Author Archives: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.

AMHF Announces Beginning of Professional Advisory Board

To help provide us with a range of ideas and resources, AMHF is making the first two appointments to its Professional Advisory Board. This group of professionals will offer ideas and advice to AMHF regarding ways to implement the mission. This will help to five us a further diversity of viewpoints. The first two members […]

Happy Birthday Jack Fowler!

All of us at AMHF wish Jack Fowler, our treasurer, the happiest of birthdays on June 18! Thank you, Jack, for all you do for us and so many others.

Insurers Balk on Insuring 19-26 group

We have noted previously that a number of insurance companies have found ways to minimize costs of serious and lifelong mental health problems that are covered under the Mental Health Parity Act. A similar dragging of feet seems to be occurring with providing health care (which includes mental health services) to 19-26 year olds. The […]

Glenn Close to Address Neuroscience 2010 Convention

Glenn Close, award-winning actress who has become an advocate for persons with bipolar disorder and other severe mental illnesses, will be the Keynote Speaker at Neuroscience 2010 , the 40th Annual Meeting of the Society of Neuroscience, to be held in San Diego from November 13-17th, 2010. Close has developed a special interest in mental […]

Mandated Treatment Law Set to Expire

Kendra’s Law, passed by the New York State legislature about ten years ago, is set to expire. This law was passed and named after a woman who was pushed to her death by a severely mentally ill person who was not following the prescribed treatment regimen. One of the advocates of this bill is E. […]

Firms Fight Practice of Mental Health Parity

The 2008 Law concerning parity for mental health treatment–making mental health care covered by insurance to be on a level with medical care–apparently is being circumvented by some businesses, the Boston Globe reported today. Therapists, previously required to only fax in treatment information, now are reported to participate in lengthy and sometimes intimidating phone interviews. […]

The Sports Wound and Bullying

Many of the public and well as the mental health professions have never heard of the phrase “sports wound.” This refers to males who do not display athletic prowess or good eye-hand coordination. As much as we may want to deny this, boys who lack sports ability often are teased and bullied through their growing […]

Many Kinds of Bullying

Today on the news, television reporters spoke of a new law that will mandate school officials to intervene and report instances in bullying. The bill was proposed after one student committed suicide following bullying. One of the more-fascinating aspects of the increased awareness or incidence of bullying, and what appears to be ineffective adult intervention, […]

Stop Bullying Now!

There’s too much bullying going on and not enough being done to stop it. In all fairness, many have the good will and courage and desire to confront bullying but want to make sure it is done properly so as to not make a bad situation worse. AMHF is monitoring the psychological damage done to […]

A Great Advocate for Children

The New York Times today announced the death of Alice Miller. Dr. Miller is a writer in the psychoanalytic tradition who did not publisher her first book until her late forties and much experience in the field. The Gifted Child was the first of many books written by a first-class intellect who had the great […]

Preventing Orphans (follow-up to Twain)

Being released this week is an exceptional book. Bruce Feiler, best-selling author and historian, writes of being diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer. He calls upon some of his friends to be resources for his daughter should he not survive, and calls them “The Council of Dads.” If you have children, read the […]

Orphans All (Mark Twain)

On this centenary of Mark Twain’s death, we look back at Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. While psychologists have written thousands if not millions of words on the effects of separation and loss in all our lives, Mark Twain taught about these powerful forces in the lives of two young boys growing up. Tom Sawyer […]

Boy Scout Troop Therapy

While riding the Lake Shore Limited–Ensconced in a small sleeping room, surrounded by a bag or two of books–I am sometimes reminded of Paul Theroux and his captivating books on Riding the Orient Express or going coast to coast on a train in Canada. In today’s New York Times, Theroux reflects on the Boy Scouts […]

National Health Care and Mental Health

As everyone is just beginning to sort out what exactly is in the new health-care laws, how they will apply, and whom they will affect, and when, AMHF is monitoring this legislation with a special interest with respect to mental-health care. More to come as the politicizing dies down and the implications become manifest.

Stuff

Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things, by Randy Frost and Gail Skeketee, is a book of interest to many, a cautionary tale in some respects, and a message of help for a group of others. The latter are those who suffer from one of the varieties of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD): compulsive hoarding. For […]

Pilots and Antidepressants

The Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) now allows pilots to continue their in-air responsibilities if they are on certain antidepressants. Historically, pilots have not been allowed to fly while taking antidepressants as many of the original antidepressants had side effects which could be extremely serious if they occurred in flight. Side effects such as seizures or […]

Loneliness, Sadness, Depression: Do We Have It Backward?

