The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness by Elyn R. Saks is an eye opening personal record of a woman’s journey through her mental illness of schizophrenia. This memoir takes readers through what it is like being a woman and a scholar with schizophrenia, how one can live a fulfilling life despite the excruciating odds of the disease. Saks brings us through her life from the development of her life mantra to what it takes to have a meaningful life with schizophrenia. This is not only a story of hope and perseverance through the loss of personal identity, security, safety, and friends but an educational opportunity for people to learn what it may be like to have a mental illness from a personal and educational perspective. This review will demonstrate present key elements, basic concepts, a personal reaction, and to whom this book may be useful. Within this book there are many elements and themes presented to express what it is like to have a …show more content…
This memoir of hope and resilience is outstanding and any person effected my mental health should have the experience of reading Saks work. Although this is a phenomenal personal account of mental health and recovery, it is important to recognize the privilege that Elyn Saks has. She has opportunity for education, and appears to have no issue with finances due to her families success. This equal opportunity into hospitals, life time medication, and psychoanalysis may not be accessible to all persons. Some people may not have a the financial, education accessibility that Elyn Saks possesses. She does express this as a concern to her readers, leaving her overall hope, “that by writing this book [she] helps others to take some of what they need to make their own lives a little better, too”
Before reading the poem “Schizophrenia” this writer assumed that it would focus on one individual diagnosis with schizophrenia, but it also focused on a house. In the poem “Schizophrenia” by Jim Stevens, the poet describes a relationship between a husband and his wife. Stevens shows how the characters differences and aggression has changed the atmosphere of the house. The poet explained that not only is the couple affected by their hostile environment, it is the house that is suffering the most from the couple’s behaviors. Stevens has the house as a representation of how a brain of a person with schizophrenia person. Through the use of the characters actions and the house, Stevens exemplifies how schizophrenia can ruin a person’s life. After
Although Susanna Kaysen’s rebellious and self-harming actions of coping with her psychosis are viewed by some critics as pushing the boundary of sanity, many people have a form of a “borderline personality” that they must accept and individually work towards understanding in order to release themselves from the confines of their disorder. Kaysen commits to a journey of self-discovery, which ultimately allows her to accept and understand herself and her psychosis.
From reading and reflecting her personal experience and journey with her sister, Pamela, I acquired a personal outlook of the deteriorating effects of mental illness as a whole, discovering how one individual’s symptoms could significantly impact others such as family and friends. From this new perspective mental health counseling provides a dominate field within not only individuals who may suffer mental illness such as Pamela, but also serve as a breaking point for family and friends who also travel through the illness, such as Carolyn.
In 1978, Susan Sheehan took an interest in Sylvia Frumkin, a schizophrenic who spent most of her life in and out of mental hospitals. For more than two years, Sheehan followed Sylvia around, observing when Sylvia talked to herself, sitting in on sessions with Sylvia’s doctors, and at times, sleeping in the same bed as Sylvia during her stay at the psychiatric centers. Through Sheehan’s intensive report on Sylvia’s life, readers are able to obtain useful information on what it’s like to live with this disorder, how impairing it can be for them, and the symptoms and causes to look out for; likewise, readers can get an inside look of how some mental hospitals are run and how a misdiagnosis can negatively impact someone’s life.
The ‘me’ becomes a haze, and the solid center from which one experiences reality breaks up like a bad radio signal. (Saks, p. 13)” These words are the description of schizophrenia, written by a woman who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, Elyn Saks. Her book, The Center Cannot Hold, is the memoir of Sak’s own life experience and her struggle with schizophrenia, or as she puts it, her journey through madness. Although her journey did not lead to a full recovery, as is the case with many individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia, Saks was able to live and maintain a life, despite her very negative prognosis.
Essay #2: Classical Argument: People fear what they do not know or understand. Madness, or insanity, can be defined as severe mental illness or abnormal behavior. It can mean that one cannot conform to society or is simply foolish. Every definition of the word, however, pertains to some deficiency in one’s relationship with oneself or the world. If a man cannot get along with people in the world because he does not operate by the same set of logical principles, moral precepts, or social graces that the society around him accepts, that society might consider him insane.
Forcing someone to take medication or be hospitalized against their will seems contrary to an individual’s right to refuse medical treatment, however, the issue becomes complicated when it involves individuals suffering from a mental illness. What should be done when a person has lost their grasp on reality, or if they are at a risk of harming themselves or others? Would that justify denying individuals the right to refuse treatment and issuing involuntary treatment? Numerous books and articles have been written which debates this issue and presents the recommendations of assorted experts.
