mental health journalist
One thing I like about dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is the way it prepares the client for the end of the therapeutic relationship. In her memoir, the founder of DBT, Marsha Linehan, writes DBT is different than psychodynamic therapy because she tells highly suicidal people with borderline personality disorder (BPD) what to do. Having figured…
I don’t know where Duane got the sawed-off shotgun, but I let him put it in the trunk of my Ford Taurus – the one that I bought used with a broken ignition. All I needed to start that car was a screwdriver. Duane was a year younger than I but had already spent years…
“OK, yeah, I’m just going to park it. I’ll see you inside,” I told Mom. Key in the ignition, I turned the engine over and checked the rear view mirror. I was sixteen and a half, which mattered at the time I wanted my driver’s license. I needed a way to get to work. By…
In October 2018, my mom, my husband, our two children and I drove to Savannah, Georgia, to celebrate my fortieth birthday. I finally had a job that offered paid time off, so I wanted to travel. “What better time to check out Tybee Island Beach than fall, when it’s cold enough to keep sunbathers away,”…
What do our local elected officials really want, other than reelection? “I do not believe in redistribution of wealth through government,” my state representative said. The one thing state representatives in Georgia are bound by the state’s constitution to accomplish every legislative session is to pass a balanced state budget. Tell me about it, American…
Many women worry they won’t make a great mother, but what about an overreactive, irritable, mean momster? Criticized for not having “common sense,” I cried out, “I wasn’t born knowing fire burns!” Fingers calloused from fact checking the frying pan when you said, “Don’t touch it. It’s hot.” “I hope your child turns out just…
I worked a Pizza Hut when I was 16 years old. “Pizza slut,” my younger brother joked about my first “real” (taxpaying) job. This was in the days of brightly colored and unique fast-food chain branding. The mid-1990s, when some Pizza Huts boasted signature red roofs that looked like a flat iron pressing the building’s…
I interviewed a registered sex offender for food Before he moved into the Stay Plus Inn, Steven Baumgartner stayed under an overpass in Orlando, Florida, the home of Disney World. That was the only place he could stay as a registered sex offender. I met him as part of the “Will Write for Food” (WWFF)…
Validation is central to dialectical behavior therapy for borderline personality disorder My mother went back to school to earn a degree as a registered nurse. She was a licensed practical nurse and wanted more education and better opportunities. I was in elementary school but already intrigued by people’s motivations. When Mom took whatever basic psychology…
I don’t remember exactly how we got from the Las Vegas airport to the hotel, but I remember the man we met along the way. My sister, her three children, my husband and our two children walked up a sidewalk toward the hotel. I took pictures along the way. I stop to take lots of…