First Person

Creative personal essays on life and family
Article December 2, 2024

A Diary of Precious Time

When Even Good News Is Hard News

When cancer recurs, there's no easy way to cope with the sense of loss that accompanies a growing awareness of mortality. Read more

Article November 19, 2024

The Funny Therapist

Dismantling Stigma, One Joke at a Time

What do therapy and comedy have in common? Therapist and comedian David Granirer has spent over two decades helping aspiring stand-up comics—many in... Read more

Article November 7, 2024

Grandma Chin's Funeral

Reflections on Grief and Belonging

A bicultural daughter of immigrants struggles to make sense of her identity as she mourns a grandmother she barely knew. Read more

Article November 7, 2024

Julia Louis-Dreyfus Is My New Therapist

The Podcast That Changed Me

In 'Wiser Than Me,' Julia Louis-Dreyfus's podcast, accomplished older women generate a free-floating sense of shared sisterhood—like an all-girls slumber... Read more

Article November 7, 2024

Parenting with a Coercive Controller

Repairing Attachment When Children Get Weaponized

The arrival of children in a coercively controlling relationship adds a complicated abuse accelerant. Read more

Article September 20, 2024

Discarding the Binary

Talking Sex and Gender with My Ever-Changing Child

His generation of kids almost had to be gender- and sexuality-questioning to be cool, right? Maybe he was just mirroring what was happening around him. Read more

Article August 28, 2024

Love, Loss & Retraumatization

Preventing PTSD in Grief

A personal experience of excruciating loss becomes a hard lesson in the neuroscience of grief. Read more

Article August 28, 2024

Will Space Aliens Get Therapy?

A Cosmic Perspective on Home

Maybe it’s time for therapists and planetary scientists to hang out more. Read more

Article August 28, 2024

Guardians of the Aquifer

Moving from Despair to Advocacy

In the face of environmental anguish, a therapy icon turns to grassroots activism and finds hope, healing, and connection. Read more

Article August 28, 2024

The Restorative Power of Birding

The Wild, Beautiful Healers in Your Own Backyard

The mindful practice of birding can help us find balance in challenging times. Read more

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