Most of us say we want the truth, but go to great lengths to avoid it. Armand DiMele and guests Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. and Catherine Altieri, LCSW examine what happens when someone must deliver unwelcome news, covering everything from bad breath to terminal diagnosis, and why doctors, friends, and partners so often fall silent.
Fear of illness can be as debilitating as illness itself. Armand DiMele and Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. walk through common neurological symptoms people misread or obsess over, from vertigo and wide-based gait to hypochondriasis, including how caretaker dynamics and secondary gain keep health anxiety alive.
Armand DiMele and Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D., a neurologist, unpack alexithymia, the inability to identify or express emotions, tracing it from spinal reflexes to brain chemistry. They explore how trauma and abuse can shut down feeling as a survival mechanism, why couples clash over emotional expression, and how hormones and neurotransmitters shape what we feel.
What separates pain threshold from pain tolerance, and when does prescribed medication become addiction? Armand DiMele and guests Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. (neurologist and pain specialist) and Dr. Kent Robertshaw, MD, Psychiatrist, trace physical pain through the nervous system, examine malingering, and use Michael Jackson’s death as a lens on narcotic dependency, withdrawal, and the emotional dimensions of chronic suffering.
Confrontation can connect or destroy depending on how it is used. Armand and co-host Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D., a neurologist, trace confrontation from childhood power dynamics to workplace disputes, examining what makes it skillful or destructive, how body chemistry fuels anger, and why finding common ground often works better than open conflict.
Why do scattered people suddenly need to line up the ducks? Armand DiMele and guest Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. trace the spectrum from everyday tidying impulses to obsessive-compulsive disorder, examining the biology of doubt, the genetics of compulsive behavior, and why nightmares may all be, at root, about organizing chaos.
When does a child’s weight become a matter of parental neglect, even criminal liability? Armand DiMele and co-host Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. talk with Molly Carmel, eating disorder specialist at the Wilkins Center, about the biology of obesity, the limits of food policing, and what parents can actually do to help.
Art can unlock emotional breakthroughs that talk therapy alone cannot. Armand DiMele and Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. explore with psychiatrist Jeremy Spiegel his practice of using deep, sustained engagement with a single artwork to dislodge buried feelings, alongside reflections on mindfulness and the emotional toll of medical training.
What separates a fixed false belief from reality, and when should it be challenged? Armand DiMele and Dr. Sherry Siegel, M.D. walk through the psychiatric anatomy of delusions and hallucinations, from delusional jealousy to Lilliputian visions in Parkinson’s patients, using vivid case stories to show how the brain constructs and distorts the real.
