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Agnes's Jacket:: A Psychologist's Search for the Meanings of Madness
In a Victorian-era German asylum, seamstress Agnes Richter painstakingly stitched a mysterious autobiographical text into every inch of the jacket she created from her institutional uniform. Despite every attempt to silence them, hundreds of other patients have managed to get their stories out, at least in disguised form. Today, in a vibrant underground net-work of "psychiatric survivor groups" all over the world, patients work together to unravel the mysteries of madness and help one another re-cover. Optimistic, courageous, and surprising, Agnes's Jacket takes us from a code-cracking bunker during World War II to the church basements and treatment centers where a whole new way of understanding the mind has begun to take form.
A vast gulf exists between the way medicine explains psychiatric illness and the experiences of those who suffer. Hornstein's luminous work helps us bridge that gulf, guiding us through the inner lives of those diagnosed with schizophrenia, bipolar illness, depression, and paranoia and emerging with nothing less than a new model for understanding one another and ourselves.
A vast gulf exists between the way medicine explains psychiatric illness and the experiences of those who suffer. Hornstein's luminous work helps us bridge that gulf, guiding us through the inner lives of those diagnosed with schizophrenia, bipolar illness, depression, and paranoia and emerging with nothing less than a new model for understanding one another and ourselves.
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First published March 17, 2009
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April 6, 2011
*** the review below was written some time ago. now that i have read the whole book i don't have a whole lot to add except the following. this book deserves to be read widely and carefully. it's a wonderful book and a delightful, riveting read. it's written as a story and it's packed with beauty, intelligence, wisdom. it is a clarion call for much-needed change. if we continue treating mental illness the way we are currently doing (especially in the US), we will create a larger and larger generation of unnecessarily diminished, crippled people. we need to rethink the way we approach madness. we need to get the pharmaceutical and the insurance companies WAY under control. we need to radically restructure the system of care. we need single payer, universal, government-sponsored health care. we need to find a way to address the systemic and systematic sadism of mental health care providers. we need to get the consumers into the conversation and grant them full agency, control, and personhood. we need to eliminate compulsive care. we need a movement the size of the women's movement, the gay rights movement, and the disability rights movement. nothing will change without a movement. ***
i read up to page 90. i read fast and furiously, and was very bummed when i couldn't carry on because the descriptions of psychosis were bothering me. this book is GREAT and i have no doubt i'll come back to it, finish it, reread it, teach it, spread it, gift it, learn from it. i am tempted to say it's the best popular book about hallucinations and psychosis i've read, and i am aware that it's a book written by a psychologist and not a "voice hearer." but gail hornstein has been solidly on the side of the patient for many years (she was the first to compile a list of patients' autobiographies and memoirs of "mental illness" in english and her list is still invaluable). as for her account, she was eight-balled for her refusal to follow the status quo in its infantilization, other-making, and pathologizing of people in psychic pain, and had to do some of her pro-patient work stealthily. the book is so respectful, profound, and full of integrity, i could not find an ounce of condescension or superiority in it, not even of the anthropological kind. hornstein goes to Hearing Voices Network meetings in the UK for years, and then does the same in the US with Freedom Center meetings. she doesn't hide her identity, asks permission of the group members to be at the meetings, and behaves exactly as the other people -- partaking in the tragedies big and small of voice hearers, sharing her experience, and chipping in when help (generally of the listening kind, sometimes of a more concrete sort) is needed. in other words, she becomes one of the guys and one has the impression she doesn't miss a meeting. since she's not a clinician, she doesn't "treat" anyone -- not that anyone wants to be treated. she learns, shares, empathizes, lives with, learns some more.
hornstein's language is admirable in its consistent refusal to use the terminology of pathology, diagnosis, and difference. you learn from what she says, but you also feel yourself shifting paradigm (what a relief!) just reading how she says it. instead, she uses diversity, and, on occasion, giftedness as guiding ideas. she does not deny the presence of pain, but she seems to attribute a lot of it -- basing herself on what the voice hearers say about their experience -- to the way voice hearers are treated by mainstream psychiatry (mainstream here is almost redundant) and our disgracefully marginalizing, stigmatizing, and punishing culture of normalcy. she explains that, like the rest of us, voice hearers learn to act the way we expect them to, and once restored to normality (i.e. to acceptability and acceptance within a group of peers) they lose a lot of their self-abasement and strangeness.
one of the things that make this book so compelling is that hornstein writes beautifully. this book is a genuine treat to read. i cannot recommend it enough, to EVERYONE, and i'm sincerely looking forward to reading it all myself.
