Jayson Blair

The last two weeks have had me repeating a phrase that I learned many years ago from my high school journalism teacher, the astute and sapient Anne Sharp, when we either came across or created an image to represent the dangers of school administrators attempting to spin us, the student newspaper. The final image was of upright tiger wearing a brim hand with a card on it reading "press." The tiger was sitting in front of a picnic basket on a blanket and a person was sitting across from them. The caption read something like (and I'm sure we got the quote from somewhere; I just can't remember), "Doing business with the press is a bit like having lunch with a tiger, you don't know whether you are having lunch or you are the lunch." For those disinclined to my wrapping, winding, wreathing stories, I simplified the principle behind why I don't like doing media interviews, "Once you've been bitten by a tiger, you are a little hesitant to stick you...

In advance, the moral of this story is not that there is nothing that some helping hands and a little Ativan can't cure. Although, its a good combination. The experiences of a client with bipolar disorder responded me of the importance of having people in your life -- peer support -- who understand through firsthand experience what it has been like to walk in your shoes. This -- the notion that having help from someone who understands from their own experience can make a difference -- is a common mantra in the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance of Northern Virginia groups and has become a tool in the vast arsenal at Ashburn Psychological Services . Bipolar disorder usually presents itself in one of three forms: full-blown mania, hypomania and depression. In the depressed and manic states, some experience psychotic symptoms, such as delusions and hallucinations. Two less common presentations of bipolar are rapid cycling, where an individual shifts from mania to depression in ...

Washingtonian magazine has released its latest list of top doctors, and among the psychologists and psychiatrists, selected by peers, based on a criteria of whom their colleagues would send a friend or family member to for help, are three familiar names: the director and a psychologist from the practice (Ashburn Psychological Services), Dr. Michael Oberschneider ; the main psychiatrist at the practice, Dr. Sabah Hadi and a psychiatrist have referred dozens of peers with bipolar to over the years, Dr. Roy Stefanik . Dr. Stefanik is one of the fastest and most detailed diagnosticians I have seen, saving patients and family much time and many headaches. He also understands the depths of pharmacology and provides insight-orientation therapy that helps, in many cases, to separate behaviors from moods, to see where are intertwined and to come with a plan to address most. She has been stolen for almost a day each week by George Mason University to provide his diagnostic and pharmacology ser...

Good news -- I'm taking my life coaching work to one of the area's fastest growing psychological and psychiatric practices, Ashburn Psychological Services , a team of psychological and psychiatric professionals in Ashburn, Va. The team is run by Michael Oberschneider, Psy.D, a well-regarded clinical psychologist, his wife, Liz, a financial wunderkind. The other clinician-contractors are: Mehul V. Mankad, M.D. , a adult and forensic psychiatrist who was the former chief resident at Duke University, is considered one of the two top area psychiatrists by members of the bipolar support groups (he blends medication management and psychotherapy in a manner that is rare these days; and his ; Susan Hamilton, PhD ., a psychologist who is well-regarded by members of the group who have been treated by her and a former mental health chief at the American Red Cross; Margaret Wong, PhD., a very funny and nice child psychologist that I had met several months before when Michael helped the D...