Love Is...

We are just a few days away from Valentine's Day. Valentine's Day is the day that has been set aside to celebrate love and relationships, usually romantic relationships. In full disclosure, I am a person that believes that we should not need a day on the calendar to tell us to celebrate love or show love to those in our lives. I also believe that if you are in a relationship with someone you care about, you should be spending time with them on a regular basis and consistently showing them that you love them and care about them. Again, this is just my opinion so, please do not be offended... The point I am making is that LOVE is at the forefront of everyone's mind as we gear up for Valentine's Day.

I want us all to take some time to think about what love means and looks like to us. We spend so much time trying to create or recreate these hollywood images of love that we don't often take the time to determine what love means for each of us individually. As someone who provides therapy to couples wanting to heal their relationships, I am speaking with firsthand knowledge about the fact that many people don't often know how to love themselves or what love looks life for them, which makes it difficult for them to know how to love another person. Starting today, I am asking each of you reading this blog, to take a bit of time to define love for yourselves and what it looks like for you when someone loves you. What I can tell you is that LOVE should not hurt, it should not cause you physical, emotional, or any other kind of violence or abuse. LOVE should be reciprocal and filled with respect and kindness. LOVE should be filled with feelings of goodness and warmth and care. Now, it is your turn to identify what love is for you and what is looks like.

As we are celebrating Valentine's Day this week, this month we also observe Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month. Educating about the warning signs of teen dating violence is very important to me because I have worked with so many teens who have been harmed by violence in their dating relationships and I believe that adults should support teens in growing into healthy adults who are capable of having healthy relationships. This means adults, we need to educate the teens in our lives about what healthy relationships look like, model for them healthy interactions in our relationships, and talk to our teens about loving themselves and what real love looks like. Check out the mental health tip on my website www.drdaphneking.com for more information on preventing and addressing teen dating violence.

Make LOVE a priority in your life every day of the week, every week of the month, and every month of the year, and every year of your life; and not just on Valentine's Day. Make loving yourself a priority, so that you can display LOVE in a healthy way to the people you are blessed to have in your life.

Sending Love Your Way,

Dr. Daphne