Welcome to A Psychologist Talks! On today's episode I try to tackle a pretty frustrating dilemma in the field by addressing the question: what is trauma versus what is personality? I'm not sure how "hot" of a take this is, but my general sense is the consensus has moved towards trauma and adversity being everything, which inadvertently diminishes the human experience into something both conceptually and clinically unhelpful. I offer my thoughts and some potential guidance for providers.KEY CONCEPTWe are more than either our experiences or our reported symptoms.

Welcome to A Psychologist Talks! On today's episode, I do a follow-up on my Narcissistic Personality Disorder series, where - while I do have an episode on gender - I needed to do a deeper dive and do some additional research myself. As I lay out in the episode, we arrive upon a point already made in the original series: the dominance of the "covert" subtype for women. However, I also try to give an experiential vibe for what this might look like in women. Put differently: while men and women are both represented in the covert narcissism subtype, are there differences based on gender? Let's take a look.KEY QUOTE"Experientially what this leads to is this really frustrating and really tragic experience of desiring and remembering that initial feeling of potential closeness. And all the permissions and space that you give [so that] maybe something can come of [it]. But then you have this emptiness that sits right next to it; that nothing ever comes of [the relationship]."

Welcome to A Psychologist Talks! On today's episode, I'm doing a quick follow-up to my episode on "incels" and the potential links to Negativistic personality traits, speaking more specifically to the links to gender. A quote from this episode probably best captures my intent with this episode: "We do everyone a disservice - regardless of what personality; regardless of what social construct we are talking about - to not understand the greater context within which the problem has arisen."OTHER QUOTES"But there are absolutely messages that we are sending men and that we are sending masculinity that are not conducive for change; they are anti-feminist in nature."[Paraphrased] "We can point to the incels; we can point to personality disorders; we can point to any group that has serious issues they need to work through and accurately say they need to 'do better.' And then there's the additional reality that we as a society - and mental healthcare providers - need to do a better job supporting growth in a healthy direction."