Psychiatric treatment is personal by nature. Choosing treatment in psychiatry involves understanding how a medication or therapy approach fits into your actual life: your schedule, your priorities, your relationships, what you're hoping to feel like.

Here's what I've come to believe: health isn't just one part of a good life. It's the part that makes everything else possible. You can work hard, build a career, create financial security for your family — and all of that matters. But if your body is worn down or your mind is struggling, none of those things feel the way you hoped they would.

I realized that psychiatry as a field tends to be more reactive than preventive. More focused on intervention than prevention. Many other fields of medicine do an excellent job educating patients about prevention. Psychiatry, however, is focused on intervention, typically after symptoms are already disruptive.