i read up to page 90. i read fast and furiously, and was very bummed when i couldn't carry on because the descriptions of psychosis were bothering me. this book is GREAT and i have no doubt i'll come back to it, finish it, reread it, teach it, spread it, gift it, learn from it. i am tempted to say it's the best popular book about hallucinations and psychosis i've read, and i am aware that it's a book written by a psychologist and not a "voice hearer." but gail hornstein has been solidly on the side of the patient for many years (she was the first to compile a list of patients' autobiographies and memoirs of "mental illness" in english and her list is still invaluable). as for her account, she was eight-balled for her refusal to follow the status quo in its infantilization, other-making, and pathologizing of people in psychic pain, and had to do some of her pro-patient work stealthily. the book is so respectful, profound, and full of integrity, i could not find an ounce of condescension or superiority in it, not even of the anthropological kind. hornstein goes to Hearing Voices Network meetings in the UK for years, and then does the same in the US with Freedom Center meetings. she doesn't hide her identity, asks permission of the group members to be at the meetings, and behaves exactly as the other people -- partaking in the tragedies big and small of voice hearers, sharing her experience, and chipping in when help (generally of the listening kind, sometimes of a more concrete sort) is needed. in other words, she becomes one of the guys and one has the impression she doesn't miss a meeting. since she's not a clinician, she doesn't "treat" anyone -- not that anyone wants to be treated. she learns, shares, empathizes, lives with, learns some more.
hornstein's language is admirable in its consistent refusal to use the terminology of pathology, diagnosis, and difference. you learn from what she says, but you also feel yourself shifting paradigm (what a relief!) just reading how she says it. instead, she uses diversity, and, on occasion, giftedness as guiding ideas. she does not deny the presence of pain, but she seems to attribute a lot of it -- basing herself on what the voice hearers say about their experience -- to the way voice hearers are treated by mainstream psychiatry (mainstream here is almost redundant) and our disgracefully marginalizing, stigmatizing, and punishing culture of normalcy. she explains that, like the rest of us, voice hearers learn to act the way we expect them to, and once restored to normality (i.e. to acceptability and acceptance within a group of peers) they lose a lot of their self-abasement and strangeness.
one of the things that make this book so compelling is that hornstein writes beautifully. this book is a genuine treat to read. i cannot recommend it enough, to EVERYONE, and i'm sincerely looking forward to reading it all myself.
February 17, 2018
It is interesting to get a window on the world of the HVN (Hearing Voices Network), the high number of people who hear voices, and the support groups that have grown up over the last twenty years or so, but be forewarned that there is little discussion of Agnes's Jacket ( a good way to sell the book?), and the book just keeps repeating the same things chapter after chapter. There is enough in it to warrant a reasonably lengthy magazine article, but not much more. Read the first two chapters and you have more or less got everything you need to know. What a fool I was to plod on to the very end! The third star is there because people should know about these things. Take a look at https://www.hearing-voices.org/ It might be a better start to finding out more.
May 9, 2014
Agnes’s Jacket is a perceptively nuanced balance between thorough research, sensitive probing & sharing and generous questioning and guidance. Gail Hornstein credits many for the insights they provided but her latent (seemingly one of her favourite words) ability to inquisitively listen has been given wings by fellow travellers who mutually inspire exact expression and further discovery. A remarkable work inspiring on a global scale for all who have any dealings with psychiatry and altered mental capabilities – sufferers, survivors, families and professionals.
I will be following her work from my continuing interest in both women’s issues and mental health. www.gailhornstein.com
I will be following her work from my continuing interest in both women’s issues and mental health. www.gailhornstein.com
January 6, 2019
This book is what you get when the author treats their subject matter, the mental conditions and the people who have these conditions, with patience, understanding and empathy. Highly recommended to anyone even remotely interested in the subject matter.
December 30, 2021
Fantastic 4.5* read, even if a bit repetitive.
It's hard to begin and describe. The main thesis of the book is that we look at psychiatric conditions (she's mainly talking about what we call schizophrenia but also others) through a false lens and treatment could be vastly improved. For Hornstein, this lens is the chemical imbalance theory and 'mainstream' psychiatry. Now, I know what you are thinking but hear me out.
Hornstein visits many different groups and people, for instance from the Hearing Voices Network. Nomen est omen, these people, schizophrenically, hear voices where there are no speakers as we know it. Hornstein caveats the entire book in a very important way namely that it is (practically?) impossible to disentangle yourself from the discourse. Being 'objective' is in a way not possible because the objectifying gaze on the mental illness is in a way already opposing the subject. Hornstein says that she intends to 'believe' the stories and see where it leads. So what we learn throughout the book is that there are much more people that have different sensory inputs/hallucinations than most understand but also that many people that do hear voices deal with them in a rather un-psychiatric but much healthier way than people in clinics or medicated (here is also a caveat that neither Hornstein nor any of the interviewees or groups ever says that if somebody thinks an institution or medication is good for them, they should abstain). So it turns out that for many, many people that are ex-patients (or survivors) of a psychiatry have had horrible experiences. And here we have this creeping problem again that with some monocle-flinging sobriety somebody might just say that the horrible experience is only in the patients head but *over all* it's better that way. But that's an extremely iffy statement because we're getting into the hard problem of consciousness territory and we can easily, reductive materialistically, say that something something chemical imbalance. But these chemicals aren't just there but they are also experienced, which is much different from describing them. I'm being complicated here, all I'm saying is we don't really have a choice than *believe* the patient when they say that they had a horrible time. The horrible time can have many sources. But if the source is the medication or maltreatment of the staff or doctors much more than the misery coming from the experience of the psychotic episode, we have to ask ourselves whether this is good (because it isn't).
