December 2024 Jenni’s Space Roundup

Starting with today’s post, every month, shortly after the end of the month, I will create a Jenni’s Space Roundup post that goes through and links and describes everything I’ve done on the website in the previous month. This provides a handy way for you to catch up on everything I’ve been doing over here.

Welcome to the December 2024 Jenni’s Space Roundup:

A Tour of the Place in Jenni’s Space at RMHS LLC.

First, let’s take a tour of the place with my very first post on the newly redesigned and rebuilt website. While we’re doing it, I’m listening to the Stardew Valley Lofi & Chill playlist on Spotify. My first article on the site gives you a tour and tells you my plans for the site. I use this site to consolidate my professional information for people looking for therapy services and to collect the various writings on mental health and human rights. In addition, I’m creating mutual aid and solidarity shopping articles every month, several times a month. These help you take direct action, highlight mutual aid efforts, or encourage you to shop in solidarity with people whose rights are under fire.

Do You Mind? Tackling the Thing:

Let’s start out strong with an article that defines executive function and gives you an idea of how to start dealing with it. Tackling the Thing helps you get started with some basic “how to use your brain” tips. It teaches you how to cope with problems getting your brain to cooperate. Also, it starts the process of helping you get all your ducks in a row.

Why Human Rights on a Mental Health Website?

Moving along, our Jenni’s Space Roundup tackles the “why” of what I’m doing. Why Human Rights on a Mental Health Website? teaches why mental health is enhanced when we look at human rights. These two go together like peanut butter and chocolate, y’all. It discusses how the things outside of you can affect your mental health.

Four Ways to Handle Any Problem:

A lot of my early posts, re-edited here, borrow from DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy). Here, Four Ways to Handle Any Problem provides a way to look at the issues in your life. Each of the four ways has a different use in your life and creates different results.

Four Currencies To Handle Any Problem, Part 2: Community And Society:

Here, I stepped away from the individual again to discuss how people can influence their environments. I laid out the four “currencies” that every person uses to negotiate their way in the world. With this article, you learn how to apply those different currencies to your own situation.

Microfiction: Diana And The Donald:

With this, I introduce microfiction. At three hundred words or less, microfiction attempts to fit an entire narrative into a very compact space. I wrote Diana and the Donald originally at the beginning of Trump’s first term in office. With what I know now, I realize I was over-optimistic. As a bit of DC fanfic, it holds a special place in my heart.

Executive Function Part 1: What Is It:

This article, Executive Function Part 1: What Is It comprises the second executive function article in this month’s Jenni’s Space Roundup. It expands on the definition of executive function for people new to the idea. In addition, it starts explaining what the different pieces of executive function is and what part of your brain controls it. It uses simple metaphors to be easy to read and understand.

Microfiction: Our Trans Cyborg Overlords:

This little story was inspired by a bit of insanity early in the trans panic. A legislator literally said, out loud, that transgender people were building cyborgs to take over the world. I took the idea and ran with it. A wholesome little story for the whole family.

Executive Function Hacks and Workarounds:

Another entry in my series on executive function, Hacks and Workarounds starts getting into the nitty gritty of how to manage executive function issues. First, it reviews what executive function is. Secondly, it walks you through techniques you can try to make your brain work for you. Finally, it reassures you that you will get better at hacking your brain as you practice.

Everything is Political:

I wrote this article in response to a challenge by some friends. Since then, my thinking has evolved, and I consider most human rights issues to be more fundamental than “politics” usually describes. However, this piece of December’s Jenni’s Space Roundup still does an excellent job of demonstrating how common things in our lives relate to politics.

Executive Function: Forming Habits:

Continuing the executive function series, this post expands on just momentary “hacks” into building habits. Due to the way we develop habits, the things that might work once or twice don’t become reliable until we consciously turn them into habits. Because of this, I broke out “habit-forming” as its own article.

Microfiction: Bluetooth’d:

Yet another microfiction. In under 300 words, this is almost a poem rather than prose. Without a doubt, this is my most abstract piece in this month’s Jenni’s Space Roundup. A quick little tale of consent, the narrator is a person who has SA’d numerous people through a fictional technology based on bluetooth tech. In his attempt to find a new victim, he instead comes across someone who has invented a way to reverse the consent violation. In addition to taking away the assaulter’s control, the tech also downloads a record of their memory of committing other offenses for law enforcement. When I write a piece like this, I always wonder if someone will get it.

