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Noose or New Slavery?
 The more my work as a psychiatrist challenges me to help my clients remain in the community, the more the staggering profundity of pain my clients endure tests me in a myriad of validations, interpretations, cognitive reframes, and psychotropic compotes. In New Orleans, this task is geometrically catastrophic with a damaged infrastructure slowly healing by second intention. – read full article
When Did You Come Back?
Today I read at the Light City Freedom School in the 9th ward on St. Claude Avenue. Cheerful little faces ran about the sanctuary of the church that sponsored the  summer program. Three little girls with barrettes and bows tried to play Miss Mary Mack. Somebody was always odd man out. They giggled loudly. A group of teenagers shared overnight gossip and teased younger ones about who did their hair that morning. – read full article
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Just another Day as a Psychiatrist
It’s another day at the primary health care center here in New Orleans. A client comes in for her first psychiatric visit. She’s not sure where to start. She starts with the narrative:
- Lost a stepdaughter at age 18 to cervical cancer. She had a tumultuous relationship with my client secondary to feeling replaced. The stepdaughter displaced anger against my client because her mother allowed a boyfriend to scald her with hot water as a young child.
- Husband of 20 years dies with her stepson in a drowning accident three days before Easter in 2001. He was a harbor policeman trying to rescue his son. Their bodies surfaced clung together miles away down the Mississippi River.
- A brother is shot 5 times in the head for a dispute about a gun cartridge unresolved by two younger brothers.
- At the brother’s funeral, a younger sister appears on the lam from parole. The parole officer shows up with a swarm of police officers to arrest her at the funeral.
- The two younger brothers were arrested the next day while the client’s mother went to check on the burial site. It wasn’t ready on the day of the funeral.
- The younger sister does two years. The two brothers do ten. – read full article
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Charlotte Hutton, MD
Vice President: Clinical Programs in New Orleans
Three months after arriving in New Orleans, psychiatrist Charlotte N.P. Hutton, M.D, of the New Orleans Adolescent Hospital put years of training and experience to work helping Louisianans of all ages cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Charlotte Hutton, MD
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