Virtual Wellness Event For Adult Performers In The UK

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Pineapple Support, the adult industry’s leading mental health non-profit, together with sponsors AdultWork and AWSummit, will be holding an online wellness event specifically aimed at the adult industry in the UK. The three-day event, which will be held from September 23-25, will include live workshops and interactive webinars from Pineapple Support therapists, as well activities such as breathwork, meditation and workouts.  

“We’re really excited to bring this event to the UK,” says Pineapple Support founder Leya Tanit. “We’ll be focusing on self-care, mental and physical well-being and education. There will be presentations from UK-based organizations NUM and Dean Street, as well as legal information from sex worker-postive law firm Gillen De Alwis Solicitors. To top it all off, the event will end with five hours of comedy and music to get  feet moving and faces smiling.” 

Tanit founded Pineapple Support in 2018 after a string of losses in the adult industry from depression and other mental illnesses. The organisation, which is a registered 501(c)3 tax-deductible qualifying charity in the US and a registered charity in the UK, has so far connected nearly nine hundred adult performers with mental health services, including free and low-cost, therapy, counseling and emotional support. 

The three-day Virtual Wellness Event will go live online at 10am BST on September 23rd. Those that wish to register for the event should visit https://pineapplesupport.org/wellness/ for more information. 

 

The following workshops and webinars will be hosted during the event (all times BST): 

September 23 

10am – 10:45am: The Power of Self Hypnosis (with Sinead Rochford) 

11.30pm -12.30pm: National Ugly Mugs (with Dr Raven Bowen, Hannah Wilcox and Rosie Hodsdon) 

12.45am – 1:45pm: Dean Street Sexual Health Clinic (with Rachel Ali) 

2pm – 2:45pm: Pilates Full Body Conditioning (with Ami Collins) 

3pm- 3:45pm: Mental Health in the Adult Industry (with Leya Tanit) 

4pm – 4:45pm: Breathwork and Yoga Nidra for Inner-Healing (with Jess Birks) 

 

September 24 

10am – 10:45 am: Managing Adversities Through Self-Compassion (with Silva Neves) 

11am – 11:45 am: Introduction to Yin Yoga (with Michele Karban) 

12pm- 12:45pm: The Use of Hypnotherapy in Overcoming, Stress, Depression and Anxiety (with George Lewis) 

2pm- 2:45pm: Mindful Eating (with Sofie Every) 

3pm – 3:45pm: EMDR – Treatment for PTSD (with Fulvio Maciaccia) 

4pm-4:45pm: What it Means to be a Pineapple Listener (with Areneae Mactans) 

 

September 25 

10 -10:45am: Navigating Relationship Conflicts — the Top Tips (with Silva Neves) 

11am- 11:45am: Vinyasa Flow Yoga Class to Awaken Your Inner Goddess (with Jess Birks) 

12pm- 12:45pm: Legal Review (with Gillen De Alwis Solicitors) 

2pm-2:45pm: How to Look After Yourself Emotionally in an Uncertain World (with Silva Neves) 

3pm- 3:45pm: Thank You from Pineapple Support 

4pm- 5pm: Live Acoustic Set (with Elijah Miller) 

5 pm – 5:15 pm: Comedy Set (with Dan Nightingale) 

5:15 pm – 5:45pm: Acoustic Set (with Ishod Black) 

5:45pm – 6pm: Comedy Set (with Dan Nightingale) 

6pm-7pm: DJ set (compiled by Sonic Emporium) 

7pm – 9pm: DJ set (compiled by Man Power) 

9pm-10pm: Journey Men DJ Mix 

Pineapple Support To Provide Suicide Prevention Training Presentation

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Pineapple Support, the adult industry’s leading mental health resource, will host a free Suicide Prevention training presentation to help those in the adult industry to better understand the mental health issues that lead to suicide, including how to identify potential signs and the steps that can be taken to prevent suicide.

The sex-positive training presentation, hosted by ​certified crisis counselor ​Amanda TR-Clemens, is designed to help those in the adult industry provide direct support to those struggling. In addition to resources and tools for suicide prevention, the presentation will also provide tools and strategies for mental health challenges individuals might be facing personally.

“This webinar will be a ‘user-friendly’, sex-informed approach to suicide prevention and crisis support that’s meant to be specifically ‘performed’ by adult film industry people for adult film industry people who may be struggling with suicide or other mental health-related issues,” says Clemens. “The more honest discussions we can have about mental health in adult, the less stigma those who want to come forward face, and the more who can be saved.”