Marry, Shag, Kill: A Relationship Metaphor:

Following fiction on consent, I move with this article to the idea of choosing the level of relationship you want with someone. Using the party game “marry, shag, kill”, I created a metaphor for how deeply you want to get to know people based on specific red and green lights that you observe as you get to know them. The first thing to remember is that you get to choose.

A Ridiculously Basic Primer on Consent Culture:

Even more consent for your reading pleasure! This article explores what consent means and how to have more of it in your life. Further, it discusses consent in non-sexual situations including in raising children. Ultimately, this is an important read for anyone wanting to support a more consensual world.

Parenting: The Case of the Dirty Rotten Little Milkspiller:

Because good parenting forms such an important piece of mental health, I occasionally dip into “how to parent”. This entry in my December Jenni’s Space Roundup compares and contrasts three styles of parenting. Specifically, the article compares and contrasts authoritarian parenting, passive parenting, and gentle parenting. At the time I wrote the article, I wasn’t particularly aware of any of these labels, but as most people don’t know the lingo, I think this works well.

How to Apologize When it Matters: Own, Apologize, Repair:

Originally, I believed that I had learned this concept of how to apologize from DBT. However, it turns out that the concept appears to come from an essay by Nora Samaran (Naava Smolash) in her work Turn This World Inside Out. Since I have never read the essay, I assume I got it second hand during a DBT training. Funny how we learn things, isn’t it?

The Four Fs of Fear: Fight, Flight, Freeze, and Fawn:

Undeniably, anxiety causes issues for millions or billions of people every day. Breaking down the way people deal with anxiety into four broad categories helps us to identify and deal with anxiety. Fight, flight, freeze, and fear describe four ways that people process and respond to fear. Because these often become deeply embedded in personalities, looking at these can be valuable for anyone.

The Shark Cage Metaphor: How to Spot Potential Abusers:

One thing that is not discussed enough in domestic violence is that abusers are predictable. They try the same techniques over and over again. Because of this, learning how they use boundary crossings and “tests” to find their prey can help you avoid these situations.

On Boundaries: No is a Complete Sentence:

Over and over again, I find that people in therapy struggle with simply saying “no” without explanation or excuse. This is because so many of us have been socialized that we are not allowed to put our own needs first. Therefore, this article gives a primer on how to say no without apology.

December 2024 Mutual Aid Links:

Next we come to the last of the December 2024 Jenni’s Space Articles. This is a pinned article (it will be replaced every month) that lists all of the mutual aid and direct action resources I have tracked down over the course of the month. This month I found several Google documents full of useful information, links to people doing incredible work, and ideas for getting you involved. I will be signing up this week for Surj’s Gear Up anti-racism training myself. Maybe I’ll see you there. Every month you will find hotlines and contact information for Federal officials included in the links.

Chain of Events: How DBT’s Behavioral Chain Analysis Can Help You!

Once again, I dip into the techniques of DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy) for a useful nugget you can you to improve your life. The behavioral chain analysis, while fairly grueling and requiring some times and some ability to tolerate looking closely at your own actions, thoughts, and feelings, is extremely valuable in helping you change behavior. I’m not gonna lie. The behavioral chain analysis is hard to do. It costs a lot to look deeply inside and face things that are holding you back. And it’s absolutely worth it.

How to Get Your Health Care Denial Overturned, Step-by-Step:

Finally, we come to the first new article of the website. I consolidated information from several sources to help you navigate fighting the all too frequent health care denials that plague people in the United States. Full of step by step advice and linking to tools that can make the appeal easier, this tool will be useful to many people.

That’s it for the December Jenni’s Space Roundup:

I spent a lot of energy in December designing and organizing the site. In addition, I wrote and/or edited all of the articles linked above. No AI was used in the writing or in the art for any of the articles. My goal for January is to include at least three “solidarity shop” articles featuring businesses owned by people whose rights are under fire. In addition, I am always looking for current direct actions, mutual aid organizations, and other important information for people who value human rights and mental health. I also plan to add another dozen or so of my articles from sites I’ve taken down elsewhere. Looking forward to seeing where this goes.

One final note: If you click on a category link and find an empty page, it is because I don’t yet have articles under that category. It’s a limitation of the theme I’m using for the website. Just click back home and try again.

Thank you.

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