Psychotherapy: Bring on the POT, but don’t forget the BEER

by Menninger Clinic August 27, 2010

First, a clarification: My post “Make my therapy plain, but with a twist” ended with the question (comment, really), “Who says there is nothing new in the world of psychotherapy?” One could easily get the impression that this referred to Dr. Allen, whose post I was discussing. It did not. In fact (as is clear […]

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Giving equal time to horrible therapists

by Menninger Clinic August 22, 2010

Last month we shared with you what I’m sure we can all agree is the ideal psychiatric environment: Strobe lights, thumping bass, Lil’ Jon imploring you to “get outta your mind,” a cheering crowd and a frank and open discussion on accepting who you are through the medium of dance all added up to a […]

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Therapy: How do you know when you’ve had enough?

by Menninger Clinic August 19, 2010

“All those years, all that money….” So begins “My Life in Therapy,” an autobiographical saga that appeared recently in The New York Times Magazine. Here, Daphne Merkin writes in great detail about her 40-plus years (!) in therapy, mostly psychoanalysis. Early in the piece, she starkly declares, “To this day, I’m not sure that I […]

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Pride and prejudice: the twin pillars of stigma?

by Menninger Clinic August 12, 2010

You know how sometimes you have a couple of seemingly unrelated experiences and awhile later you make a connection between them? Serendipity! Well, recently, this happened to me. Pride, prejudice and honor I was watching Men of Honor about a week ago. I have always enjoyed the hero’s story in this movie. In spite of […]

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Psychotherapy: can we grow more potent POT?

by Menninger Clinic August 9, 2010

More invested in what is important than what is new, and protesting the proliferation of new therapies with their accompanying slew of acronyms (e.g., CBT, DBT, IPT, MBT, etc.), I have declared myself a practitioner of POT: Plain Old Therapy. In response to this declaration, my colleague, Tom Ellis, responded, “Who says there’s nothing new […]

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Self-help: listening to the noise of love

by Menninger Clinic August 6, 2010

Recently I’ve been hearing instructive quips about my behavior, as in “get right with the world” and “negative thoughts draw negative thoughts.” At first I believed I was merely hearing voices. Then I realized my whispering wife was essentially proselytizing on behalf of some self-help gurus who have written something called The Vortex. The Vortex […]

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Psychiatry: the ultimate arch nemesis?

by Menninger Clinic July 30, 2010

As it says in my bio, I like to read; it’s one of the few hobbies having a 2-year-old allows me to keep up with. Aside from traditional works of fiction and non-fiction (and the nigh constant Sandra Boynton books), I read a lot of comics (a genre that deserves its own de-stigmatizing blog if […]

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Chipotle doesn’t care about the stigma of OCD

by Menninger Clinic July 27, 2010

Recently a coworker went to Chipotle Mexican Grill for lunch. She came back with some righteous fury to go along with her burrito. “How can a company that advertises they do everything the right way put out a bag like this?!” she wondered. So I took a picture of that bag with my phone. (Here’s […]

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Make my psychotherapy plain, but with a twist

by Menninger Clinic July 23, 2010

Jon Allen’s post “Is psychotherapy going to POT?” is spot on in terms of describing the quandary faced by psychotherapists and their patients with respect to the double-edged sword of “prescriptive therapies.” New weapons Indeed, recent decades have brought us many new “weapons” to use against some of the most troubling psychiatric conditions. For example, […]

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Is psychotherapy going to POT?

by Menninger Clinic July 21, 2010

The field of psychotherapy suffers from acronymania: a proliferating plague of acronyms. Your psychotherapy brand will not be taken seriously if you don’t have a good acronym for it, preferably three letters, although you can get by with four or two. A short list: CBT, DBT, TFP, DIT, CPP, TPP, SIT, ERP, IPT, PCT, CFP, […]

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