Author: arvain

Tick tock

Before I moved to New York, back when I was still in Hungary, sleep used to find me in my medical office. I seldom went upstairs, even though my apartment was just above my practice. More often, I would fall asleep at my desk, with my head resting on my laptop, caught between answering emails, […]

Freedom is a verb

Yesterday, while witnessing the formation of the new Hungarian Parliament and Peter Magyar’s inaugural address as Prime Minister of Hungary, I sat in my New York apartment and was moved to tears. There are moments when a political speech stops being about politics, when words aimed at an entire nation somehow find the most private […]

Hunger

You have to want it more than anything else. More than comfort, approval, but most importantly, you have to want it more than the seductive safety of a life that asks nothing extraordinary of you. You have to want it so fiercely that, at times, it borders on madness in the eyes of those who […]

Monthly reset & reflection with Nora and Eliott🐾

April Normally, I can quickly identify a month and summarize it with a clear sentence, a main theme, and a simple emotional story. However, April didn’t follow that pattern. It was vibrantly chaotic, slightly scattered, impulsive, and unpredictable, and I found myself loving it even more because of its wildness. It began softly, with me […]

I am the storm- a year in exile

For over a month, I’ve been avoiding writing this—my summary of the first year in New York—waiting for the perfect moment to share it. I’ve begun it at least four times. I open the document, face that year head-on, but each time I close it again, as if doing so could somehow make that year […]

Finally I can breathe- The Day Hungary Rewrote History

Less than twenty years ago—though it feels much longer—being Hungarian would spark a glow around the table. People would lean in instead of falling silent, with Budapest embodying beauty, brilliance, and long golden evenings by the Danube. Someone would always smile and mention the Parliament illuminated at night, the charm of Fisherman’s Bastion, the lively […]

Nothing About This Is Aesthetic

A Substack friend tagged me in a note asking me to share my self-care and wellness routine, and I started to type it in a note, but then I thought, no, that just won’t be enough… As a clinical health psychologist and lifestyle medicine practitioner, I’ve always valued a healthy lifestyle. However, during the more […]

❤️🤍💚

This one is for my Hungarian friends and readers who face the most important elections of our history. I want to encourage them to make their voices heard. I could say so many things—painfully too many—but as I have worked as a clinical health psychologist for 16 years, exactly as long as this totalitarian, corrupt […]

Each smile, a bargain paid in soul

I’m nowhere near where you stand, I could never reach that land. Cold between two stars I roam, with no clear path, no steady home, and still I go, though it takes its toll, each step a trade from my fading soul.

Monthly reset & reflection with Nora and Eliott🐾

My March in New York mainly focused on science. Early in the month, I delivered a talk at the Endometriosis Foundation of America Medical Conference in Times Square, discussing why pain frequently continues even after a “successful” endometriosis surgery, and exploring potential solutions from both the patient’s and the physician’s perspectives. I also gave a […]