Nicholas Kristof’s column in the Sunday Review section of The New York Times chronicles the travails of Mike Yurchison, an Iraq war veteran battling head injury and PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder). His girlfriend of three and a half years is struggling too, not sure if she can continue to hang in there with him considering all the challenges of dealing with a man shattered by war and mental illness. According to Mr. Yurchison, psychiatry has helped him become addicted to opiates and otherwise he has found these doctors “unhelpful.” This is too often the case. Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan are killing themselves at alarming rates. Mike’s brother and close friend, both veterans, recently killed themselves. We also see periodic rampages at military bases such as Fort Hood where medication is often part of the picture. read more

Anxiety is the feeling of fear, dread, worry and concern that is often associated with physiological uneasiness. There are many reasons people experience anxiety. Some of us are prone to it through our genetic makeup. Others have been so strongly conditioned in childhood through abuse, neglect or trauma, that the experience of anxiety is inevitable. In my experience of working with thousands of people over the past twenty years, the vast majority of us experience anxiety as a result of the habit of avoidance. read more