The Work of Being Human

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thevanessabentley@gmail.com

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A Therapist's Take on TOXIC FEMININITY: Female Power Games

September 21, 2026

We’ve heard about toxic masculinity until we’re blue in the face. But what about TOXIC FEMININITY?In this episode, I’m turning the lens toward us women and asking what happens when the very qualities that make femininity powerful become tools for gaining power over other people.I explore the natural flexibility, responsiveness, creativity, and nurturing capacity of the feminine—and how those strengths can become distorted when we move from responding to reality to trying to control it.Using t...

ADHD: The Human Behind the Label - with Paul Drayton

September 14, 2026

ADHD isn't a good enough explanation... Paul Drayton was diagnosed with ADHD in 2021. Like many people, receiving the diagnosis brought relief. Experiences and behaviors that had confused him for years suddenly had a name.But does giving something a name explain it?In this conversation, I wanted to try something different. Instead of interpreting Paul through the diagnosis, I wanted to understand HIM.So we moved away from the label and into his life.We talked about the sensitive little bo...

STOP DEFINING YOURSELF WITH A DIAGNOSIS: Therapy Culture Isn't Therapy

August 31, 2026

I’m a therapist who 's had enough of therapy culture!One of my biggest pet peeves with it is the way we’ve turned mental health diagnoses into explanations for human beings. Depression. Anxiety. ADHD. Bipolar disorder. Narcissism. We throw these labels around as though they explain *why* someone thinks, feels, and behaves the way they do. They don’t. A diagnosis tells you the WHAT. It does not tell you the WHY.This week, I’m digging into what psychiatric diagnoses actually are, how they e...