Personal Stories | Psych Central

Weekends at Bellevue

Tuesday, October 20th, 2009

Ever wanted to go beyond the doors of a psychiatric hospital? To have a key to the locked units? To witness the day-to-day at a legendary institution mired in mystery and folklore? Weekends at Bellevue, ...

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I’m an Only Child. So What?

Tuesday, October 6th, 2009

I do not have any brothers or sisters. Yes, I am an only child. So what? It is okay with me that I don’t have brothers or sisters, so why is it often not ...

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Searching for Soul: A Survivor’s Guide

Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009

Bobbe Tyler, author, nonfiction writer and retired communications coordinator for Lucasfilm Ltd, has written a book of the type, and in the style, that has kept her alive all these years. Her book, Searching ...

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My Adversity, My Son

Tuesday, August 25th, 2009

I watched "Hawthorne" on TNT tonight. One of the story lines was about a woman who came into the ER with a broken arm and during the examination she was discovered to have many bruises ...

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Ordinary Heroes

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

Last night I went to a convenience store. I was joking with one of the two female cashiers working the late night shift when this guy stormed in, shouting obscenities, totally agitated. I was scared—sure ...

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Hiding Behind the Pulpit with Bipolar Disorder

Tuesday, August 11th, 2009

I have an illness that affects nearly 1 out of every 17 Americans, and affects 1 out of every 5 families. This disease is chronic in nature, and can only be controlled, not cured. It ...

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Yoga Journey

Wednesday, July 1st, 2009

I started going to yoga classes when I was a sophomore in college. This was in 1995, so the yoga craze had not yet begun. I didn’t know much about yoga, but liked ...

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Three Men, One Month: The Match.com Journey Continues

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

I have now been on roughly a month’s worth of Match.com dates. None of them was completely awful, but some were definitely better than others. Date One: The Liquid Hater I started with a man I ...

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Mother’s Day Thoughts by a Mommy of Angels

Saturday, May 9th, 2009

I have been thinking. I have 6 Angels waiting for me in Heaven. I have miscarriages. The couple weeks surrounding Mother's Day contain several significant dates for me anyway. May 8th was the 7th anniversary ...

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We Shouldn’t Need a Day of Our Own

Saturday, May 9th, 2009

Everybody in the United States is terribly aware the second Sunday in May is Mother's Day -- the floral and greeting card industries won’t let you forget it. Mother's Day is big business. (Whether people ...

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Another Antidepressant Journey

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009

Today I have spent a lot of time on the phone with both a nurse and my psychiatrist. Our big topic of the day? How to get me off Celexa. I started ...

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Sylvia Plath’s Legacy

Tuesday, April 7th, 2009

For someone who has only read her biography and never read any of Sylvia Plath’s actual poetry, I spend an awful lot of time thinking about her. That’s because I suffer from chronic depression ...

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Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin

Monday, April 6th, 2009

Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin By Norah Vincent New York: Viking, December 2008 Hardcover, 283 pages $25.95 Immersion journalism, as it’s called, can be kind of fun on a limited basis. In my days ...

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The Healing Power of a Good Therapist

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

The precursor of the mirror is the mother's face. —D.W. Winnicott, Playing and Reality, 1971 Thirteen years ago I gave birth to my very much wanted third child. Eight months later I ended up in ...

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Living with Schizoaffective Disorder, Part 2

Wednesday, February 4th, 2009

The Heebee-Jeebies Be careful when you wrestle with monsters, lest you thereby become one. For, if you stare long enough into the abyss, the abyss also stares into you. -- Friedrich Nietszche Now I ...

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