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megatsunami's review
4.0
3.5 stars. This book gives a very raw and real portrayal of the internal experience of severe anxiety. I found it most compelling when she describes the disconnect between her internal state and how others perceive her, and talks about the nature of pain as something that can't be verified by others. Her story is also an indictment of our mental health systems of "care" (among other things, the fact that her doctors were not recommending therapy for her during the many years when she was prescribed multiple mental health medications is seriously malpractice!). I felt the book was sometimes less strong in the parts where it extrapolated from the author's experience to generalize about mental health treatment in general (e.g. when she describes her experience on Zoloft and then goes right into claims that Zoloft caused people to commit murders).
I appreciated this review's perspective.
I appreciated this review's perspective.
ascannerdorkly's review
reflective
sad
medium-paced
2.5
2.5 stars, really - I appreciate what this book set out to do more than I appreciate what it actually did.
The author writes about her own experience and perspective - that’s fine, but she sometimes conflates her experience with *the* experience of white women in america. the chapter on her eating disorder particularly bothered me - why not begin to discuss the ways we can change this? she wrote about it like it is fact that girls are not to eat more than one slice of pizza. fuuuuuuck that.
i was also bothered by the way she wrote about anxiety, OCD, and her ED as completely separate things in her life, as if they weren’t intertwined.
I felt that this book really needed a better editor. Some timelines made no sense at all (and at one point she talks of how anxiety can do this to a person — yes, but in a separate narrative, make it make sense!). there were also times i felt she repeated herself. while largely well written, the editing was very frustrating.
i also felt like there was a bit of exaggeration. maybe its just me not trusting memoirs after “a million little pieces”… but …. could also be the editing?
thinking of thin, cis white women (albeit ones with mental health problems) as victims seems near-sighted. i appreciate her perspective on disability and the working class, but i really felt like the author has a perspective of herself as perpetual victim and as someone who’s worked to change that narrative for themself, this was frustrating..
The author writes about her own experience and perspective - that’s fine, but she sometimes conflates her experience with *the* experience of white women in america. the chapter on her eating disorder particularly bothered me - why not begin to discuss the ways we can change this? she wrote about it like it is fact that girls are not to eat more than one slice of pizza. fuuuuuuck that.
i was also bothered by the way she wrote about anxiety, OCD, and her ED as completely separate things in her life, as if they weren’t intertwined.
I felt that this book really needed a better editor. Some timelines made no sense at all (and at one point she talks of how anxiety can do this to a person — yes, but in a separate narrative, make it make sense!). there were also times i felt she repeated herself. while largely well written, the editing was very frustrating.
i also felt like there was a bit of exaggeration. maybe its just me not trusting memoirs after “a million little pieces”… but …. could also be the editing?
thinking of thin, cis white women (albeit ones with mental health problems) as victims seems near-sighted. i appreciate her perspective on disability and the working class, but i really felt like the author has a perspective of herself as perpetual victim and as someone who’s worked to change that narrative for themself, this was frustrating..
libkatem's review
5.0
I read this book very slowly, but honestly, it made me feel so much better. Montgomery's anxiety is much more intense than mine. All the same, it's hard and complicated and painful, no matter what degree your mental illness. She's also a fabulous writer, and she cares so much.
<3
<3
shelbyroo's review
3.0
I think my expectations for this book were too high. While I completely empathize with the author’s experience, I hoped this would focus around big pharma’s influence on the mental health crisis in America. It did here and there, with cherry-picked facts around the experience of being a white cisgender female with mental illness. This *is* the authors experience and I can’t judge them for that... but to ignore minority populations in this discussion was off-putting for me personally.
ella_d_'s review against another edition
informative
sad
1.0
Poorly written and biased.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Sexual assault
Minor: Misogyny
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