Pineapple Support was founded in 2018, by British performer Leya Tanit, in response to a string of losses in the adult industry from depression and other mental illnesses. The organisation, which is a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the UK, has so far connected over a thousand adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost, therapy, counseling and emotional support.

“This training presentation will be held on World Suicide Prevention Day,” says Tanit. “We’re hosting this in memory of those in our industry we’ve lost, and to honor their memory by building a more informed and supportive community. Amanda’s experience working for the National Suicide Prevention Hotline, as well as her work coordinating emergency and volunteer rescues and speaking at schools and events on the topic of suicide prevention makes her the perfect host for this training presentation.”

The Suicide Prevention Training presentation will go live on September 10th at 1 pm ES and is scheduled to last one hour but may extend. Please visit https://pineapplesupport.org/webinars/ for more information and to access the webinar link.

Psychotherapy vs Coaching

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There are so many types of mental health professionals that it is hard to keep them all straight: counselors, psychotherapists, clinical social workers, clinical psychologists, and counseling psychologists. For simplicity we will refer to the above as therapists.

Therapists’ treatments are greatly varied too: cognitive behavioral, psychoanalytic, interpersonal, EMDR, to name a few. What they all have in common is they provide therapy to address psychological issues. Here we will refer to it as psychotherapy.

Psychotherapy facilitates insight into your past, giving attention to old psychological wounds to solve current mental health issues. Psychotherapy mainly focuses on mental health issues, abuse, and addiction.

Coaching is focused on your current situation and your goals for the future: where are you now and where do you want to be? Coaching can focus on the past to make sense of what’s happening now. How you can use your present strengths and resources to move you towards the life that you want.

These statements are generalizations. Psychotherapy can include all aspects of coaching. Coaching can and does use therapeutic or psychological tools to help clients change their beliefs, feel better, and make life changes. What coaching does not provide is diagnosis or specific treatment for mental illnesses as defined by the American Psychological Association.

If this description sounds fuzzy, that’s because it is. Most descriptions about therapy and coaching are purposefully vague because what happens in therapy and coaching sessions depends on the type of therapy or coaching, the style of the therapist or coach, and most importantly, the needs of each individual client.

Furthermore, some therapists also provide coaching, which may combine the best of both worlds. As psychologist and coach Dr. Jeffrey E. Auerbach points out,

“Psychologists have the most training of any profession in understanding human motivation, behavior, learning and change,” he says. “And if they’ve done clinical work, they have a depth of one-on-one experience far greater than that of people who aren’t mental health professionals”.

Pineapple Support only works with licensed therapists, some of whom also provide coaching to reach a greater number of clients. Pineapple Support therapists bring to coaching sessions their knowledge and understanding of the human psyche as well as the psychological skills to enable clients to make meaningful life changes.

Privacy At Pineapple

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I’ve heard from a number of people recently asking about patient privacy at Pineapple Support. As a performer myself, as well as someone who has struggled with anxiety and depression, I understand the stigma associated with treatment and take privacy incredibly personally. 

At Pineapple Support, all patient information is kept entirely confidential. Any information provided to us, either in the application process or in conversations after, is governed by patient privacy protections like HIPAA. 

Because social media has been one of the easiest ways for people to reach us, this has sometimes presented a unique challenge. How do we adequately communicate with those in reaching out to us on social, while still maintaining the strict privacy guidelines? Whether we are DM’d personal information, or asked a question about therapy in a thread, the possibility of an inadvertent violation is too risky.

As a result, we will immediately be moving any conversations about their care off of Twitter and other social media, and immediately move them to our official email.

Our social media presence is vital, and from our earliest days, I wanted us to be accessible. To be a friend, not an anonymous bot. Much of that came naturally. For most of the two years since we founded, we’ve had no staff and no salaries. I’ve occupied nearly every role myself — founder and fundraiser, therapy connector to social media voice.  

But even if that helped make us accessible, I don’t want anyone to ever feel that a conversation they’re having with us, whether by DM or tweet, has left them exposed. A patient is free to discuss their condition as openly as they wish. We can not — even in response to a question. 

I will be doing a full review of the conversations that I and anyone else on the team have had on Twitter and social media. To anyone who has felt a discussion inappropriate, you have my deepest apologies, and my commitment that we will work to make this better. 

 

  • Leya

Pineapple Support Adds Dedicated Therapist for Latin American Performers

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Pineapple Support has added independent therapist Yiset Mosquera Moreno to its roster of professionals available to provide support to Spanish-speaking performers in Latin America.

