I'm Takahiro Haga, a psychiatrist.

Today, I'd like to share a little about myself.

Recently, many doctors, including Dr. Yusuke Masuda, have been speaking quite frankly about themselves. I think self-disclosure is actually very important.

When you get down to it, the things psychiatrists talk about tend to be similar.

"Eat three meals a day properly."

"Avoid reversing your day and night cycle and regulate your sleep-wake cycle."

"Take baths."

"Exercise moderately."

These are all common sense things.

Even in videos of doctors talking about cosmetic medicine, they said something to the effect of, "Just by regulating lifestyle habits such as diet, sleep, and exercise, about 70% of skin condition improves. The remaining 30% is the role of cosmetic medicine."

Ultimately, whether it's medicine or cosmetic medicine, the basics aren't all that different.

So, even though they're saying the same thing, why do we listen to what one person says, and ignore what another says?

I think "who is saying it" plays a big role.

If you don't disclose anything about yourself, the only things people can judge you by are your way of speaking, your appearance, and your overall demeanor. But when you talk about the life you've lived, what you've worried about, and what your weaknesses are, people will empathize with you.

"I'll listen to what this teacher has to say."

Sometimes people think that.

That's why I decided to try disclosing more about myself.

There are three main things I feel are "really troublesome."

First, I have extremely sensitive skin.

This isn't just a matter of having sensitive skin; I think I might have the most sensitive skin out of 100 people.

A while ago, I went to a place where you can enjoy a barrel sauna in the middle of a forest. You enter a barrel-shaped sauna, then a cold bath with groundwater, and relax on a deck chair while enjoying the forest air. It's the perfect environment for a sauna lover.

That day was cloudy.

"It's cloudy, so it should be fine,"

Thinking that, I let my guard down and repeated the sauna, cold bath, and outdoor air bathing cycle many times with a lot of skin exposed. This was a huge mistake.

It was only about an hour, but afterwards, my whole body looked like it had been burned. It wasn't just redness or a rash; my skin was raw and oozing fluid.

Ultimately, I had to use oral steroids and antihistamines, and apply topical steroid cream all over my body, and it finally calmed down after a few days.

Just being outside for about an hour on a cloudy day caused this much of a rash.

That's how sensitive I am to sunlight.

Since I started doing home visits, I've definitely started using sunscreen a lot more. However, I don't really like putting anything on my face or neck in the first place. Even so, if I don't, my skin gets irritated, so I take precautions, including arm covers.

I don't really care that much about the appearance itself.

However,

When people say, "Doctor, your face is red,"

"Is your skin okay?"

For some reason, I really dislike it.

Of course, the other person is saying it out of concern, but deep down I think, "Just leave me alone."

Perhaps, even though I don't think of it as a "complex," it's actually something I'm quite sensitive about. People can get unnecessarily upset when someone points out something they don't want to talk about.

The second thing is that I sweat an abnormal amount.

I've been active in sports since I was young, so I've always been someone who sweats. However, it wasn't this much before.

But as I've gotten older, I've started sweating an incredible amount in situations that require mental effort, slightly stressful situations, or in hot places.

Just walking from my house to the train station in the summer, my T-shirt is soaked by the time I get on the train.

I'll never forget the time I visited my daughter's middle school.

I was given a tour of the girls' school, and a teacher guided me around the campus. I was even allowed into a classroom where the art club students were working, and for some reason, I became incredibly nervous there.

Then, I started sweating profusely, like a waterfall.

A father in his forties, sweating profusely alone in a classroom full of middle school girls.

"I must look like a really suspicious old man,"

Thinking that made me sweat even more.

It was a vicious cycle.

As a psychiatrist, I've met many patients who sweat profusely when nervous. But I've hardly ever seen anyone sweat more than me.

Fortunately, my sweat doesn't smell very strong.

There are eccrine and apocrine sweat glands, but in my case, I sweat a lot of watery sweat from my whole body, not just my armpits, so perhaps that's why the smell is relatively mild.

Even so, it's incredibly inconvenient.

"Doctor, you're sweating a lot, are you okay?"

Patients and people around me sometimes express concern.

Of course, outwardly, I reply,

"I'm fine. Thank you."


But deep down, I'm thinking, "It's okay, just leave me al...