Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

First, We Make the Beast Beautiful: A New Story About Anxiety by Sarah Wilson

10 reviews

marianajosefa's review against another edition

medium-paced

really bad. fatphobic (also advices leaving sugar bc that causes anxiety). privileged. “just do it” “just put in the work” (basically you deserve your situation). 
also the random advice of leaving anti depressants? you are not a professional and it’s dangerous to suggest such thing. anti medication messages. fuck no. 
also using a holocaust survivor memoir and use it to make your point about anxiety? doesn’t feel good. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt

rhymeswithcarmen's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

1.0

I came to this expecting more research than memoir; that's on me. Still, the overall experience was like meeting a friend of a friend and feeling like you have loads in common only to have them earnestly tell you that chemtrails are making the frogs gay. There were many such record scratch moments throughout. And repeated citations of such dubious experts as David Brooks and Tim Ferriss. Plus a lot of label and name dropping, racial bias, and fatphobia. Oh the fatphobia. It is possible that this entire book was created to be content marketing for the author's diet program and books. Overall, yikes. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fatphobia, Self harm, Eating disorder, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Mental illness, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

gondorgirl's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative inspiring slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness and Chronic illness

Moderate: Ableism, Drug use, Medical content, Grief, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicide attempt, Infertility, Panic attacks/disorders, Pregnancy, Eating disorder, Miscarriage, Self harm, and Suicidal thoughts

feathersmcgraw's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

1.5

It may work for the author, but I really don't like how she talks about anxiety. I don't think the idea that there are anxious people and then there are 'life naturals' who 'get it' is at all helpful. It's also worrying that there's a section speculating that people are more creative when they stop taking their medication. There's no solid evidence that this is the case so discussing it in the way that Wilson does is honestly reckless. She also seems to have something against cognitive behavioural therapy, for some reason? Mental health is complicated and these are conversations that really need to be had with medical professionals

I have to credit her for writing so candidly about her own experiences, but that's about it. Even with my above concerns aside, the book's structure is so haphazard that it' a chaotic read.
This is not a book for a person in crisis.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness

klariti's review against another edition

I couldn't finish this book because there was too much glorifying of mental illness. As someone with mental illness myself, I really couldn't connect with the idea that we should let our anxiety run wild. Yes, anxiety can be helpful to tell us when something is wrong or when something should change. But anxiety doesn't make everyone successful. 

Which leads me to my next issue. Sarah Wilson is privileged in that she is successful. And her anxiety helped her get there. 
Not all people experience anxiety that way. For some folks it's debilitating. Anxiety makes some people's lives worse not better. It's not something some people want to celebrate.
This isn't to say that some people have grown from their anxiety, but her whole vibe is that we should embrace our anxiety and let it make us successful. She makes it seem like we can all learn to be successful from our anxiety, which just isn't true.

The other thing that upset me, was that within 30 pages of the book she talks about going off her medication without talking about how incredibly dangerous it is. It isn't until later in the book that she talks about only tapering off your medication with doctor supervision. I think it's really dangerous not to mention that right away.

Overall, I really just couldn't get on board with her message. I agree that there can be some beautiful or useful things about anxiety and mental illness, but to just want to focus so much on using it for the positive erases so many folks experiences. 

Also, not all of us are privileged enough to be able to talk to the Dali Lama and do yoga with famous people. A lot of people can't even afford therapy. So
braggadocious. 😒

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fatphobia and Mental illness

bravelass85's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

An important if meandering exploration of anxiety 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Mental illness and Suicidal thoughts

erinwolf1997's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring lighthearted reflective slow-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness and Mental illness

Moderate: Infertility, Medical content, Miscarriage, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Eating disorder

Minor: Pregnancy

tuckysinclaire's review against another edition

Didn’t like the authors writing style, author wrote from a place of privilege 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Chronic illness, Eating disorder, Infertility, Medical content, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, and Self harm

shewantsthediction's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful reflective slow-paced

2.0

Very privileged point of view (typical middle-class white lady stuff). The way she talks about other cultures is also sketch.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Self harm, and Chronic illness

Moderate: Infertility and Fatphobia

Minor: Toxic relationship

mckeelyshannon's review against another edition

challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

Favorite quote from this book - “I’d add that, in such instances, we’d love everyone (someone?) to see that we absolutely do not have our shit together. And to come and tell us they’ve got this one. Even for five minutes.
The more anxious we are, the more we’d really love someone to come and take the load off us and help us cope for a bit. This presents us with another cruel anxious irony, doesn’t it:
The more anxious we are, the more high functioning we will make ourselves appear, which just encourages the world to lean on us more.
Anxiety... it’s a befuddling clusterfuckery for everyone involved.”

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Chronic illness, Drug abuse, Drug use, Infertility, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Panic attacks/disorders, and Suicidal thoughts