Kate Motaung

The holidays, like grief, are a mixed bag of unpredictable events and the emotions that grow from them. Put dealing with grief and important holidays like Christmas together and you have the recipe for a tumultuous and volatile storm of emotions. Throw in the pressure of expectations, family dynamics, financial obligations, dreary weather, and even more and you have a season that can be anything but merry and bright. McKinney Christian Counseling offers compassionate support to help you navigate [...]

As a parent, you likely have spent many hours and nights worrying and planning your kid’s sleep. In the newborn days, those hours are often spent praying for more than two consecutive hours of sleep. In the toddler years, those hours may be spent juggling the mental gymnastics of scheduling naps around various other tasks and activities. While both of those seasons are incredibly difficult and exhausting, navigating scary sleep disturbances with your child can be immensely stressful and [...]

Some people are comfortable with who they are, especially when it comes to their bodies. When you gaze at yourself in the mirror, do you like what you see? As winter draws to a close and the summer months set in, do you feel comfortable as you shed those heavy coats and snow boots for t-shirts, shorts, and pool/beach wear? If there’s a camera around, do you feel comfortable and confident to have your picture taken? Our bodies are [...]

There are some hilarious content creators out there on social media. Humor is deeply subjective, but it can be endlessly fascinating to see TikToks or YouTube clips about babies tasting something like a lemon for the first time. Many find themselves puckering their lips as the first sensations of sourness tantalize their tastebuds, faces screwed up into all manner of expressions. Less hilarious, but no less powerful, is how a person reacts when certain people in their lives are [...]

EMDR therapy (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a structured therapeutic technique developed in the late 1980s by American psychologist and educator, Francine Shapiro, Ph.D. It has since become a gold standard, evidence-based modality for treating the symptoms and emotional distress caused by post-traumatic stress disorder or other disturbing life events. EMDR therapy focuses directly on your traumatic memory and on changing the way it is stored in your brain. It does not require that you talk about it [...]

It is human nature to be easily enticed or confused by the materialistic and fake society we live in. Unless you remember who you are in the sight of the Lord, you may live your life as a mere shadow of your true self. As the world gets increasingly fast-paced, the lines between what is real and what is false, or who is genuine and who is a pretender, have become blurred. It is easy to lose your identity [...]

Love it or hate it, work is one of those things that needs doing. Most of us spend a significant portion of our lives working and we do so to earn a living, which allows us to take care of our responsibilities and gives us room to enjoy things like vacations. Work can be enjoyable, but it is also often quite stressful. One of the major sources of stress in people’s lives is their work, and that stress can [...]

We all experience feelings of anxiety occasionally; from low levels of stress to sometimes even crushing anxiety. These feelings can vary in intensity and duration and what triggers them will also differ from person to person. For some people, being called upon in class or during a work meeting is terrifying, while for others meeting new people or being in crowds can make them anxious. Therefore, anxiety can ebb and flow depending on circumstances. However, for some individuals, anxiety [...]

An eating disorder is a mental health condition that involves abnormal eating habits such as overeating, undereating, or eating nonfood items. Symptoms may vary, but the common thread underlying them all is an unhealthy preoccupation with food, body image, and/or weight that negatively impacts your physical and emotional health, makes it hard to focus on other aspects of life, and robs you of your joy. The 2022 text revision edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, [...]

When two people are in a relationship with each other, they have the opportunity to open themselves up to each other and build up a history of fruitful and positive interactions. If you accumulate enough of these positive and fruitful interactions with a person, that usually allows you to continue being open to them, and avoid trust issues. Trusting other people with pieces of ourselves isn’t an easy thing. For one thing, not everyone is trustworthy, and it isn’t [...]

When we’re feeling nostalgic, it’s tempting to say that things were simpler, better, or easier in the past. Often, parents of adolescents find themselves saying this as they consider the brave new world their children are navigating and trying to make sense of. It can be scary, and nostalgia can be a form of retreat. There’s nothing wrong with nostalgia; however, it can paralyze you in the present or blind you from seeing the beauty and opportunities that exist [...]

If you had the option to never feel or express anger again, would you take it? Depending on your experiences with anger, you might hesitate with your response, or you might respond quickly in the affirmative. Even people who have had mostly positive and healthy experiences with anger won’t necessarily feel warm feelings at the thought of anger. Anger is just that sort of emotion that’s an unwelcome visitor when it shows up. For a Christian who wants to [...]