Cathren is a community collaborative artist who has been working with the Community Libraries of Providence and other non-profits since 2012, developing arts and literacy programs and creating public art installations. She has been an artist in residence at Hattie Ide Chaffee Home since 2023, implementing visual arts and health programs with seniors and dementia patients. Website: ArtHouseRI.com
The term “neurodiversity” first appeared in 1998 in a New York Times article by American journalist Harvey Blume. It was an intriguing idea – that neurological differences such as Autism Spectrum, ADHD, bipolar, et al., are not conditions that require medical intervention to “cure” them, but rather a natural variation in the human genome. Instead […]
Dear C and Dr. B.: I have no idea how to handle this situation. Last summer, my brother-in-law, Steve, was murdered. He had 2 sons, Jeff and Mark, and a recently divorced wife who is absolutely crazy. She’d been a paid escort when Steve married her and from the start no one liked her. She […]
Dear C and Dr. B: I was at an office party with about twelve people who’d been talking, laughing and making jokes for over an hour. The elevator door opened – it was the bookkeeper, Pam, and her husband Steve. They were dressed in their formal best, and they really did look much nicer than the […]
Dear C and Dr. B: I am anxious and can’t sleep. I obsess over the state of the world and just how bad things have gotten. All I see is death and destruction, inhumanity, and no hope for the future. I went to a therapist and she told me the same thing as my family and nearly everyone […]
Dear C and Dr. B: This Thanksgiving, my husband and my mother got into an argument over the proper way to melt cheese on toast in order to make grilled cheese sandwiches. Listening to them, I had a sudden realization: OMG, I married my mother! They each had this same tone of underlying bitter sarcasm […]
Glad tidings, RI! This holiday season is going to be very bright. As 2021 draws to a close, the majority of our art galleries have not just survived the pandemic – they are thriving. Restrictions brought innovation and when in-person events went temporarily dark, a virtual world came alive. Gallery Night ran virtual trolley tours […]
Dear C and Dr. B, My head is still reeling over this and I have not quite been able to reorient myself. It all started a year ago, after my divorce. I was feeling dejected and lonely. I wasn’t ready to date yet so instead I joined an online pen pal service. I was matched up with […]
Dear C and Dr. B, I am a therapist at a busy community health center and I am unsure how to think about one client who was in her 20’s. She told me she was going to commit suicide by contracting COVID. She said she would carry this out by not getting vaccinated and refusing to […]
Dear C and Dr. B, I think my husband is trying to hand me a load of crap, maybe you can offer an opinion. Joe has a weight problem which could potentially impact his health, but he just can’t stick to his diet. His reason? He blames our pet, a cockatiel. Joe claims the bird […]
Dear C and Dr. B: My sister is an inflexible person and she flies off the handle if we are discussing a topic and I don’t agree with her. She tends to have very negative opinions based on her own social prejudices, like, “EVERYONE on unemployment now is just a lazy freeloader, there’s tons of jobs.” […]