Category: Psychotherapy

Anatomy of a Mental Health Epidemic

Does brain chemistry equate with emotional welfare or mental illness? We recommend respectful consideration of Robert Whitaker, Anatomy of an Epidemic, recently published by Crown Publishers. As a reporter who is not on the front lines of severe mental illness and emotional trauma, Whitaker, of course, could not have all the answers.

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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 […]

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Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar: A Factitious Death?

In 1953, the year the Rosenbergs were convicted in the electric chair, Esther Greenwood (a.k.a. Elly Higginbottom), poet Sylvia Plath’s alter ego (further complicating the picture, Plath wrote under the pen name “Victoria Lucas”), underwent electroshock therapy. Electricity, neurological connections, high-strung emotion, madness, suicide (which the real-life Plath committed ten years after the setting of […]

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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 […]

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Literary Critic on Mental Health

I highly recommend Louis Menand in the March 1, 2010, issue of The New Yorker. In part, Menand writes: “Progress in medical science is made by lurching around. The best that can be hoped is that we are lurching in an overall good direction….The goal of biological psychiatry is to identify the organic conditions underlying […]

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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 […]

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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 […]

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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 […]

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Trouble Getting to Sleep?

Sleep is essential according to the American Psychological Association. This professional group notes that “millions of people don’t get enough, resulting in such problems as daytime sleepiness, poor decision-making, interference with learning, and accidents.” One study, using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), suggested that CBT can do a better job of reducing anxiety than sleeping pills. […]

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Book on Cognitive Therapy Wins British Medical Society Book Award

Many therapies focus on identifying and resolving feelings and conflicts. Empathy–truly understanding another’s life situation–is a common characteristic of all successful therapists. Beginning in the 1970s, Albert Ellis and Aaron Beck developed Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) which emphasizes identifying dysfunctional thoughts, changing them to transform negative feelings such as depression and anxiety into positive mental […]

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There Are Depressions and There Is Depression

Today’s lingering economic recession affects citizens in a number of ways as anxiety is heaped on anxiety, especially at this pressure-packed time of year. One might call this phenomenon “The Depression of Depression.” New York Times

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Rave Review of The Violent Person by Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.

The Midwest Book Service gives a 5-Star review to The Violent Person the first book issued by the American Mental Health Foundation. See this review on amazon by clicking below. amazon

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A Jungian Poem by Leah Jimenez

The author is a writer and student of Jungian psychology, who hopes one day to take up temporary residence in Zurich , and to become immersed and absorbed into the rich Jungian tradition, one still alive on the continent. Visit to the Psychoanalyst by Leah Jimenez Who are you? I am Death? Death? Yes, Death. […]

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Handwriting and Personal Identity

One advantage of a blog is the expression of creative ideas, or at least new ideas, in a rapid way. So I will take advantage of this and hope there is at least a little creativity to be found in what follows. Personally written messages are becoming extinct. It is so much easier to dash […]

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A New York (Therapy) Minute

Many are accustomed to viewing therapy as a process that occurs in chunks of 30, 45, or 60 minutes. Yes, much healing occurs this way. Others remind us that therapy can occur in short intervals: the school psychologist briefly talking to a student, the psychologist stopping by at someone’s bedside in a hospital, the quick […]

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Fort Hood and the Violent Person

The tragic violence at Fort Hood first kept a nation in suspense, then brought the nation to high levels of powerful emotions, and now has our country looking back to find answers. Why did this happen? What were telltale signs that might have been missed? Can we learn something from this mass shooting to prevent […]

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Therapists, Therapies, or Both?

When I was learning fly casting a number of years ago, I turned to a number of experts to teach me. Throughout small successes in getting the heavy and whiplike line to carry the tiny artificial fly toward the fish were many, many failures through which the line wrapped around me or became entangled in […]

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Stefan de Schill Award video

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Stefan de Schill in the Daily News

The presentation of the Stefan de Schill Award was covered in the NY Daily News.

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AMHF in the Register-Star

AMHF’s presentation of the Stefan de Schill Award to Astor Services appeared in the Hudson/Catskills newspaper, the Register-Star.

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AMHF in the Poughkeepsie Journal

The Foundation’s presentation of the Stefan de Schill Award received coverage in the Poughkeepsie Journal.

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AMHF Award Ceremony

On October 21, 2009, AMHF awarded Astor Services the first Stefan de Schill Award. This is a $5,000 grant plus the framed citation pictured on our homepage. The ceremony was hosted by Dr Sapna Parikh, medical reporter at Fox News. Overall, some 35 people, representing AMHF and Astor Services, were in attendance. Jazz saxophonist Tony […]

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Celebrating World Mental Health Day

Tomorrow, October 10, 2009, is World Mental Health Day! world mental health day

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Astor Services Receives First Stefan de Schill Memorial Award from AMHF

For further information please contact: Sonia Barnes-Moorhead The Astor Home for Children Foundation (845) 871-1117 *protected email* Astor Services for Children & Families Receives the first American Mental Health Foundation’s Stefan de Schill Award FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Rhinebeck, N.Y. (October 8, 2009) — Astor Services for Children & Families is the first recipient of the Stefan […]

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American Psychological Association (AAP) Convention 2009

I am recently back from attending the annual American Psychological Association, the major organization of practicing and research psychologists in North America. With 150,000 members, the venerable APA convened for the 117th time in Toronto. Over 10,000 members, representing major universities and clinical programs, attended, as well as many psychologists who are in private practice. […]

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Eating Disorders among Straight and Gay Men

Bulimia. Anorexia. Binge Eating. Such are almost always associated with young women. But the New York Times reports such conditions are identified by therapists in a significant percentage of the male population.

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I HATE YOU! DON’T LEAVE ME! Borderline Personality Disorder

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a cross to bear for all who are within its range, including spouses, other immediate family, friends, and perhaps the sufferer of this condition most of all. Before 1980, this was not a recognized psychiatric term. But it was added in the Third Edition of The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual […]

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Hagiophobia: Defined but How Prevalent?

One of the goals of the American Mental Health Foundation is to encourage exploration between religion and mental health, particularly in finding religious practices that enhance mental health. We always hope to do so in a nondenominational way. Hagios comes from the Greek word meaning “sacred” or “holy.” Hagiophobia therefore means fear of God, saints, […]

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Some Things I Have Learned about Autism

By Dr. William Van Ornum When I was a psychology graduate student at Loyola University of Chicago, my introduction to autism involved observing and learning about a nine-year-old girl who constantly banged her head against hard objects, to the point of bleeding and perhaps even concussion. The saddest part was seeing that nothing seemed to […]

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My Summer with William James

Summer is a great time to catch up on all of those novels, mysteries, and thrillers that have piled up over the year. Sometimes it can be a time to reacquaint oneself with favorite authors from the past, read long ago while in school, knowing that a rereading can bring out many more themes. One […]

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