Psychotherapy • Consultation • EMDR
Q: My close friend Mark (that’s not his real name) – fell in love with someone nine years ago – I’ll call him Sam. Sam has done nothing but harm to him. He can’t hold down a job, even though Mark spent a lot of money he doesn’t have for schools and training programs for…
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Q: I’ve been dogged by times of really intense depression for most of my life. Anti-depressants have helped some, and I’ve been in and out of therapy for years, but it’s still a struggle. I know you’ve written about meditation in the past. Do you think it could help me with my depression? I’ve tried…
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Q: I’ve been with my husband for almost fifteen years. We don’t have any major problems like physical abuse, or cheating, or drugs. I really love him and I know he loves me, But I keep wishing he would be different than he is. I find myself resenting him all the time for little ways…
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Stan has come into therapy to decide whether to break up with his boyfriend, Michael. He loves Michael, and feels loved in return, but he’s finding so many imperfections in him that he’s afraid that he’s “settling.” Michael isn’t well-read, he’s politically naïve, his tastes in music are limited, and so on. Stan suspects that…
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In September 1944, Viktor Frankl, a prominent Jewish psychiatrist in Vienna, was transported to Auschwitz along with his pregnant wife and parents. By the time the camp was liberated, they had been murdered, but he had survived. Soon after being freed, he spent nine days writing an account of his experiences and what he’d learned…
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In the last few months a number of people have told me that they’re taking breaks from Facebook (or other social media) because they believe that it’s making them increasingly unhappy; and I’ve been looking into what the research says about the effects these media have on emotional well-being. The studies show that when we…
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Valentine’s Day is almost here again, a day that is pretty tough for a lot of single people. So many of us have uncritically bought into the notion, almost universally assumed in popular movies, music, and books, that romantic love is the One True Road to happiness. Life doesn’t really begin until you meet your…
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Are human beings basically good or bad? My colleague, neuropsychologist Rick Hanson believes that science can answer this age-old question. He points out: “When the body is not disturbed by hunger, thirst, pain, or illness, and when the mind is not disturbed by threat, frustration, or rejection, then most people settle into their resting state,…
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Ted was one of the few people of color in the small Midwestern town where he grew up. He was also gay, and was targeted because of it even before he was old enough to understand what the word meant. He was beaten up badly a few times as a child, but the most emotionally…
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Recently, my friend David told me “My pumpkin spice latte syndrome is back.” He was referring to the fact that every year, just about the time his coffee shop starts serving pumpkin lattes, he begins to feel sluggish, blue, and irritable; and his down mood persists, off and on, through the winter months. He’s…
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