SPOTLIGHT -
May 3rd 2024
“The fundamental act of medical care is assumption of responsibility.”
April 26th 2024
"Otherwise it's spring, and everything looks frail; the sky is baby blue, and the just-unfurling leaves are full of infant chlorophyll, the very tint of inexperience."
April 22nd 2024
"I pulled my scuffle hoe hard through the clay’s crust and heard the blade scrape metal and earth."
April 19th 2024
"And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold, And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold."
April 12th 2024
"I shall forget civilization, I shall forget color, caste, I shall move in a fantastic world of raceless men and women..."
A Lobsterman Looks at the Sea
His new hip healed in, we’re working on a bluff, talking doctors and health care reform as we shove a new propane tank into place...
The Death of an Addict
As clinicians, we can only imagine what happens when patients terminate treatment. Thoughts from an addiction psychiatry fellow.
A Curious Kind of Love
Sometimes when proposing a treatment plan, I flash to an image of my patient seated beside me on this orchard bench watching orioles court in May’s sharp sunlight...
Psychiatry Comic: Identity Crisis
"So how did you feel when you found out you weren't a . . .?"
Psychiatry Comic: Germaphobia
Some novel ideas for the therapy clinic.
Psychiatry Comic: SSRI Dogs
Which one is Selective Serotonin and which is Reuptake Inhibitor? Some Friday fun.
Lazy Birder
Dawn is at five, but I sleep past nine, not caring if I miss a few warblers flying home for summer...
Psychiatry Comic: APA Rockstar
A bit of conference levity as we cover serious issues.
Spring Rorschach Test
Keeping the season in mind, what is your first impression of this image?
Hit by a Bus
That’s how he’d like to go, he tells me, not by this slow seeding of liver and spine, not with all the tears and long good-byes.
Sleeping Daughter
The Big Bad Wolf and Wicked Witch liked to creak the stairs by her bedroom door and wake her from dreams calling, “Daddy!”
Steel Against Steel
On the cracked macadam court in the shadow of The Castle on the Hill, below fake gun turrets built with bricks...
Talk Radio, 2 am
I’m driving home from the ER, not ready for sleep, eaten up by memories of my mistakes...
This Year in Rorschach: 2014
Featuring this year in Rorschach tests at Psychiatric Times.
Motorcycle Racer
We’ve been meeting since his PSA spiked and he decided on surgery. Radiation finished, nerves nicked by the robot...
Extinction
After a managed care company calls me to be “a prescriber,” I recall The Book of Dinosaurs my grandfather gave me the day I turned seven.
Rainy Day Sunflower at 9/11 Memorial
This sunflower at the 9/11 Memorial said that a ray of sunshine remains, and that life blooms anew, in spite of the losses.
It’s Always a Brain Tumor
It's always a brain tumor when I have a headache. “Don’t be crazy,” I tell myself, “You’re just inventing a doctor-mind catastrophe.”
Jonesin’
In a world in which substance use disorders are no longer suffered in isolation, treating addiction is a challenging journey with obstacles, intermittent failures, and life-altering successes. A poem on drug withdrawal expressed through the eyes of a fellow in addiction medicine.
Creative Expressions and the Unconscious Mind
Painting and writing are ways in which this clinician expresses herself and relaxes after a hard day's work with patients.
Practicing My Scales
When I learned my first scale at 45 I knew I would never rip loose and free like the pros who started as teenagers, when time didn’t matter and practicing was just another form of play.
How a Psychiatrist Writes a Poem
I begin by remembering my hours as a patient and Freud’s “Fundamental Rule”: Say Whatever Comes to Mind...
Frozen in Fear: On Treating PTSD
We do not have to set time aside to do something that helps validate our experience, while simultaneously coping with it. The lesson expressed in this psychiatry resident's poem.
Lunch Break at a Residential School
When I’m hungry, I love to stroll past the campus barnyard and visit the colorful, caged characters who live, like me...
The Empire of Alcohol
The frayed dignity of the patient described in this poem, his intelligence matched by the inexplicable intransigence of his alcoholism, moved this VA psychiatrist to describe the clinical encounter, apropos for April, Alcohol Awareness Month.
Psychiatrist Baseball Cards
I’d love to create a new set every year, our glossy portraits on one side, caduceus in the corner, honors, cure rates, and publications on the back...
First Impressions: Rorschach Test
What is your first impression of this ink blot?
Psychotherapy and Sculpture: A Rewarding New Life
In the process of both psychotherapy and sculpture, this psychiatrist discovered there is potential for an exciting and rewarding life. Here, a representative piece from his collection.
Words Heal: Coping With Cancer
When a full-time writer's husband was diagnosed with cancer, she found writing poetry helped her cope. She guessed that others would, like her, find their experiences with cancer best expressed through poetry. So began The Cancer Poetry Project.
Data Point
Three years deep in despair, he’s swallowed every pill I prescribed...