“I’m looking forward to using the experience I’ve gained from working with people from all genders and sexual orientations, treating situations like depression, stress, grieving process, self-esteem issues and relationship issues,” said Mosquera. “As a former cam model, I fully understand the difficulties of sex work that can affect mental health and I believe that everyone has the right to ask for mental help when in need, without being judged for their skin color, their gender, their nationality or what they do for a living.”

Leya Tanit, the founder of Pineapple Support, welcomed the opportunity to expand their reach.

“Since we began offering therapy, we’ve realised the incredible demand of adult performers seeking mental health services in Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America,” Tanit said. “We’re excited to welcome Yiset to the team, where her knowledge and experience is going to help many more performers receive the support they need.”

Pineapple Support was founded in 2018. The organization, a registered nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the United Kingdom, has connected over 1,000 adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost therapy, counseling and emotional support.

Click here for additional details and follow the org Twitter for the latest updates.

July is Parent Performer Month

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Pineapple Support will host a free support group and webinar to help adult performers build and nurture strong, supportive relationships with their parents and other family members.

The free Parent and Performer Support Group will run Sundays for six weeks, July 12 to August 16, from 3 to 4 p.m. (PDT). For more information, click here.

A Pineapple rep described the group as “an educational and mild process group that focuses on relational ties in the family. This group will cover the various emotions around the performer discussing or revealing their career choice to their parents and the parents’ reaction to the information and how to communicate and listen in a healthy way as a family and how to accept and support each other.”

The free webinar is titled “Challenges of Family Members of Adult Entertainers” and is scheduled for July 21 at 12 noon (PDT).

The session is designed for “adult entertainers and their family members to discuss the unique challenges to their relationships, which sometimes lead to conflict, estrangement and harmful interconnection,” said the rep. “This webinar addresses many of these challenges with the goal of providing greater understanding and tools to develop healthy methods of interaction.”

Click here to register and for additional details.

Leya Tanit, founder of Pineapple Support, chose the month of July to focus on “providing support to performers to help improve their relationships with their parents or other family members.”

“We are encouraging performers to contribute by sending us videos or writing about their experience with parents and family members discovering they are in the industry, which we will share on our social media platforms,” Tanit continued.

Those who wish to participate should email contact@pineapplesupport.org for details.

Pineapple Support was founded in 2018. The organization, a registered nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the United Kingdom, has connected over 1,000 adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost therapy, counseling and emotional support.

Find the organization online and on Twitter for the latest updates.

Adultwork Joins Pineapple Support As Bronze-Level Sponsor

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Pineapple Support, the adult industry’s leading mental health nonprofit, is pleased to welcome Adultwork as a bronze-level sponsor. The leading adult directory joins over fifty adult businesses and organizations in committing funds and resources to the organization.

 

“We are delighted to become a Pineapple Support Partner,” said Vince Charlton, AdultWork.com’s Business Development Director. “Mental health and wellness services dedicated to adult industry performers are vital and we wholly support Pineapple for providing these.”

 

Pineapple Support was founded by British performer Leya Tanit in 2018, after a string of losses in the adult industry from depression and other mental illnesses. The organisation, which is a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the UK, has so far connected over a thousand adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost, therapy, counseling and emotional support.

 

“Adultwork’s support and contribution to Pineapple helps us reach even more adult performers around the world. Especially during trying times like those we are currently facing, mental health and wellness is especially important,” says Tanit. “Thanks to the support from all of our generous sponsors, we’re on track to connect more adult performers than ever this year.”

What It Means To Be An Ally

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The world feels like it is crumbling apart. Each day we are faced with unprecedented news and new fears. It’s scary and it’s horrifying, and I am filled with so much hope and joy because of it.

It takes complete destruction for rebuilding, to create a new way of living and perception. This revolution and joining together of communities has been sparked by incidents that should never have occurred, but they have forced people to address problems within our systems and within our own minds.

So, what does it mean to be an ally? To me, being an ally is standing up for the rights of a group of people as if they were your own. To use your privilege and transfer the benefits to those who lack it. To put others before you and acknowledge that while you may feel pain, that this conversation is not about you.

An important part of being an active ally is learning the history and struggles of the group of people you are supporting. This doesn’t mean that you should expect them to educate you. This is something you must research on your own.

