While I was looking at the list of possible book options that I could read for this project, it was rather hard to narrow the list down to a top three that would really be interested in reading. However I eventually narrowed the list down to my top pick, which happened to be Monkey Mind: A Memoir of Anxiety by Daniel Smith. I found this book to be very interesting, as well as an easy enjoyable read. This book is the story of a man named Daniel Smith, and his path while he struggles with anxiety. This book is all about the cause and development of anxiety that he suffers with in his life. The story is told from Daniel’s perspective and jumps back and forth between his older life and his younger life to help get his story across. Daniel …show more content…
The biological evidences is that his own mother also suffered from anxiety and it is proven that Anxiety disorder can be passed on through genetics. Therefore the fact that Daniel had Anxiety is very possible to have to do with the fact that his mother also suffered from it. Now this is not the only case for Daniels anxiety. Daniel also suffered from a few traumatic events throughout his childhood and teens years that definitely played a role in his anxiety disorder. The incident in which he almost drowned as a child was very traumatic, and would be for anyone. He was very young for this even and really doesn’t remember it but for a while he had a great fear of water and then a short period of being afraid of the toilet. This traumatic caused Daniel to gain a fear of water for a period of time throughout his life. Then the event in which he lost his virginity. He says that that event is the one that really sparked his anxiety and caused it to become to …show more content…
His family was very supportive for Daniel. They were always the people that he would talk to when he was having bad anxiety. Especially when Daniel went off to college for the first time. He was very anxious and would call home to his mother every day and more than once a day. His parents then came to see him at school to talk to him and see what was going on with him. They were both very supportive and understanding of Daniels case which I think helped him in the long run. It is said that having a good support group when one suffers from anxiety is one of the most beneficial things for the person with anxiety. His family was always there for him no matter what. I think that the fact that Daniel had such a strong support group defiantly helped with his story, now it never went away but it did get better for him. Also the fact that they supported this book probably helped in as
The novel Go Ask Alice written anonymously tells the story of one girl’s struggle with drug addiction. The conflict in this novel is person versus self. The protagonist is struggling against herself trying to overcome addiction. The mood is depressing. The main character reveals how drugs ruined her life, which evokes depressed feelings in the reader. The point of view is first person. This is a publishing of a teenage girl’s diary and she wrote in first person. The conflict, mood, and point of view make this book a work of realistic fiction.
In the short story “Bulldog” by Greg Bottoms, two adolescents are harassing a ferocious bulldog that one of them used to own. The narrator documents his friend, Mark, ranting about his familial issues, his hatred for his parents, and then taking his anger out on the bulldog. In these scenes, Bottoms uses various sensory details including auditory, visual, and tactile to create a strong overarching mood of anxiety that reaches the audience.
People in society tend to face many challenges that occur in their lives. Some of these challenges can affect people's lives in a positive way or a negative way. If they face their challenges in the negative way, they will suffer for a long time. Having confidence in themselves is considered the best way to overcome the suffering they have in their lives. In the novel, The Shipping News, by Annie Proulx, Quoyle deals with many difficult challenges along his life journey by suffering from bad childhood experiences which led him to have a low self confidence, falling in love with the wrong person that made his life miserable, and raising his two children on his own without getting any support from his wife.
