What if your psychiatrist actually had time to talk to you, not just for fifteen minutes, not just to click boxes and refill your prescription, but to really understand why you feel the way you do? What if your appointment included a conversation about your childhood, your diet, your sleep, and even your gut bacteria,...

We live in a culture where people will swallow, snort, inject, or chug just about anything if it promises to make them happier, sharper, or stronger. Some of it works, some of it doesn’t, and some of it lands you in a congressional hearing. SSRIs SSRIs are the antidepressants like fluoxetine, sertraline, escitalopram. They’ve been...

OCD officially packed its bags and moved out of the Anxiety Disorders “house” in 2013 when the DSM-5 came out1. Before that, it lived with all the other anxious conditions, but the experts decided OCD was just too unique to be lumped in2. Now it lives in its own fancy neighborhood called “Obsessive-Compulsive and Related...

Jeffrey Epstein did not create trauma. He industrialized it. He turned teenage girls into party favors for men who already had everything. He built a machine with drivers, pilots, butlers, lawyers, and moneyed friends. All of them claimed later they “didn’t know.” The trauma he left behind did not end when the headlines moved on....

During my psychiatry residency and fellowship, we met weekly to watch a film and then gather in a room to dissect it. These were not casual Netflix nights with snacks and a side of gossip. They were deep dives into character motivation, symptom portrayal, ethical dilemmas, and cultural subtext. We would watch a scene, stop...

Some girl on social media says she’s “traumatized” because a barista called her “ma’am,” and your health teacher says trauma is what happens when you experience a “distressing event,” which is vague enough to include your GPA. Trauma, PTSD, being a victim, being a survivor, it’s all real, complicated, and way more than just a...

I prescribe actual medication. The kind that’s been tested, approved, and doesn’t come in a hemp-wrapped mason jar. But I’m also not blind. Or arrogant. Or so deep in my own lane that I can’t see there might be more than one way to help someone feel like a functioning human being. That’s why I...

With all of the craziness in the world, especially in our country, I thought I’d make us some food that might help you laugh before the next existential crisis hits. So… imagine this: You take your significant other out for a nice meal. Not your boss, not your kid’s school principal, not that cousin who...

Beneath conscious awareness, the inner monologue narrating your every move, is the unconscious. The unconscious is the shadowy mental storage unit where your brain hoards all the stuff you’re not actively aware of but that still manages to hijack your decisions1. Freud, who chain-smoked cigars and saw your mom in every dream you’ve ever had,...

Imagine your brain is like a chill, well-balanced party. Everyone’s doing their thing—dopamine’s out there passing around snacks of motivation and pleasure—basically the brain’s hype man, making sure you care about stuff, want stuff, and get up off the couch to go after stuff. In addiction, dopamine gets completely hijacked. Substances and behaviors that trigger...