Kani Ilangovan M.D. LLC

I am a child, adolescent and adult psychiatrist who has been treating Princeton University students since 2008.

I do both medication management and psychotherapy. My modalities are interpersonal, cognitive-behavioral and mindfulness based therapies.

Healing helps restore our strength, resilience, compassion, energy, patience and perspective. It is a huge gift to yourself and others to devote your time and energy to heal.

Due to stigma, some may think it is a weakness to go to a therapist or therapist. I strongly disagree and tell my patients that Olympic athletes, the best athletes in the world, need coaches. We live in a time when therapy and medication are readily available. Why not get the help you need?

Who should go to therapy? Anyone who could benefit. You don’t have to be totally distraught and depressed. You don’t have to be at a certain point on the scale of suffering to qualify. You could go if you feel you would like someone objective, outside of your friend/family/work orbit to discuss some of the issues you are facing in your life. You could go if you are feeling tired and would benefit from some support.

Would you like to unburden your heart from some secrets you are carrying or trauma you have experienced? Would you like someone to talk to whom you can tell anything and it will be confidential and will not impact your relationships with others if you tell them?

Some people are in therapy just to cope with the people in their lives who really need to go to therapy, but won’t ever go.

I am in therapy and I find it helps me recover myself, my memories, my relationships, my humanity. Therapy helps me not feel like just a cog in the production machine. I agree with the saying “What is broken in relationship must be healed in relationship.”

I am constantly amazed and impressed by the students whom I see. I am often surprised by the lack of self-compassion in many of the students I see. When your identity is centered around intelligence and achievement, arriving at a setting where everyone is intelligent and successful can be disorienting and make you question your identity and worth. 

I believe that all people have inherent value and so do many of the students I see, but despite believing that, they somehow feel that their personal value hinges on their achievements and others’ opinions of them. I think that, unfortunately, many aspects of Princeton’s culture reinforce this belief. For example, the eating clubs, in which students spend a grueling week staying up all hours of the night rating and critiquing people as to who are the most desirable to be granted entrance to their elite, exclusive group. It sounds like a grueling, exhausting and disheartening process from what I have heard from students and not a very pleasant way of looking at people.

I feel that many Princeton students are encouraged to hide their vulnerability for fear of not being good enough, which makes them feel like frauds and inadequate since they need to put on a front in order to be accepted. Have you heard of imposter syndrome? I like the sayings “You shouldn’t compare your insides to other people’s outsides. It’s not a fair comparison” and “Comparison is the thief of joy.”

You all are smart and successful, but this culture makes many of you feel unworthy. Being human is acceptable and valuable. Our limitations help us have compassion and understanding for others. You are not required to be superhuman even though it often feels like a superhero training academy here.

Accepting your vulnerability will allow you to manifest even more of your strengths. If you have any time, I recommend that you watch this TED talk by Brene Brown:
http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html
I think her book The Gifts of Imperfection should be required reading for every Princeton student. Accepting and embracing our imperfection sets us free and accelerates our growth. Here are some great self compassion exercises from Dr. Kristin Neff: https://self-compassion.org/self-compassion-practices/

As my wise, retired therapist friend Carol Tracy said, “by sharing our own struggles, by being open to our own humanity and vulnerability, we can connect with the pain and conflicts of others, in ways that lets them know we do understand and they are not alone. And in the end, I do believe that what unites us is the deep wish to be known and understood by another. I tell my clients that when they are (hopefully) 90 years old and on their deathbed, they are not going to be thinking about that "B" they got in college, or how much they weighed when they were 23 or any of the other things we criticize ourselves about, but rather, who and how did I love, and did I let them know.”

I also appreciate this quote from Dr. Devika Bhushan, former acting Surgeon General of CA “Real self care involves the hard work of setting boundaries, cultivating our muscles of self-compassion, and getting clear on the values that determine how we want to live - not just on our goals themselves. This allows ‘our insides to match our outsides.’”

I encourage you to treat yourself with great kindness and compassion, and when you are suffering, do the most loving and kind thing you can for yourself. If you are open to therapy, I really encourage you to give it a try.

May you seek the support that is readily available and enter a space where you feel seen, valued and heard. I like the saying “Hurt people hurt people. Healed people heal people.” We need all the healers we can get in our heartbreaking and beautiful world.