Ellen Barry

“He just doesn’t like S.S.R.I.s." Psychiatry has been shaken up by Robert F. Kennedy's push to curb Americans' use of antidepressants. I reported last week at the APA's annual meeting. Comments are open. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/24/s...

Powerful personal essay meets fascinating science reporting in this exploration of what dementia takes from us. @jacobfeldman.bsky.social's favorite this week by @ellenbarry.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2026/05/07/s...

During the last years of his life, my father woke up nearly every day convinced that he had to set off on a journey. Could brain science explain what had happened? www.nytimes.com/2026/05/07/s...

An extraordinary thing from @ellenbarry.bsky.social; memoir and inquiry, the neuroscience of this century and the history of the last, a quiet facing of things, hope. Give thanks that there are still spaces for work like this. (Gift link)

As usual, the reader comments on this report about RFK Jr's push to help Americans wean off SSRIs are worth spending time with, both those that say SSRIs were lifesaving & those saying withdrawing from them was awful. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/04/s...

Today RFK Jr. rolled out a multi-pronged effort to help Americans wean off SSRI antidepressants. Do they want to? Comments are open. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/04/s...

As RFK Jr. sets out to rein in the use of SSRIs, a group of top psychiatrists are developing ground rules for helping patients get off medications, acknowledging that patients are often "parked" on a drug for years without any endpoint in sight. Comments are open. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/01/s...

Some good news: New research from Harvard Medical School found youth suicides were 11 percent lower than expected after the launch of the 988 hotline in 2022. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/s...

Idaho cut wraparound services for people with schizophrenia. In the weeks after the service was discontinued, there was a preventable death among the program's former clients. And another. And another. And another. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/07/h...

Last summer, I received a manuscript in the mail from a 32-year-old man who wanted to tell me the story of his psychosis -- how close he came to killing his dad, and how, when it passed, they put the pieces of their relationship back together. Here it is. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/29/s...

A Harvard psychiatrist addresses Kennedy's claim that he "cured schizophrenia" with the keto diet. That is "not accurate," Dr. Christopher Palmer said. But Palmer hopes Kennedy's MAHA movement will help expand access to the treatment. w/ @ellenbarry.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2026/02/06/u...

For much of the 20th century, dysfunctional mothers were blamed for all kinds of adult maladies. But a new study on early life parenting found something unexpected: Stress from the father's behavior shaped a child's health into the future.

Great reporting from @ellenbarry.bsky.social + @pambelluck.bsky.social on the push — & fight — to get postpartum psychosis in the DSM:

Is it time for 'psychiatry's Bible' to include a listing for postpartum psychosis? @PamBelluck and I report on the internal deliberations. Comments are open. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/20/h...

Another blockbuster from Sarah Topol, on a rapacious international egg-harvesting syndicate that preys on poor women. Hopefully we will read about arrests in this case. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/m...

A jury was asked to convict a woman who killed her two boys. What they were not told: The prosecution's own expert found she was schizophrenic, psychotic at the time of the crime. Prison officials did too. But the jury did not hear it, Yvonne Abraham reports. www.bostonglobe.com/2025/12/04/m...

This piece about a man who overcame midlife despair by becoming a typewriter repairman is -- I don't know how to describe it except as chicken soup for the soul. The sounds of these machines are strangely comforting. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

This is far worse than anyone expected. Trump's HUD plan would cut *two-thirds* of permanent housing and push as many as 170,000 formerly homeless people back onto the street—redirecting funds to work mandates, forced treatment, and encampment sweeps. All as mass internment camps are being built.

At the peak of his career, a bullfighter unclips his pigtail. Heart-stopping, from @jasondhorowitz “I’ve decided to stop before I fall.” www.nytimes.com/2025/11/12/w...

exceptional reporting from @ellenbarry.bsky.social + Jason DeParle on the new homeless policy shifts in Salt Lake City — which the Cicero Institute casts as “a harbinger of the future.” gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/10/29/u...

Extraordinary reporting from Emily Baumgaertner Nunn on the malignant criminal network that turns girls in foster care into prostitutes on L.A.'s Figueroa Street -- and why the police can't stop it. Everyone should read this. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/26/m...

R.I.P. ICON D’Angelo 🙏🏾🕊️

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.

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.

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...

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...

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...

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.

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...

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...

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.

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.

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...

"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...

"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...

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...

"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

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...

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...