Emily White is a lawyer who lived alone for six years in her 30s and said those were years of “savage loneliness.” She has written a book about this, “Lonely: A memoir”, just published by Harper Collins. Ms. White describes many of the pop psychology attitudes that even serious therapists adope. “Living alone gives you […]

OCD…as Viewed by Ashley Dupre

The New York Post recently hired Ashley Dupre to write a column on relationships, “Ask Ashley”, and it appears each Sunday. Recently, Cara, age 35, residing in Park Slope, asked Ashley the following: “My boyfriend and I recently moved in together. I’m anal about keeping a straight apartment. How can I approach this so I […]

Spirituality and OCD: Part 4

How might Eudes’ views be judged by others who are knowledgeable about psychology, psychiatry, and spirituality? Robert Coles, M.D., psychiatrist at Harvard University has for four decades emphasized the need for modern mental-health workers to combine spirituality with mental-health therapy. John Cardinal O’Connor, while known for his strong and formidable presence, also had a master’s […]

Spirituality and OCD: Part 3

“The problem with OCD,” John Eudes says, “is that it leads to a mode of perception and thinking that is too abstract, too narrow. God is life-giving, not a taskmaster or harsh judge of solitary behaviors, as OCD or scrupulosity suggests. To fight OCD, one has to develop other images and thoughts based on reality […]

Spirituality and OCD: Part 2

As professionals in the mental-health fields try harder with cognitive behavior therapy and medications, over and over, one might imagine that this is a manifestation of the same mechanism of OCD. Where might other sources of help be found, especially for those suffering with scrupulosity? Can a Trappist monk, who is also a Georgetown-trained physician […]

Spirituality and OCD: Part 1

Although Monk and Jack Nicholson’s character in As Good as It Gets brought smiles as well as sympathy to those who never heard of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), and even a certain peacefulness among OCD sufferers that, finally, their peers might see them not as weird but as true persons, a sad reality remains. Obsessive […]

Clerical Abuse in Germany

This week brings an intriguing story from Germany that raises questions concerning the duty to warn others when there is imminent danger of behaviors such as child abuse, suicide, or violent behaviors. In a story reported by the New York Times, a German psychiatrist has made public allegations that he warned a Roman Catholic Archdiocese […]

Mental Health, Faculty, and College Violence

How might the manner of treatment in which behaviors indicative of mental-health problems on campuses be related to violence? The recent murders by a professor who was denied tenure in Alabama bring the issue of FACULTY mental health to the fore. Heather Munro Prescott has some tantalizing ideas on the massacre that recently occurred in […]

Neuropsychology: All Kinds of Things Affected by the Brain

NEUROPSYCHOLOGY: “All Kinds of Things Affected by the Brain” Simone Collymore, PhD, is a neuropsychologist in Kingston, New York, one of the few practitioners in the Hudson Valley of this specialty involving psychology and brain science. Whereas other specialists that study the brain by necessity use tools that may have less-than-helpful side effects, Collymore’s craft […]

Upcoming Changes in the DSM

The profession of psychiatry is now in the fourth edition of the book that classifies mental disorders: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual IV. The revised version will be published in 2013, and there continues to be debate about what will and will not be included. The New York Times brings this and a spirited discussion in […]

Too Many Soldier Suicides: Part 2

Headlines everywhere proclaim sad news: *In 2009 alone more than 330 active servicemen and women have committed suicide *Shocking new figures show the number of soldiers who commit suicide in January could top the number of soldiers killed in Iraq *Tough old soldier battles new enemy: suicide *Every day, five US soldiers try to kill […]

Too Many Soldier Suicides Part 1: In Flanders Fields

Too many US soldiers are attempting or carrying out suicide attempts; many succeed. One reason for this is the tremendous ambivalence over current military actions. This is not like World War II, a so-called good war, although this phrase also causes many to wince. Viktor Frankl, concentration-camp survivor, wrote in Man’s Search for Meaning that […]

Jerilyn Ross, 63, Dies: A Therapist Who Overcame Her Own Anxiety

There is a touching story in the news about Dr. Jeriyn Ross, a therapist who was especially helpful to those who had phobias, especially phobias involving the fear of heights. She was well known and esteemed for her compassionate accompaniment of persons with phobias as they faced their fears directly. This approach has now become […]

More on Aging Gracefully

The following article by William Van Ornum appeared in the Hudson Valley News on January 19, 2010. RIVER REFLECTIONS ON PSYCHOLOGY AGING GRACEFULLY As a clinical psychologist, resident of the Hudson Valley, and recent member of the +55 Club, what might I offer to a subject that is on a lot of our minds—getting older? […]

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