July 29, 2022

July 29, 2022

If They Didn’t Want My Advice, Why Did They Ask for It?

I often get calls or texts or emails from people I know (well and less well) asking for advice in times of their confusion or distress. For the most part I’m happy to be a sounding board and I try to assist when I can. Very often these reach outs […]

June 30, 2022

Flowers Are No Longer On The Grave

A friend’s mother died. Not suddenly; she had been ill. But still, he was not “prepared.” Not exactly sure what “prepared” is. Even when the mind knows what is coming, the heart and the gut have a way of putting on the breaks. And upon hearing that a loved one […]

May 27, 2022

Mental Health

“We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness.” This is what Ashley and Wynonna Judd said publicly in response to their mother’s recent death. Much of the world was surprised. Much of it wasn’t. Naomi Judd was a brave and outspoken advocate for mental health […]

April 7, 2022

Teen Suicide: Opening Our Hearts Without Judgment

As many of you know, I write the Sanity Savers newsletters with a hope of being helpful. Some of the articles are more personal than others and I appreciate the feedback you offer. It means a lot. I had written and was ready to post a different article last month, […]

March 4, 2022

March 4, 2022

The Terror of War: Echoes of History

As many of you know, I write the Sanity Savers newsletters with a hope of being helpful. Some of the articles are more personal than others and I appreciate the feedback you offer. It means a lot. I had written and was ready to post a different article this month. […]

March 10, 2021

Who’s Caring for the Caregiver?

We have long realized that patients with long-term illnesses such as cancer or Alzheimer’s Disease go through phases of inevitable decline that require the medical team to continually adapt treatment to meet their changing needs. Through my work with caregivers who oversee the daily care of family members with such […]

January 29, 2021

Minds Matter – Behavioral Health in Pandemics and Beyond

January, 2021 by Dr. Dale Atkins Isolation and loneliness are key issues in our post-pandemic world. The COVID-19 crisis has actually distracted us from this issue. We may believe loneliness will go away when the pandemic ends. Wrong! Loneliness will continue after the pandemic is in the rearview mirror. Isolation […]

January 19, 2021

Memory Jog

This is the time many of us make New Year’s resolutions which often result in feelings of guilt when we don’t follow through for whatever reason. One popular resolution is “to exercise more this year.” Recently, someone sent me a photo of a trip we took together; it jogged my […]

December 5, 2020

How We Can Care for Our Aging Parents (During a Pandemic)

I had begun writing this piece before COVID. I recently unearthed it in my “unfinished — to be used at another time” file. Now, we are in the midst of holidays that look nothing like the holidays we envisioned when I first thought about this piece. I wanted to write […]

December 1, 2020

If Kindness Were a Drug, the FDA Would Approve It

Reprinted courtesy of The Journal of General Internal Medicine by Steven M. Asch MD, MPH, Dale V. Atkins PhD, Psychology, PC & Anne Walling MD, PhD “Ultimately, the secret of quality is love,” declared Avedis Donabedian, a pioneering systems thinker and the father of modern quality assurance. Few in health […]

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