• Gaming can play a significant role in supporting overall wellbeing and can be a valuable complementary tool alongside professional therapy for those who have experienced trauma. It’s about finding agency and comfort in play:

  • Distraction and Healthy Escape: Games can offer a temporary, healthy escape from overwhelming memories or feelings, providing a much-needed mental break and helping to lower stress levels.
  • Sense of Control and Agency: Trauma often involves a loss of control. Games can provide a safe environment where you can make choices, overcome challenges, and experience a sense of mastery, which can be incredibly empowering.
  • Emotional Processing (Symbolic Play): Some games allow for symbolic processing of difficult experiences through narrative, problem-solving, or character development, helping you to indirectly work through emotions in a safe space.
  • Building Resilience: Overcoming in-game challenges and setbacks can help build resilience and self-efficacy, showing you that you are capable of navigating difficulties.
  • Social Connection and Support: Multiplayer games can foster a sense of community and reduce feelings of isolation, providing a safe space to connect with others who share your interests.
  • Regulating the Nervous System: Engaging in focused, enjoyable play can help to regulate an overactive nervous system, moving out of “fight or flight” mode into a more calm and regulated state.

While gaming is wonderful, balance is key for overall wellbeing. Consider how gaming fits into your life alongside other activities you enjoy.

• Mindful Gaming Sessions: Instead of endless scrolling, set intentions for your gaming time. Are you playing to connect with friends? To relax? To achieve a specific goal?
• Set Realistic Screen Time Goals (with Family): Work together with your family to set realistic screen time limits that suit your individual needs and routine. This might mean having screen-free times or days, or limiting gaming before bed. Sometimes listening to a story or a podcast can be a really good way of keeping ourselves entertained without needing to have a screen on, and can be a really good way to help get to sleep. The goal isn’t restriction, but balance and healthy integration into your life. Sometimes you may feel you need to spend more time on a game, to help with self regulation, or if you’ve just had a hard day and need some distraction. 
• Vary Your Activities: Make sure you also engage in offline activities you enjoy, like hobbies, outdoor play, reading, or spending time with family.
• Digital Detox Moments: Schedule short breaks from screens to rest your eyes and mind. Even a 5-minute break can make a difference.
• Online Safety & Netiquette: Always remember to be aware of online strangers, protect personal information, and report anything that makes you uncomfortable. Be a good digital citizen and treat others with respect online.
• Developing Digital Skills: Explore avenues beyond just playing games. Learn game design, 3D modelling, digital art, or coding. These creative pursuits can boost confidence, provide a sense of accomplishment, and even open doors to future passions or careers.

• HealthyGamerGG (Dr. K): A Harvard-trained psychiatrist who deeply understands gaming culture and provides mental health insights specifically for gamers. His channel covers stress, motivation, social anxiety, and more in a highly empathetic and non-judgmental way. He often discusses how gaming can be a positive force in life.
• Gaming the Mind: Features doctors who are also gamers, exploring the intersection of mental health and gaming, and promoting wellbeing within the gaming community.

• Minecraft / Roblox: These platforms offer open-world creativity and building, providing a powerful sense of control, achievement, and a platform for social interaction. They allow players to design and inhabit their own safe spaces, which can be immensely regulating. The collaborative nature of multiplayer offers low-pressure social connection where shared projects dictate interaction, easing potential social anxiety.
• The Sims 4: A life simulation game that allows for imaginative play, storytelling, and managing virtual lives. It can offer a low-stakes way to explore different scenarios, practice decision-making, and even process real-life situations symbolically through the lives of your Sims, offering a sense of agency and emotional distance.
• Subnautica: This underwater exploration and survival game can be very immersive and calming due to its stunning visuals and ambient sounds. It offers a sense of wonder and discovery as you explore alien oceans, providing a healthy distraction and fostering feelings of accomplishment as you progress and overcome challenges. The quiet exploration can be deeply regulating.
• Gris: A beautifully artistic platformer that symbolically explores themes of grief and emotional recovery through stunning visuals and a moving score. The journey through its abstract landscapes can help players process complex emotions indirectly, providing a cathartic experience through its narrative and stunning art style.
• Celeste: A challenging platformer with a strong narrative about anxiety and overcoming internal struggles. The gameplay itself, which involves repeated attempts to master difficult jumps, mirrors the persistence needed to overcome anxiety in real life. It provides a sense of resilience and accomplishment as players conquer seemingly impossible sections, and its story offers powerful messages of self-acceptance and perseverance in the face of mental health challenges.
• Spiritfarer: A management sim about dying and learning to say goodbye. This gentle, poignant game helps players process themes of loss, grief, and empathy by caring for spirits and fulfilling their last wishes before they pass on. It allows for a safe, reflective space to engage with difficult emotions, promoting understanding and compassion for others and oneself.

• Ticket to Ride: A popular, relaxing board game about building railway routes across a map. It involves strategy but less direct conflict than some other games, making it a great option for calm strategic thinking and mild social interaction without high pressure.
• Catan: A classic resource-gathering and trading board game that offers strategic depth and social interaction. Its emphasis on negotiation and trade allows players to practice social influencing skills in a structured, friendly environment.
• Chess: A highly strategic board game that can significantly improve focus, problem-solving skills, and forward-thinking. Its intense concentration demands a kind of mental meditation, pulling attention away from stressors and into a complex, satisfying challenge.
• Puzzle games (e.g., jigsaw puzzles, logic puzzles): These can be very calming and help with concentration. The solitary, focused nature of puzzle-solving can be deeply meditative, providing a healthy mental break and a sense of accomplishment upon completion.

• Forest: Helps you stay focused by growing a virtual tree when you avoid using your phone. If you leave the app, the tree dies.
• Space: Tracks your screen time and helps you set limits and take digital breaks.
• Freedom: Blocks distracting websites and apps across all your devices.
• OurPact: A parental control app that allows parents to manage and monitor their child’s screen time and app usage.

• Gaming the Mind Podcast: Explores interactions between mental health and gaming, discussing a wide range of stories and psychological concepts within video games.
• “The Psychology of Video Games” Podcast: Delves into the psychological aspects of gaming, often highlighting benefits and how games impact the brain and behavior in positive ways.