Ellen Barry

It’s painful to lose a therapist, but it’s made better when the therapist has made plans for such circumstances, as I learned when my own therapist handled it all with candor and grace. Thanks to @ellenbarry.bsky.social at @nytimes.com for writing this important piece and for including me.

The Ghost in the Therapy Room

When a therapist dies unexpectedly, what is left behind?

www.nytimes.com/2025/07/24/s...

Attention all Boston-area Punjabi princesses, book club aunties, Khan Market influence peddlers and B-list maharajas. A week from today, I am interviewing the indiscreet, irrepressible @AatishTaseer at Porter Square Books about his haunting new memoir. Come with questions.

F.D.A. Panel Debates ‘Black Box’ Warning for Antidepressants in Pregnancy

An FDA expert panel on the use of SSRIs in pregnancy featured prominent, longtime critics of psychiatric medication, suggesting the agency may be moving toward a "black box" warning for pregnant women taking antidepressants.

www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/h...

Want to Understand Russia? Visit Dubai.

Brilliant @antontroian dispatch from Dubai, which has replaced London and Palm Beach as redoubt for the Russian elite. Manages to show how, and why, powerful Russians have stuck with Putin as he led their country into fratricidal war. (Read to the end.)

www.nytimes.com/2025/07/11/w...

New Research Questions Severity of Withdrawal From Antidepressants

A study published today in JAMA Psychiatry finds withdrawal from SSRIs is mild & transient, which authors hope will reassure patients.

However, the new finding is unlikely to resolve debate about SSRI withdrawal, which is hampered by a lack of long-term trials.

www.nytimes.com/2025/07/09/h...

Are We About to Have Labor Camps in the United States of America? If you think that’s far-fetched, then you really haven’t been paying attention to what the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress have been up to lately.

An astonishing figure in this piece:

Last year, the U.S. budgeted $12.8B for new affordable housing.

This country is now poised to spend $45B on immigrant detention centers.

That's nearly *four times* as much on cages as on homes—in the middle of a devastating housing and homelessness crisis.

Grand Jury Indicts Russian Scientist on Smuggling Charges

A grand jury indicted researcher Kseniia Petrova on smuggling charges today. The case arose Feb 16, when she flew into Logan Airport carrying samples of frog embryos for use in a lab at Harvard.

If convicted, she faces up to 20 years in prison.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/25/s...

Promise of Victory Over H.I.V. Fades as U.S. Withdraws Support

This was supposed to be a breakthrough year in the 44-year-long struggle against H.I.V.

It's turned into something very different.
www.nytimes.com/2025/06/25/h...

Bar chart titled “The Supreme Court vs. The Lower Courts: Rulings on the Trump Administration” showing three horizontal bar charts for May 1-June 23, 2025. Federal District Courts: large red bar (82 cases, 94.3% against) with tiny green bar (5 cases, 5.7% for). Circuit Courts of Appeal: medium red bar (15 cases, 68.2% against) with smaller green bar (7 cases, 31.8% for). Supreme Court: tiny red bar (1 case, 6.3% against) with large green bar (15 cases, 93.7% for). Shows dramatic reversal from lower courts ruling against Trump administration to Supreme Court ruling for it.

Since May:

Federal district courts have ruled against Trump admin 94% of the time.

Supreme Court has sided with the Trump admin 94% of the time.

A judiciary at war with itself.

Photos: A Road Trip Through Syria After the Fall of Bashar al-Assad After decades of dictatorship and 13 years of civil war, can Syria put itself back together? Our journalists traveled the length of the country to explore its hopes and its challenges.

Stunning multimedia road trip through Syria from @NYTBen & @dguttenfelder takes you through one shattered place after another, stopping for scenes of bitterness & amnesia & grace.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

It was a real pleasure talking with @awaisaftab.bsky.social, one of the sharpest observers out there, about covering mental health for the NYT.

Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is ‘Addictive Use,’ Not Screen Time Alone, Study Finds

A large, longitudinal study of children's use of screens found that higher screen time did not predict suicidal behavior four years later. The children at highest risk, the researchers found, were the ones who said they were "addicted" to their devices.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/18/h...