Daniels past best friend Chris had a tragic death. After this, daniel became hesitant towards making new friends as he thought he would lose them again. This death changed his life majorly, he slowly had fewer friends because he thought the closer he became to them and the more he relied on them he would lose them, He then met eddy who changed his life forever. Even when eddy is dead Daniel kept his emotions and lessons learnt from eddy to use in life, this he did. He used everything eddy said and it helped him through life. Eddy's death made daniel feel happy and sad. Happy because she had died the way she meant to “ Nothing except I felt like she'd died the way she was meant to. No sirens. N needles and tubes. No watching her fade away.” (pg 191) It also made him feel lonely, his best friend in the world had just died “I felt stranded and lost. Alone in the world, it was a feeling that scorched a path in my mind back to the time when Chris had died." Eddy's death made daniel more appreciative of the people around him. He also became very positive and trusting. He knew he could face life on his own, he knew he was independent but also knew when to ask for help, he knew he could find someone else like eddy. “I wasn't alone. I'd never be alone, eddy had taught me that. Alone is a state of mind." Due to the deaths of eddy and Chris daniels identity has changed for the good from lessons in
In Edwidge Danticat’s novel, it is shown that people in suffering are thus hopeful, yet their hope leads to despair as they realize that hope does not free them from the harsh reality of their own lives. Guy, a working husband and father struggling to feed his family, from “A Wall of Fire Rising”, reveals the depth of his despair when he decides to take his own life. Throughout the story, Guy talks of flying
Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman is a novel about a school aged boy named Caden who becomes afflicted by mental illness. Caden is a smart kid and a very good student when he suddenly begins to do poorly on tests, becomes distant, and starts making odd comments. Instead of perceiving normal reality, he sees life in a metaphorical dream world where he is on a ship with many strange characters. His parents get him help in a mental hospital where he struggles but eventually recovers from his illness. The author uses Caden’s story and literary devices such as rhyming, metaphors, and personification to communicate what it is like to struggle through mental illness. Going through mental illness is like going through a parallel but
Leahy, R. L. (2008, April 30). How Big a Problem is Anxiety?. Psychology Today: Health, Help,
Anxiety is common mental illness in the US, which Kim Krisberg talks about in her article “Anxiety: A Normal Response That Can Feel Overwhelming. The cause of anxiety is brought up in Peter Crostas’ article “What Causes Anxiety?” Crosta also explains the treatments for anxiety in his article, “What Are Treatments For Anxiety?”
Emotional discomfort can sometimes be perceived as mental instability. A person may look, act, or feel insane, when in truth they are just very uncomfortable in their own skin. The narrator has a genuinely difficult decision to make which far outside his comfort zone. He is choosing between a woman who has been like a mother to him and much needed job that he feels he may enjoy. This choice is tearing him apart from the inside out. From the ringing noises that interrupt his every thought to the skin he is scraping off. The author uses diction, syntax, and extended metaphors to express the complete and utter discomfort of the narrator, both physically and emotionally.
Do you know what it feels like to have your palms sweat, throat close up, and your fingers tremble? This is the everyday life of someone who lives with anxiety. As soon as I wake up in the morning, I hear my brain freaking out about the day ahead of me. What do I eat for breakfast? What do I do first when I get home from school? What happens if I get in a car crash on my way to school? A million thoughts at one time racing through my head. I never have the time to process all of them. Most mornings, I lay in my bed and have to take a few deep breaths to begin my hectic but not so hectic day. That’s just the beginning. It’s safe to say that I feel that I 'm an anxious person and that I have an anxiety disorder.
I think Joseph LeDoux did an amazing job on his work, The Emotional Brain: The Mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life. Though I’m not a expert about emotions or even in the fields of science, I, in my personal opinion would definitely recommend this book to anybody who would ask for a book recommendation for class or even for pleasure because it does provide a steady understanding of the behind scenes of emotions and the role in it to evolutionary beings. AND it certainly was stress-free to flip each page one by one until the very end.
If you have ever been tense before an exam, a date, or a job interview, you have some idea of what anxiety feels like. Increased heart rate, sweating, rapid breathing, a dry mouth, and a sense of dread are common components of anxiety. But episodes of modern anxiety are a normal part of the life for most people. But what anxiety is so intense and long lasting that it impairs a person’s daily functioning is called an anxiety disorder. It is a general term for several disorders that cause apprehension, nervousness, fear, and worrying. These disorders affect how we feel and behave, and they can manifest real physical symptoms. Mild anxiety is vague and unsettling, while severe anxiety can be extremely debilitating, having a serious impact on daily life.
Anxiety disorders are psychiatric in nature and can cause distress in the individual experiencing them. High amount of anxiety often appear in individuals who are vulnerable to stressful situations and can cause fear, sadness, anger, and dependent on the extent of the disorder, social isolation. Extreme anxiety can be a genetic trait or a learned process from a traumatic experience, such as childhood induced posttraumatic syndrome. The individual may have barriers that prevent them from dealing with normal situations, which can produce debilitating amounts of anxiety. In these cases, the individual may obsess about the worst possible scenario when dealing with high stress situations. This normally produces a fight or flight response to the high stress situation that is being experienced.
The novel follows the protagonist, Celie, as she experiences such hardships as racism and abuse, all the while attempting to discover her own sense of self-worth. Celie expresses herself through a series of private letters that are initially addressed to God, then later to her sister Nettie. As Celie develops from an adolescent into an adult, her letters possess m... ... middle of paper ... ... bservations of her situation and form an analysis of her own feelings.