By a veteran psychologist who’s definitely overcooked a few things too
Let’s talk about Carmy Berzatto — the brilliant, haunted, and frequently spiraling chef at the heart of FX’s The Bear. If you’ve seen the show, you probably already feel like you’ve been in therapy just from watching it. The clatter, the chaos, the constant low-level scream that is Carmy’s internal monologue — it’s anxiety television at its most visceral. But underneath the sweat, the shouting, and the sous-chef stress lies a very human story about trauma, perfectionism, and the fear of being truly seen.
As a psychologist with more years in practice than Carmy has spent behind a stove (and thankfully, far less yelling), I find him to be a fascinating study in unresolved grief and complex trauma. But let’s break that down in terms the average viewer — or line cook — can digest.
High Functioning, Low Regulation
Carmy is the type of client who walks into a session not because he wants to, but because someone he reluctantly respects told him he needs to. He’s visibly uncomfortable with emotional language, reflexively turns any personal question into a work story, and probably forgot to eat today. He’s a perfectionist — not because he wants to be the best, but because he believes that being anything less might make him unlovable or unworthy.
He runs on pure adrenaline, intensity, and shame. His capacity for excellence is immense, but so is his internal punishment system. He’s like a Michelin-starred racehorse with a limp — you can marvel at the beauty of it, but you also want to cry when you see how hard he’s pushing just to keep standing.
What’s Eating Carmy?
We can’t talk about Carmy without talking about trauma. He’s experienced it in layers — family dysfunction, substance use disorder in those closest to him, toxic workplaces, the suicide of his brother, and the unrelenting demands of professional kitchens that prize brutality over wellness. But trauma isn’t just about what happened to him. It’s also about what never happened — the nurturance, safety, and affirmation he never received.
What’s most striking is how Carmy has internalized the chaos of his upbringing. The kitchen is both his battlefield and his comfort zone. He recreates stress and conflict because it feels familiar. If things are too calm, he assumes he must be missing something — and finds a way to light a metaphorical (or literal) fire.
And then there’s the vulnerability. Or more accurately: the total avoidance of it. Carmy is emotionally avoidant with the flair of a man who once confided in a piece of Wagyu beef before he ever opened up to another human being. Intimacy — with friends, family, romantic partners — is terrifying to him because it implies surrender. And surrender, in his mind, is weakness.
“Yes, Chef” and the Psychology of Control
One of the most revealing dynamics in The Bear is how Carmy relates to power and control. He wields authority reluctantly but rigidly. He doesn’t want to be a tyrant, but he doesn’t know how to lead without replicating the environments that shaped him. To Carmy, control equals safety. When things spin out — and they always do — his impulse is to tighten the reins even further, to eliminate risk by eliminating trust.
A psychologist might name what he’s dealing with as symptoms of Complex PTSD, likely coupled with Obsessive-Compulsive Personality traits — not OCD in the classic sense, but the perfectionism, rigidity, and hyper-focus on rules and order as a defense against inner chaos. He’s not obsessive because he likes structure. He’s obsessive because structure is the only thing between him and emotional collapse.
What Would Therapy Look Like?
First off: getting Carmy to show up consistently would be a challenge. He’d cancel, reschedule, forget, or try to make therapy into a performance. He might even offer to cook for me as a way of avoiding talking about his feelings (which, to be fair, I’d accept).
But with time and the right approach, there’s hope. Carmy would benefit most from a therapist who doesn’t flinch at intensity. Someone who can sit with his pain without trying to fix it too quickly. A trauma-informed psychodynamic or somatic therapist could help him begin to recognize how his body and nervous system are always in a state of hyperarousal — and why.
One of the early goals in treatment would be helping him separate who he is from what he does. His self-worth is completely fused with his performance. Therapy would help him build a stable internal identity — one not entirely dependent on external praise or relentless standards.
We’d also work on boundaries. With family. With staff. With himself. Right now, Carmy has no off switch. Teaching him how to rest without guilt might be the most radical intervention of all.
And let’s not forget grief. So much of Carmy’s pain is unspoken sorrow — for his brother, for his lost youth, for the parts of himself he never got to grow. Grief isn’t a straight line, and it doesn’t end in catharsis. But learning to carry it, rather than run from it, could offer Carmy the emotional flexibility he so deeply lacks.
Why We Root for Him
Despite everything, we want Carmy to win — not in the culinary sense, but in the human one. We want him to love and be loved. To take a deep breath. To laugh without irony. We see ourselves in his anxiety, his pressure to be perfect, his fear of not being enough. Carmy’s struggle is a mirror for anyone who’s ever tried to outrun their own past by staying too busy to feel it.
The Bear doesn’t offer easy resolutions, and neither does therapy. But in the quiet moments — when Carmy lets someone in, or pauses long enough to just be — we get a glimpse of what healing could look like. And like any good meal, it’s made up of simple things done with care: patience, honesty, connection, and a dash of hope.