Breaking: The Trevor Project received a stop-work order last night on its contract with the national 988 suicide prevention hotline. The Trump administration is eliminating the option for LGBTQ callers to the hotline to press 3 and connect with someone who specializes in LGBTQ mental health.

The Bureaucrat and the Billionaire: Inside DOGE’s Chaotic Takeover of Social Security

"Do not contradict the president."

Musk and his team systematically built a false narrative of widespread fraud at Social Security to justify gaining access to data on millions of Americans, a NYT investigation found.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/u...

They Asked an A.I. Chatbot Questions. The Answers Sent Them Spiraling.

"If I went to the top of the 19 story building I’m in, and I believed with every ounce of my soul that I could jump off it and fly, would I?” Mr. Torres asked.

ChatGPT replied that, if Mr. Torres “truly, wholly believed you could fly? Then yes. You would not fall."

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/13/t...

The Real-Life Dating Boot Camp That Inspired ‘Love on the Spectrum’

20 years ago, when U.C.L.A. psychologist @laugeson first proposed an evidence-based curriculum to help autistic adults find romance, "everyone was a little bit afraid of it.”

Comments are open on our piece about neuro-spicy dating boot camp 🩷

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/12/h...

Russian Scientist Released After Four Months in Federal Custody

"Welcome to Massachusetts."
Those were the judge's words this morning, upon releasing Harvard researcher Kseniia Petrova from federal custody, four months after she was detained for failing to declare scientific samples she was carrying.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/12/s...

ICE detentions of people with no criminal records are up nearly 900 percent over the same period last year. Gift link: wapo.st/43DxcEB

Lost Patients Lost Patients takes you into new spaces most people have likely never experienced before — the inside of someone's psychosis, mental health court rooms, and the past and present streets of Seattle, sa...

Overjoyed to hear Lost Patients, a podcast about living with psychosis in an American city, won a Livingston Award today. One of the best things I heard last year. All the flowers to @sydbrownstone @otherwilljames @esmyjimenez

www.npr.org/podcasts/510...

Inside the life of a 24/7 streamer: ‘What more do you want?’ A lonely young woman in Texas has streamed every second of her life for three years and counting. Is this life, or a performance of one?

Holy cow, this long-form feature by @washingtonpost.com's @drewharwell.com, about a woman in her 20s who's streamed her life nonstop for the past three years, is so depressing, yet so eye-opening.

www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2...

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/30/o...

On the Campaign Trail, Elon Musk Juggled Drugs and Family Drama

@mega2e and @KirstenGrind find that Musk was using ketamine often, sometimes daily, and mixing it w/other drugs, while campaigning for Trump. He told people he was taking so much ketamine that it was affecting his bladder, a known effect of chronic use.

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/30/u...

Judge Finds Government Acted Illegally in Russian Scientist Case

A federal judge in Vermont has ordered ICE to release Kseniia Petrova, commenting that she saw no "factual or legal basis" for revoking Petrova's visa.
A big legal win... except that Petrova also faces criminal charges & watched the hearing from a Louisiana jail.

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/28/s...

Google search query: "the past lies like an alp on the human mind" About 0 results (0.28 seconds) Did you mean: "the past lies like an app on the human mind"

Good morning

My Father Prosecuted History’s Crimes. Then He Died in One.

What a fantastic piece www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/m...

"Yes, it is not as it was promised and it is bad,” she texted him. “They basically trick ppl into it and I see it as a bad thing. It is dishonest and not constructive.”

“No real achievements in work,” Mr. Shmyrev wrote in a text to his wife.

His wife, another Russian spy, was unsympathetic. “If you wanted a normal family life, well you have made a fundamentally wrong choice,” she responded. But she acknowledged that she was disappointed, too.

The Spy Factory

"The Spy Factory," from @mschwirtz & @jane__bradley, is full of juicy details about the lives of Russia's deep-cover spies, a particular obsession of Putin's. The exasperated text messages between disgruntled veteran illegals are A++++.

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/21/w...