An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness

To be honest, I should have done my research on Kay Redfield Jamison, who is the professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins.  She is an impressive lady: she achieved early tenure at UCLA, lectured at Harvard and Oxford, and was named a "Hero of Medicine" by Times Magazine.  When I found out that she, of all people, personally suffered from bipolar (manic-depressive) disorder, I was intrigued to read her memoir and garner some insights from her personal experience.

Unfortunately, and this is going to make me sound like a complete jerk... 'meh'.

I spent three days reading a prose version of a glorified resume.  Yes, I get that she's super gifted and that she grew up with awesome family support and that she studied in prestigious labs with super privileged opportunities... so I found it really hard to 'get' her dissatisfaction with life.   She found school so difficult that she took time off while studying abroad in Ireland, where she hung out with her siblings that studied throughout the U.K.  She achieved tenure, was guaranteed career development and financial stability... but that's the thing about depression... it's never going to be good enough.

I get that this is a memoir, but having been in a difficult place myself, I needed hope, compassion from a writer who had experienced the darkness, and the inspiration that came from rooting on someone who eventually found peace with their condition, even if they still waged the occasional battle.  Instead, I read 219 pages of her resume, family history of bipolar disorder, struggles with adult onset depression, and finding hope... in her lithium prescription.

Errrrrr... so yeah, the next book I'm going to read is going to be a happy one.