Lately, I’ve been wondering what to do about my face. I took a new job last year, one that relocated me from a clinic in Uptown, Chicago to a community health center in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I’ve noticed that women at my current job wear much more makeup than women…

In 2010 I quit a job in a dramatic way, having reached the threshold of how much bullshit I could accept from the tedious, entry-level positions that a bachelor’s degree in psychology afforded. …

Like a rodent in the sand, I am deaf to her approaching appetite. The fork of tongue rouses me at three; blurry-eyed and breathless, I am indefensible. Can you milk me, Greg? Can you milk me?Martinlawrencemartinlawrencemartinlawrence. Corral doors open and this demon takes to the race. How about arranging all…

“I am embarrassed to be here.” “I really didn’t want to come today.” “I’m worried you’ll tell me I’m crazy.” “I should have done this years ago.” These are some of the most common things patients tell me at the beginning of their first psychiatric visit with me, because, let’s…

Have you heard the one about the shy college student who stayed on campus for the holidays and was befriended by the beautiful girl down the hall? How each day they spent together, with each playful slap and private joke exchanged, he fell deeper in love with her? Can you…

The Fantasy Woman is better than me in every way. She excels in the very areas in which I am deficient, and will always best me — even when I am well-practiced and she is a very beginner — when others are watching. She is everyone’s sweetheart, accommodating to the…

IBS has me negotiating with myself, and entitlement isn’t helping — “We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same.” —Carlos Castaneda This morning, more than six hours ago, I drank half a cup of white tea. Now, I am so bloated that no position I can contort myself into—cross-legged in my office…

One of my friends who is a psychiatrist recently confessed to me that he no longer shares his vocation with people he meets at parties; instead, he regales with them with cheery anecdotes from his (fake) life as an interior decorator. This fib, my friend tells me, is dual purpose…

There’s no puzzle in the addiction world like it: we need food to exist, and yet, food is the thing that takes so many of us down. …