I was two miles away from shore with two and a half more to swim before I reached the other side. I stopped for a second, treaded water and said to myself, “I’m going to die. And I’m NEVER doing this again.” I was just one of 569 other swimmers participating in a 4.4 mile...

I’ve become increasingly intrigued by the topic of hope because, if anything is going to help me climb out of the Black Hole of depression, it’s a sense of hope. In their book, “Hope in the Age of Anxiety,” psychology professors Anthony Scioli and Henry Biller discuss hope from a variety of different perspectives, combining...

Nowhere in the DSM-IV does it mention “the stupid complex,” but I’m telling you it’s an epidemic these days. I used to suffer in silence. But ever since I’ve come out of the closet, I swear I find a fellow sufferer every day. At my last therapy session, I was telling her how scared I...

I’ve long been interested in the connection between mental health and addiction because the worlds of recovery are so similar and yet so different. One of my biggest frustrations in addiction recovery circles is the lack of awareness of mental health–especially the physiological nature that threatens lives. And many depressed folks don’t take seriously enough the addictive...

Guilt is one of the main rivers feeding into the great lake of depression. And that’s unfortunate if you’ve been raised Catholic or Jewish. Or are prone to OCD behaviors like extreme rumination of thoughts. Soooooo ….. as usual, I have to come up with a visualization technique that allows myself to unload some of...