I have always believed that the prognoses for Schizophrenia was, at best, bleak with little chance of any normality or functionality. While I understand that Snyder’s situation is by no means the norm, his current situation offers hope that a life of stability, self-sufficiency and social competence is possible for those diagnosed with Schizophrenia. This assisted in altering my view of Schizophrenia as a “hopeless” situation. It reminded me how important it is to not give up on your clients and believe that they are capable of living, at least to some extent, a fulfilling and functional life. If I as a counselor have no faith in my clients and believe my clients to be hopeless and doomed to their disorder, how can I possibly expect to be able to assist them or for them to be able to help themselves. It is essential to remember that my client has been diagnosed with Schizophrenia and not that my clients is a schizophrenic; this goes for every diagnosis, it does not define who my client
Schizophrenia is perhaps one of the most treaded mental disorders, and often confused with multiple personality disorder, which is now known as dissociative identity disorder (DID). With hallucinations, false senses of reality, and delusions, paranoid thoughts that have no basis in reality, schizophrenia is the truly terrifying to not only those around the patient, but to the patient themself. For Professor Elyn Saks, a professor of law, psychiatry, and psychology at the University of Southern California, this comes as no surprise. As a chronic schizophrenic, Professor Saks recalled one of her worst psychotic episodes, which occurred shortly after her New Haven analyst, Dr. White, revealed to her that he was closing his practice. Saks described the news to be shattering, and the trigger to her psychotic episode. Saks continues to describe the psychotic episode, telling the audience hat her best friend flew out to be with her. Saks begins to quote from her writings: "...[f]or a week or more, I had barely eaten. I was gaunt. I walked
Families with a member suffering from any illness may be stressful enough but families with members diagnosed with schizophrenia are often faced with additional challenges such as the “external stressors of social stigma, isolation, and emotional frustration”. Many times, family conflicts arise as members attempt to provide care on an everyday basis (Chien, 2010, pg. xi). “A Beautiful Mind” is a brilliant motion picture directed by Ron Howard that chronicles the life of one John Nash, a prominent mathematician and the challenges he endures throughout his adult life afflicted with a chronic mental illness. “A Beautiful Mind” allows us to gain insight into the stressors that many families undergo when faced with living with a person with schizophrenia. This paper will explore the impact of schizophrenia on the lives of the Nash family as depicted in the aforementioned movie. Exploring the impact of the disease on the Nash family’s life will be followed with a discussion regarding an assessment conducted of the family, through the use of the Calgary Family Assessment model. Conducting the assessment allowed us to determine two nursing priorities, and nursing interventions in relation to them through the use of the Calgary intervention model. Essentially it becomes evident that the challenges faced by the Nash family are in the functional domain. The families inability to effectively communicate and problem solve becomes evident, which is negatively impacting the families ability to function effectively. Our nursing interventions guided by the Calgary Nursing Intervention Model will focus on providing the Nash family with the support needed to bring about change in the affective domain in foster effective communication with the famil...
middle of paper ... ... However, there is a large portion of mental health ill people that are able to find stability and maintain stability in their illness. Many of these people overcome their illness to some extent and manage to play an important role in society. Work Cited: Claire Henderson, Sara Evans-Lacko, Clare Flach, Graham, Thornicrofi.
Insanity seems to be the question in the courtroom today. What defines if a person is mentally stable or if he is sick? The government and court system has been trying to find the definite line, but there are still varying beliefs for and against whether people should be allowed to plead insanity. The definition of insanity is, “the state of being mentally ill; madness” (Oxford Dictionary). The definition of mentally ill is “psychiatric disorder that results in a disruption in a person’s thinking, feeling, moods, and ability to relate to others” (worldiQ.com). That being said, ponder these two situations.
BIBLIOGRAPHY Arasse, Daniel. Complete Guide to Mental Health. Allen Lane Press,New York, 1989. Gingerich, Susan. Coping With Schizophrenia. New Harbinger Publications, Inc. Oakland, 1994. Kass, Stephen. Schizophrenia: The Facts. Oxford University Press. New York, 1997. Muesen, Kim. “Schizophrenia”. Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia. Microsoft Corporation, 1998. Young, Patrick. The Encyclopedia od Health, Psychological Disorders and Their Treatment. Herrington Publications. New York, 1991.
One in five Americans, approximately 60 million people, have a mental illnesses (Muhlbauer, 2002).The recovery model, also referred to as recovery oriented practice, is generally understood to be defined as an approach that supports and emphasizes an individual’s potential for recovery. When discussing recovery in this approach, it is generally seen as a journey that is personal as opposed to having a set outcome. This involves hope, meaning, coping skills, supportive relationships, sense of the self, a secure base, social inclusion and many other factors. There has been an ongoing debate in theory and in practice about what constitutes ‘recovery’ or a recovery model. The major difference that should be recognized between the recovery model and the medical model is as follows: the medical model locates the abnormal behavior within an individual claiming a factor that is assumed to cause the behavior problems whereas, the recovery model tends to place stress on peer support and empowerment (Conrad and Schneider, 2009). This essay will demonstrate that the recovery model has come a long way in theory and practice and therefore, psychological well-being is achievable through this model.
Davidson, L., & Strauss, J. S. (1992). Sense of self in recovery from severe mental illness. The