One Soldier’s Suicide Story
While we return to our daily lives after the holidays and get into the Christmas spirit, some families will not be celebrating this year. One family is James Weigl’s, a soldier who returned home after deployment, suffered from depression, and ultimately took his own life. Forty-three percent of soldiers who commit suicide do so after returning home from deployment, demonstrating that follow-up care with soldiers after deployment is just as important as mental health treatment while in active duty.

A Note to the Severely Depressed: Don’t Try So Hard
I don’t know about you, but when I’m severely depressed 90 percent of my negative thinking is based on the fact that I am a failure because all my cognitive-behavioral strategies and positive thinking and mindfulness attempts aren’t working. I discussed this with Dr. Smith yesterday and she reminded me, once more, that severe depression can’t be treated in a mind-over-matter way. Her compassionate logic made me review the pages of my forthcoming book,

Happy Thanksgiving, 2009
It’s the last Thursday of November, and here in the States, that means our annual rite of giving thanks to our forefathers for “finding” America and making this a home for all of the outcasts in the world (e.g., “your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…”). So Happy Thanksgiving to one and all. So it seems like a good time, as I’ve done in years past, to thank you, our loyal and thoughtful readers, for helping make Psych Central the great independent mental health resource it is today. Without you, there wouldn’t be much point in writing and publishing every day to bring you new insights and perspectives on mental health and psy

Can Therapy Really Change Your Brain?
I feel fortunate to be a psychotherapist in this day and age. Aside from the change we and our clients can report anecdotally, there is increasing evidence to support the potential for true change within the brain via the therapeutic relationship. I’m no expert in neuroscience and relationships – but am excited about the notion that people’s brains can be rewired within their intimate relationships and within the therapist-client relationship. In the “Clinicianâ€

The Proteus Effect: How Our Avatar Changes Online Behavior
The other day, a commenter asked whether people “truly represent themselves for who they are, do they take on different personality characteristics while in their online persona, and how is their level of tolerance for disagreement affected?” One way to examine this question is to look how people provide based upon the