Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

I'm Telling the Truth, but I'm Lying: Essays by Bassey Ikpi

17 reviews

kkogane's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Drug abuse, and Mental illness

vonni's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

5.0

I cannot describe how wonderful it was to read this book. Some parts felt like reading my own journal, but in such luxurious and vivid description. Bassey is a gift. Thank you 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Self harm, Grief, Alcohol, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, and Eating disorder

Minor: Vomit

corngod31's review against another edition

challenging emotional sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide attempt, Violence, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, and Eating disorder

lureads2's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Eating disorder, Drug use, Suicidal thoughts, and Mental illness

Moderate: Forced institutionalization

I loved this book-Beautifully written & visceral insights into the reality of bipolar disorder. There are vivid descriptions of depression, hopelessness, self-starvation & suicidality that could be triggering to readers.

emzireads's review against another edition

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness

Moderate: Grief and Child abuse

onewoman_bookclub's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective medium-paced

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Mental illness and Suicidal thoughts

mscoleman's review against another edition

slow-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Suicidal thoughts and Mental illness

bookishbrenbren's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

This is a memoir of one woman's struggles through her bi-polar II in a series of chronological essays. 

This was a moving memoir and beautifully written, she writes emotions beautifully - you can really tell she makes her living through her words. Memoirs like this are why I'm a fan of them at all, I think they teach us how to be more empathetic and more understanding - both towards the world around us and towards ourselves. 
That being said, this was not a perfect 5* read for me. It's hard to put my finger on exactly why - I thought it could have used more structure... I didn't understand until the 50-60% mark that the essays were chronological and walking us through her life experiences. And I didn't realize we wouldn't revisit any of the people she introduced us to until that point. I would've liked more reflections on her family and less on her men. I also have issue with the ending. She basically writes/includes one essay as a great goodbye and in my opinion

it has a bit of a goodbye-cruel-world bent to it, especially knowing she has struggled through suicidal ideation so heavily

... but then the next essay

she's like oh I have a kid and here's my letter to him

and in between those two things we are expected to

mourn the great loss of Peter and understand how this loss affects her but... we don't know a Peter?

unless my reading was off, that was our first introduction to him. Anyways I understand that her life is still a work in progress, aren't we all, and reading even somewhat disjointed essays by her is a real treat. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, and Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Drug use

readbydeb's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

4.5

Incredibly vulnerable, powerful and captivating, this collection of essays explores how Ikpi navigated her experience with and ultimate diagnosis of bipolar II. This was my first experience with Ikpi’s work, and I was blown away by her amazing storytelling prowess and ability to draw you into her narrative and make you viscerally feel the emotions she was experiencing. I highlighted so many compelling quotes in these essays, and my experience reading this collection was particularly heightened by concurrently listening to the audiobook as read by the author.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Eating disorder, Drug abuse, and Mental illness

horizonous's review against another edition

emotional reflective medium-paced

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse and Mental illness

Moderate: Animal death, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, and Sexual content

Minor: Child abuse, Eating disorder, Suicidal thoughts, and Terminal illness

◦ Mental illness = Bipolar disorder; depression, hypomania
◦ Terminal illness = Dementia