejecting the feminist encouragement to women to focus on themselves and their careers. Lara Trump says that more women are choosing to get married, have families, draw close to God, and then also have a career. If you haven’t tried her weekly program Saturday evening on Fox News, I encourage you to give it a try.
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The Science of Complaining: How It Harms Your Brain
If you have a client who habitually complains, the content in this article may be worthwhile to share with them. Chronic complaining can definitely harm relationships, but scientific research also supports the idea that chronic complaining can harm the person themselves and is a habit that is changeable.
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Teens Smoking Weed
This is an excellent article by Mark Gregston for parents and for any counselor who works with teens. It includes several topics: (1) Why marijuana use is so prevalent among teens today, (2) How to recognize the signs of drug use, and (3) How to connect with teens to help them move to solid ground.
The article also includes a section for parents on whether to share their own drug use and how to use that information to build a bridge with one’s teen
Click here to read the full article.
Why Caring for Grandchildren Could Be One of the Best Things for the Brain
For a variety of reasons, parents are increasingly asking grandparents if they would care for their children while they are at work. Research is showing that this activity may actually be helpful for the grandparents as well as giving grandchildren an opportunity to develop special memories of their grandparents.
Click here to read the full article
For People with Autism, Can Restaurant Kitchens Be a Haven?
This is from the New York Times, so you won’t be able to read it without a subscription. So I’ll summarize it’s major point. For people on the autism spectrum, it appears that restaurant kitchens can be an excellent environment for them to succeed. There is now a specific program “Chefs on the Spectrum” designed to train chefs to work in fine dining establishments. It has been discovered that these kitchens can often be excellent places for people with certain kinds of neurological and developmental disabilities to work. Sometimes their disabilities allow them to be especially good at certain tasks. If you work with these teens or young adults, this might be an excellent career for them to consider.
Click here to read the full article
Women Who Are Active in Midlife Have 50% Lower Risk of Early Death
In midlife women often face significant demands on their time, so taking the time for exercise may not be a priority. But this large study from Australia found that women who adhered to the 150 minutes of vigorous exercise per week had a 50% lower risk of early death than those who did not.
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Inflated Grades Deflate Future Earnings
Grade inflation has become endemic in our school system, but the author of this article explains why it is not good for students, for teachers, for college admissions officials, and for future employers. I encourage everyone to read this article.
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A generation of boys grew up on porn. Now, some young men want out
It is significant that USA Today devoted the front page of the newspaper to this article this week. Apparently the average age that young men get introduced to porn is 12 (the article doesn’t give information about girls and young women, but I know from other sources that women also struggle, but a smaller percentage do). The commercial value to the industry is estimated at 191 billion dollars!
The article discusses some of the problems young adults who have had extensive experience viewing porn have in real-life romantic relationships. Despite the fact that the DSM-5 has failed to label strong pornography consumption as an addiction, apparently many who find themselves attracted to it want to leave it. Reddit alone has more than one million men in sexual addiction groups, and there are many other groups for men and women seeking to leave this activity. So if you have a male or female client struggling with this problem, reassure them that the process of addiction is understandable, and that they are not alone in desiring to leave.
Click here to read the full article
As States Hint Resistance to SCOTUS Ruling on Gender Counseling, What’s Next for Free Speech?
As discussed in last week’s Friday News, last week the Supreme Court ruled 8 to 1 that Colorado’s law saying the counselors could not counsel clients asking about homosexual or lesbian issues or gender dysphoria in any way other than to encourage homosexuality, lesbianism or transgender ideology violated the Free Speech clause of the Constitution. This ruling has implications for 24 other states that have conversion therapy laws. Apparently several of those states are thinking of ways to get around the Supreme Court ruling. See article for details.
Click here to read the full article
Finland Study Exposes the Harms of ‘Gender-Affirming are’ and Hints at the Real Cause of Gender Dysphoria
In the past parents who were ambivalent about their teen receiving gender affirming care were often asked by gender therapists: “Would you rather have a dead son or a transgender daughter?” That usually persuaded a reluctant parent to allow their child to attend gender-affirming therapy.
