From the psychiatrist—Welcome

I am delighted to be able to share some thoughts with you about the mind and mental illness in these series of informal postings. In this inaugural post, I will tell you a little about the journey that has taken me here. But first, a million thanks to Jim Legare for setting up this beautiful site. It is a work in progress and we are working hard to include within it insightful writings and practical information. We appreciate any suggestions to improve its content.

In what almost seems like a previous life, I was an academic research psychiatrist. As a student at Baylor College of Medicine, I spent several years studying how hormonal signals regulate cells, the basic functional units that comprise all organs of the human body. Powerful hormones such as steroids and neurotransmitters control the genes within these cells, that is, they influence whether these genes are read out to produce cellular proteins. As I started to study psychiatry and the brain, I realized that sensory signals (the sights, sounds, and smells that reach our brain through the sensory organs) are likely to alter to brain in similar and equally powerful ways. This is how our “experiences” change our brain and alter the way we feel and behave. But how? The answer to this question is complex and I shall explore it further in a future post.

The most important insight which I learned during my years as research psychiatrist is that the brain is capable of profound change throughout life, which alters the very cellular composition of the adult brain. For the patient suffering from any psychological disorder, this capacity for change must be promoted and nurtured. The mission of my clinical practice is to facilitate the patient’s capacities for recovery, renewal and growth.