Vilia Dragovoy opens with a technique simple enough to use mid-conversation: the Rule of Threes, where someone feeling anxious identifies three things they can see, three things they can smell, and three body parts they can move. It will not cure anxiety, she says, but it interrupts the spiral long enough to get through a stressful moment, whether that is a flight, a public-speaking slot, or a parent-teacher conference. Both hosts admit on air to having struggled with public speaking fears themselves, and Dragovoy walks through how a phobia like that almost always traces back to a root cause, whether fear of rejection or judgment, that therapy is built to unpack.
Dragovoy co-owns the Center for Revitalizing Psychiatry with her mother, Dr. Marina Turova, who founded the practice in Hackensack, New Jersey, in 2003 before opening a Sarasota location roughly thirteen years ago after falling for the area on vacation. Dragovoy's sister Alina joined about ten years ago, and Dragovoy herself joined four years ago; the sisters are now co-owners pushing the practice toward more services, wider technology, and expanded scheduling, including appointments as early as 6:20 a.m. and as late as 8 p.m. The Sarasota office alone employs 22 providers, covering everyone from psychiatrists and psychiatric nurse practitioners to therapists, psychologists, and life coaches, a distinction Dragovoy carefully explains for listeners who conflate the titles.
Two Very Different Client Bases Dragovoy has a front-row seat to how geography shapes mental health, comparing patients at the practice's original New Jersey office with those in Sarasota. She says clients in the fast-paced Bergen County market typically arrive already deep into crisis, having neglected their mental health the way people neglect the gym, while Sarasota clients tend to come in earlier, before conditions escalate, which she credits to less regional stigma around asking for help. She is candid that not every client needs medication, describing cases where a psychiatric provider steers someone toward therapy alone, and others where therapy alone is not enough for something like bipolar disorder.
On roundabouts, Dragovoy, who moved to Sarasota during the pandemic after years in the New York and New Jersey area, says she has mixed feelings and admits mild anxiety creeps in during rush hour, wondering whether the driver ahead of her actually knows how to use one. She singles out the diverging diamond interchange at I-75 and University Parkway as the most disorienting intersection she has encountered locally, and closes by recommending her close friend Karen Matford of Sirius Day Spa and MedSpa as a future guest.
What you'll take away
- Dragovoy teaches a quick anxiety technique called the Rule of Threes: naming three things you see, smell and can move
- Her family's practice, the Center for Revitalizing Psychiatry, started in Hackensack, New Jersey in 2003 and expanded to Sarasota about thirteen years ago
- The Sarasota office employs 22 providers spanning psychiatrists, psychiatric nurse practitioners, therapists, psychologists and life coaches
- She says Sarasota clients tend to seek help earlier than her New Jersey clients, attributing it to lower regional stigma around mental health
- She finds the I-75 and University Parkway diverging diamond interchange more disorienting than any standard roundabout in town
“The sooner you address the issue, the easier it's going to be to fix it or to prevent from happening.”
“It's very easy to neglect mental health, unfortunately, like cancer, until it comes out you don't know it's there.”
Places mentioned: I-75 and University Parkway