But a recent 20-year study from Finland reveals just the opposite may be true. Teens and young adults who received gender-affirming psychotherapy were three times more likely to need psychiatric treatment in the following years than those who did not. And those who received transgender medical treatment in addition to gender-affirming counseling were even more likely to receive psychiatric treatment in the years following. So this adds to a growing amount of literature saying that gender-affirming care is not the best antidote for gender dysphoria.
This study also revealed another important finding, which has been found in other studies. Those who struggled with gender dysphoria issues had more psychological problems in general than those who did not have struggles with gender dysphoria.
Click here to read the full article
ADHD Diagnoses Rose in Young People After Two Major Events, Canadian Study Shows
Many people have commented on the rise in the number of people diagnosed with ADHD in the last decade. Two events appear to have been significant in the rise in ADHD diagnoses: (1) the change in the DSM-5 criteria that symptoms must appear before the age of 12 (rather than 7), and (2) COVID. Although this has increased the number of ADHD diagnoses, and so might have caused a slight increase in false diagnoses, specialists say that a greater problem are those who are not identified as having ADHD and thus are untreated.
Click here to read the full article
Will 'Jessica' Tame Toddlers' Tantrums?
There new approach for dealing with toddler’s tantrums that is taking the Internet by storm. When a toddler starts tantrumming, the parent is encouraged to call out the name “Jessica” while not looking at their tantrumming child. Often the behavior causes the tantrumming child to stop the tantrum and look for Jessica.
Specialists recommend that, while the method may work in some situations, parents should not overuse the method. They instead recommend that parents offer the child something new that will be attractive to them. They also talked about helping the child learn to express what they want, talking with them about why they can or cannot give that to them, and helping the child learn to manage their emotions are important steps in good parenting.
Click here to read the full article
The hypercurious mind
This article, by a NIMH neuroscientist with ADHD, is one I would recommend every counselor who works with ADHD clients and every educator, read. Since hypercuriosity probably exists on a spectrum and every human being, whether or not they have ADHD, has some level of hypercuriosity, it probably is worthwhile for every counselor to read.
Hypercuriosity explains why some people with ADHD can spend hours intensely focusing on a task that interests them, while being easily distracted when things don’t interest them.
Quoting from the article she says: “the day-to-day reality of people with ADHD is more complex than the [DSM-5-TR] clinical definition suggests. It’s a highly heterogeneous condition, expressed along multiple dimensions of severity and sensitivity. Most who meet the criteria aren’t impaired all the time, or in all settings, but tend to find certain environments particularly demanding, such as those that allow limited autonomy or require sustained attention to predetermined tasks while punishing nonlinear exploration. Place the same person in a context with novelty, urgency, real stakes or exciting uncertainty, and the very same tendencies – normally labelled as ‘inattention’ or ‘impulsivity’ – can support intense focus, fast pattern-recognition, high energy and creative problem-solving.”
Another excellent quote (although I strongly recommend you read the whole article): “This isn’t about rebranding ADHD as a gift or denying its real costs. Rather, the question is whether we’re ready to find out what hypercurious minds can achieve when they’re not spending all their energy trying to sit still and think straight. What would happen if we stopped trying to fix them and started building environments that actually supported them?”
So for counselors, educators and also employers, the challenge would be: “How do I find ways to attract the hypercurious mind to the tasks that need to be accomplished today?”
Click here to read the full article
How American Teenagers Are Targeted in ‘Sextortion’ Scams, Sometimes With Deadly Consequences
Although I’ve included articles on this topic before, I encourage you, if you counsel with teens or parents, to read this one that came out yesterday also. According to a 2023 survey, nearly ¼ of children and teens ages 9-17 have shared nude pictures of themselves with someone online, so this is not a rare problem.
This article describes how sexual predators develop “friendships” with children and teens and eventually seduce them into sharing intimate pictures with them, and then sextorting them, sometimes causing teens to commit suicide out of embarrassment.
If you teach children or teens as a Sunday School teacher or educator in public or private schools, or work as a counselor to this age group please warn them of sextortion scams and how to avoid getting seduced into them.
Click here to read the full article
Have a wonderful week!
Henry Virkler