MentalIllness

Get Me Out of Here: My Recovery from Borderline Personality Disorder | Rachel Reiland

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Like many people who‘ve found out they or a loved one have BPD, I came across Reiland‘s memoir pretty early in my research. The first 2/3rds are pretty harrowing, as Reiland unapologetically presents some awful behavior.

I am torn by how much I enjoyed her story overall and how much I want to call shenanigans on some of it. I don‘t want to discount her experience, but there are times where her circumstances seem too convenient. ⬇️

BC_Dittemore And I often wondered how helpful this book could be to people who don‘t have anywhere near the same support system Reiland had. 2w

5 likes1 comment

currentlyreadinginCO

The Painter's Daughters: A Novel | Emily Howes

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Haunting and beautiful historical fiction about Thomas Gainsborough's daughters 🔥🔥. The author writes young girls well and ages them naturally, giving their development a role in revealing this story's secrets. Gainsborough's paintings are referenced through the girls' memories of sitting for them and seeing them in their homes. I loved the writing, and gasped at the twists - also worth reading the bit about the art inspiring the plot at the end

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monkeygirlsmama

Made You Up | Francesca Zappia

Learned about a #freelittlelibrary just down the street from us. Moving this weekend, and my daughter decided she had a few books she didn't wish to take with us. Having recently heard about this FLL I decided I'd drop off the no longer desired books to add to their selection. I didn't intend to leave with my own mini haul. 🙄 But, in my defense one of these three books is one I grabbed for my daughter. 😁📚😊

Kristy_K I read Made You Up years ago and remember loving it! 2w

monkeygirlsmama @Kristy_K After I grabbed it and was nearly home I started thinking I too may have read it already. LoL Not that I'll let that stop me from reading it again. 😁 1w

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CatLass007

The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness | Elyn R. Saks

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#ReadAway2024 Elyn Saks‘ memoir is compelling. Her history of mental illness began as a child with delusions, although it wasn‘t recognized at the time. As she grew older she developed anorexia. When she participated in an immersive summer abroad, she experimented with marijuana and also tried it once or twice when she returned home. Feeling guilty, she confessed her brief experimentation to her parents, who strongly overreacted, (cont)⬇️

DieAReader, Andrew65, GHABI4ROSES

CatLass007 assuming she was a drug addict and forcing her to attend every day after school and on weekends a rather suspect treatment program. Their insistence that all drugs were bad, even taking aspirin for a headache, and that using any kind of medication meant she was weak and was not using enough self-control. At Vanderbilt University she began experiencing hallucinations but hid them from everyone and managed to graduate first in her class. (cont)⬇️ 3w

CatLass007 Next she attended Oxford University where she earned her doctorate in Philosophy. It was while she was at Oxford that she had her first psychotic break. She sought medical attention but was insistent that she would not, could not, take drugs. She was part of a daily outpatient program where she participated in groups. Eventually she did begin to take prescribed antidepressants and participating in intensive daily psychoanalysis. But she (cont)⬇️ 3w

CatLass007 eventually stopped taking the medication. This was to be a continuing pattern throughout her life, taking prescribed medication until she felt like she was exerting enough self-control to stop taking medication. Eventually she completed her studies and returned to the US to study law at Yale. She suffered another psychotic break but at Yale Medical, the treatment she received was brutal. She was forced into restraints, injected with (cont)⬇️ 3w

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CatLass007 anti-psychotics and doctors informed the University that she had to be withdrawn from school for the semester. The rights of the patient in the UK were far superior to the rights of the patient in the US. She eventually earned her JD from Yale and took an adjunct position in Law at a small school in New England. She applied for tenure track positions at over 40 universities and was hired at the University of Southern California, her first (cont)⬇️ 3w

CatLass007 choice. Eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia, later amended to schizoaffective disorder because of her concurrent depression, she taught classes, published papers, and had a book outline in her portfolio which she presented in her bid for tenure. She achieved tenure and continues to teach and publish. She attempted on many occasions throughout her treatment to wean herself from medication so that she would be in control, not the (cont)⬇️ 3w

CatLass007 medicine. After decades she finally was able to admit to herself that she had a mental illness and would need to be on medication for the rest of her life. I believe that her denial of the necessity of medication was caused by two factors: the drug treatment program in which she was forced to participate, and her own hubris. For the majority of her life she believed she was too intelligent to have a mental illness. I witnessed the (cont)⬇️ 3w

CatLass007 same behavior in my mother‘s younger brother. He was an MD and he didn‘t need Lithium. His intelligence combined with his arrogance caused the delusion that he didn‘t need to be medicated. If you or anyone you know has a mental illness, I encourage you to read this book. (edited) 3w

DieAReader 📚Stacked❤️‍🔥Sounds like a great read! You might also enjoy my current read😏 there‘s a MAX, 4 episode show available as of today about it too.

HIDDEN VALLEY ROAD.

CatLass007 @DieAReader Thanks for the rec. This sounds familiar to me. 3w

DieAReader @CatLass007 🤓Absolutely! It was published in 2020 so, you may have already read it😏 I‘m a little behind🤣🤷🏻‍♀️ 3w

CatLass007 @DieAReader No, I haven‘t read it. But I‘ve read about it. 3w

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

There is hope, even when your brain tells you there isn‘t.

Lovelylottereader (Technically from the acknowledgments) 3w

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

[…] and no one ever says goodbye unless they want to see you again.

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

Love is not a tragedy or a failure, but a gift.
You remember your first love because they show you, prove to you, that you can live and be loved, that nothing in this world is deserved except for love, that love is both how you become a person, and why.

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

To be alive is to be missing.

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

“You pick your endings, and your beginnings. You get to pick the frame, you know? Maybe you don‘t choose what‘s in the picture, but you decide on the frame”

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Lovelylottereader

Turtles All the Way Down | John Green

“The problem with happy endings,” I said, “is that they‘re either not really happy, or not really endings, you know?”

1 like