Make sure to listen to those around you, to their opinions, concerns and experiences. Take the time to question your biases and challenge your assumptions. Working on ourselves and understanding our language is an important part of becoming an effective ally.

With this, we must remember that we are all human, chances are, you will make mistakes. Accept criticism gracefully, learn and grow from it.

Being an ally is more than being sympathetic toward those who are being discriminated against. It’s more than believing in the cause and for equality. Being and ally means you must be willing to act and to take action together with others in the pursuit of ending oppression.

Keep your mind and heart open. Together we are stronger and we can and will make the world a better place.

Pineapple Support, Pornhub To Hold Breathwork Event for International Whores’ Day

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Pineapple Support, the adult industry’s leading mental health nonprofit, will host a special event focused on breathwork, sponsored by Pornhub. The event will take place on June 2nd at 1pm EST, coinciding with International Whore’s Day celebrations.

“Sex-workers can often play the role of therapists, taking on the emotions of clients as well as their emotional struggles,” says breathwork specialist and coach Sapphire. “Breathwork is a magical powerful tool for transformation and healing, which allows us access to inner blockages, negative thoughts, emotions and patterns not easily accessed through traditional therapy. This can lead us to releasing emotional baggage and a release of a shift in old patterns resulting in much needed transformation.”

One person attending the event will be randomly selected to receive $100 of Pornhub merchandise, as well as a course of one-on-one breathwork sessions with Sapphire.

“Each breathwork journey is unique and teaches us how we benefit from breathing fully and consciously, at the same time bringing changes into our lives for the better,” says Tanit. “Breathwork can help reduce the symptoms associated with anxiety, depression, PTSD, ADD and insomnia. Join us on June 2nd when together we can release this energy and unite as a community.”

Pineapple Support was founded in early 2018 by British performer Leya Tanit in response to losses in the adult industry from depression, addiction and other mental illnesses. The organisation, which is a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit in the United States and a registered charity in the UK, has so far connected over one thousand adult performers to mental health services, including free and low-cost, therapy, counseling and emotional support.

For more information and to sign-up for the Breathwork Event, please visit https://pineapplesupport.org/breathworks/.

Addiction & Recovery – Family

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Tips and coping strategies from week 5 of the Addiction Recovery workshop with therapist Nicki Line.

Family

Here are a few concepts that may be relevant to some of your experiences.

 

Differentiation of Self v Fusion

Differentiation of self– The ability to be in emotional contact with others yet still remain independent in your thoughts, feelings, and emotional functioning. People who are well differentiated from others are able to face difficult, emotionally charged problems, and not feel compelled to preach about what others should think, feel, not rush in to smooth the problem over immediately, and not pretend to be attached emotionally.

Fusion– This is essentially the opposite of a well differentiated self.  People who lack differentiation typically set aside individual choices, thoughts and feelings in order to achieve or maintain harmony in the relationship system (this can be a family system, friend system, etc). Fusion occurs when people form intense relationships with others, and their actions depend largely on the condition of this relationship at any given time. When experiencing fusion, an individual’s decisions largely depend on what others will think and how others will react, and if the decision will upset the intense bond of the relationship. People who are not well differentiated may feel that everyone in a relationship system needs to think and feel the same way or else the bonds will be broken. So either they must mold themselves to fit others, or pressure others to think feel and act the same way they do.

 

Transgenerational Trauma

We briefly discussed how trauma can be passed down through our families. Here is a brief overview of transgenerational trauma in families if this feels relevant to you, or you’d like to look more into it.

Transgenerational trauma refers to trauma that passes through generations. The idea is that not only can someone experience trauma, they can then pass the symptoms and behaviors of trauma survival to the next generation, who then might further pass these along the family line.

Transgenerational trauma can negatively impact families as a result of:

  1. Unresolved emotions and thoughts about a traumatic event
  2. Negative repeated patterns of behavior including beliefs about parenting
  3. Untreated or poorly treated substance abuse or severe mental illness
  4. Poor parent-child relationships and emotional attachment
  5. Complicated personality traits or personality disorders
  6. Content attitude with the ways things are within the family

 

Family Genograms

We discussed that not only trauma, but certain patterns of behavior and interaction can pass through families and influence families. One way to take a closer look at patterns in your own family is to construct a family genogram.  A family genogram is structurally similar to a family tree, but it includes information about relationships, interactions between family members, mental illness, substance usage, and more information.  We typically take a look at three generations using a genogram.

 

Here is a guide on family genograms:

https://www.therapistaid.com/therapy-guide/genograms