I’ve always found it curious that more suicides happen in the spring than in any other season. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Center for Health Statistics, suicide rates are lowest in the winter months and highest in the springtime. What’s so bad about April and May? The sun...

I’ve heard a thousand variations of this problem: “My brother is depressed, but he also drinks a lot, which is probably causing the depression. So what do you treat first? The alcoholism or the depression?” The two conditions are so intertwined that it can be impossible to separate them. Just last week I met with...

Once a year or so I’m tempted to shave my head like I’m going through chemo to make my depression visible to others. I’m thinking if I pulled a Sinead O’Connor, people would take the illness seriously. I saw a commercial the other day for some leukemia association, and I was jealous. I know that’s...

I’m reading “50 Shades of Grey.” It’s come to that. I’m not very far, just at the elevator scene when they finally kiss. It’s the safest, cheapest, easiest solution so far that I’ve found to my problem: a libido that exists somewhere on the back of a milk carton (missing). This problem isn’t new, of course....

The other day a child psychologist was telling me about a very rigid, perfectionistic patient of hers. “I want to control what other people are thinking,” the patient explained. “How do you think you are going to do that?” the therapist responded. The 11 year-old brainstormed but couldn’t come up with a solution. Finally the...