dr.woodbury

People often come to a psychiatric evaluation hoping for clarity. They may also carry understandable concerns: about being rushed, mislabeled, or reduced to a checklist of symptoms. A thoughtful psychiatric evaluation is not about speed or certainty. It’s about careful understanding , built over time and in context. An Evaluation Is More Than a Symptom Inventory Symptom checklists can be useful, but they are only one part of the picture. A comprehensive evaluation also considers: How symptoms...

Many adults seek psychiatric care because something feels off, but it’s hard to name exactly what. You might feel persistently exhausted, less motivated, emotionally flat, or not like yourself. You may wonder whether this is burnout, depression, anxiety, or something else entirely. It’s a reasonable question. But in practice, the most helpful starting point is often not the label itself , but the pattern  behind your symptoms. Why Labels Can Feel So Important Diagnostic terms can offer...

Many patients report mental fatigue even on days without significant emotional or cognitive demands. Clinically, this can reflect the cumulative impact of uncompleted tasks that continue to sit in your mind. This aligns with the Zeigarnik effect , a phenomenon first identified in the 1920s, describing how the mind holds onto incomplete tasks more than completed ones (Zeigarnik, 1927). These uncompleted tasks, or "open loops," include things like brief conversations you want to follow up on,...