Phone addiction: it is real and it is hurting our relationships

Odds you are reading this on your phone right now.

And as much as I am pleased that my writings find an audience, I am also scared by the pervasiveness of phones in our lives.

When exactly did we tip over the edge from talking to people on our phones to getting our entertainment from them?

When did phones stop being about connecting with others and more about disconnecting?

For most of us - and congratulations to those who are still resisting - our phone screen is the first thing we check in the morning and the last thing we look at in the evening.

I plead guilty too. My particular phone addiction is a game, that takes a few minutes to play and keeps my brain occupied enough not to think about whatever might give me anxiety. At least for those few minutes. Then I can either return to real life, or play another round. I may have wasted several hours in a row on more than one occasion...

It has all the hallmarks of addiction - it's used to avoid certain emotions, I do it more than I intend to, and it interferes with my relationships as my attention is not in the here and now.

The good news is that I am aware of it. The bad news that I still haven't quit cold turkey, by simply uninstalling that game.

In the grand scheme of things it could be much worse of course. But I'm not kidding myself - time spent on any app repeatedly and without any productive outcome is avoidant behaviour.

Who hasn't missed out on a story told by their kid because they were checking emails? Who hasn't had dinner and instead of conversing with the person at the same table has spent their time checking out Instagram or Facebook? Who hasn't watched porn instead of looking for intimacy with their partner?

The thing with the phone is that it is easier. You're less vulnerable than when engaging with real people, where there might be boredom, or worse, rejection when you interact with them.

The problem is that eventually we lose the capacity to hold long meandering conversations.
The ability to be there and listen without channel-flicking through the boring bits.
The bravery to truly engage with another person. 

And I'm only referring to adult use of phones, not children's - that is an even more frightening aspect, as children's brains are so much more malleable and hence prone to addiction, and need true social interactions in order to grow into healthy adults who can handle conversations but also rejection without falling apart.

So how can we kick the habit in order to put the phone back into its rightful place, as a tool of productivity rather than entertainment centre?

Cold turkey seems difficult in our world, we do need - or appreciate the convenience of - our phones. But quitting the apps that we idle on can be a start.

Actually looking at our consumption - how many hours a day - can be another step.

But probably the best way, is to start filling our life with real interactions again.

Meeting people for coffee. Talking on the phone rather than multi-tasking an online chat.

Spending time with our loved ones and giving them the gift of all our attention.

There will be less time left to spend on our phones.

And I'm guessing that we might feel better in our skin, in our family, in our community - and hence experiencing less anxiety of not being good enough, not beautiful enough or not popular enough.

I promise you this - if you call me, I will make time to meet with you face-to-face. In my office if you need my professional help, or for coffee if you want to catch up. And during that time, my phone will be switched off, and out of reach.

I look forward to my improved social (not social media!) life :)

Psychiatrist, psychotherapist, psychologist - who's what?

"So, what do you do?"

Most of the times when I answer "I'm a Psychotherapist" to that question, I get a puzzled look and the next question is "what is that?" or "what's the difference between what you do and a psychiatrist or a psychologist?".

So I thought I'd write a brief post to explain the differences.

Psychiatrists are medical doctors, who specialise in mental illnesses. Surprisingly, that covers a lot of conditions that the layman may not think of as mental illnesses, such as eating disorders, addictions, depression as well as the more classic ones such as schizophrenia, bipolar etc. Psychiatrists are the only mental health professionals who can prescribe drugs, and being doctors, this is often their first and sometimes their only port of call.

Psychology on the other hand is the study of the human mind in all of its applications, which is why you can find psychologists in professions as diverse as human Resources, marketing or advertising - they study how humans "tick". Clinical psychologists are not medical doctors, but have to do a specialisation which makes them part of the medical model, and hence some of their sessions can be covered by Medicare. Their main tool is cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT), which is about changing your thoughts and behaviours in order to change your feelings.

Psychotherapy by contrast is the study of the human mind in its therapeutic applications. It is a "helping profession" only. The tools at our disposal are very varied, you can find people working in psychodynamic, Gestalt or existential therapy, following Carl Rogers' Humanistic approach, Victor Frankl's idea of freedom to choose, Murray Bowen's Family systems theory, Sigmund Freud's Psychoanalysis or Carl Jung, and for some of us, the "eclectic" therapists, many of the above.

In my practice I rarely decide which modality I will use, it happens organically and I will often only realise later on that "oh, I've used CBT with this client today" or "I've worked existentially with that client". I like having a full tool-box, because the risk of only having a hammer is to be only able to see the whole world as a nail...

So while I can't prescribe you drugs, and won't give you advice or tell you how to think or what to do, what I can do is offer you is a safe space to confide yourself and help you work out your own personal way to heal yourself.

That is what I do.