As we learn through some historical tangents, there were 'mad' people before but they were often treated much differently. As Foucault talk s a lot about in Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, some mad people were deemed prophets or people that once a year get befallen by spirits etc. Hornstein brings up the example of Margery Kempe who was a holy person and people thought she can communicate with god. What made psychosis much worse for the experiencing people, according to the argument, is partly due to the pathologizing gaze we have on these things. And of course we don't have to go back to speaking people holy but as the Hearing Voices Network shows, just being normal and down-to-earth about 'weird' people (aka things that are not directly obvious to me) does a lot of mileage.
People with psychiatric conditions get locked away or mistreated in a big way and often we hear that the illness might be untreatable. But for one, this doesn't seem to be true on a large scale, as many schizophrenics lead a life that isn't different from someone with rheumatism that is considered untreatable: they manage and accommodate and it works. We don't just depreciate people.
Furthermore, the way these conditions are (un)treatable is mostly defined around medication. And I want to emphasize again that I, as a chemist, am a huge fan of medicine and chemistry. But it depends on what it does to the people. For instance electro shock therapy (or if we go back, lobotomy) seem to be much more pernicious than evidence or patient willingness would allow. Somewhat novel in Hornstein's book is the learning (from afflicted people) that it's also possible to concretely listen to the voices they hear. If people are administered Thorazine it might just subdue the voices but not get rid of them. Many patients might not want to get rid of them but we focus a lot on that. Many say that by 'engaging' with the voices they learn from them (and not in a esoteric way etc): it turns out that many schizophrenics have a traumatic event in the past and didn't 'just become' like that. As with maybe less severe forms of psychosis, it seems obvious that talking and engaging with the issue seems much better in many cases (not always) than sweeping it under the rug, as medication might.
Maybe a last point: it's very 'difficult' to figure out how to deal with a patient who is psychotic. Of course psychiatry has strict regulation on what you can do but at some point the patient is declared incapable of judging their own lives. But it's a tricky discussion on where that starts.
There might be a lot to be said about how world wide psychiatry also interacts with the pharma company complex but Hornstein doesn't talk about that. Furthermore, how we deal with women, prisoners, and ethnic minorities in regard to psychiatric treatment would also warrant an entire other book.
The actual Jacket of Agnes Richter, which is a jacket she wore in her home and stitched cryptic text into it, is more of a MacGuffin in a way. It's interesting and sort of an artefact, but I think the main strong points of the book are elsewhere. Some of these tangents are also the reason why it can feel a bit long and repetitive at times but if you're interested in psychiatric history, it's really worthwhile.
Companions to this that felt particularly synergistic were Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales, and maybe Simulacra and Simulation. Hornstein also recommends Girl, Interrupted, which I'm halfway through now and am really loving. I like her approach when teaching of introducing texts written by actual survivors of mental illnesses or institutions. For all the science that I love and think Hornstein might be strawmanning here and there, getting schizophrenics in the loop is super important. A broken leg is a super external thing and we can 'objectively' talk about it. It's so external, that it's almost external to person attached to the leg. But inside the brain, it's very difficult to be objective and we can't just disregard what they say.
One of my favorite books this year. Interesting for almost any reader.
It's hard to begin and describe. The main thesis of the book is that we look at psychiatric conditions (she's mainly talking about what we call schizophrenia but also others) through a false lens and treatment could be vastly improved. For Hornstein, this lens is the chemical imbalance theory and 'mainstream' psychiatry. Now, I know what you are thinking but hear me out.
Hornstein visits many different groups and people, for instance from the Hearing Voices Network. Nomen est omen, these people, schizophrenically, hear voices where there are no speakers as we know it. Hornstein caveats the entire book in a very important way namely that it is (practically?) impossible to disentangle yourself from the discourse. Being 'objective' is in a way not possible because the objectifying gaze on the mental illness is in a way already opposing the subject. Hornstein says that she intends to 'believe' the stories and see where it leads. So what we learn throughout the book is that there are much more people that have different sensory inputs/hallucinations than most understand but also that many people that do hear voices deal with them in a rather un-psychiatric but much healthier way than people in clinics or medicated (here is also a caveat that neither Hornstein nor any of the interviewees or groups ever says that if somebody thinks an institution or medication is good for them, they should abstain). So it turns out that for many, many people that are ex-patients (or survivors) of a psychiatry have had horrible experiences. And here we have this creeping problem again that with some monocle-flinging sobriety somebody might just say that the horrible experience is only in the patients head but *over all* it's better that way. But that's an extremely iffy statement because we're getting into the hard problem of consciousness territory and we can easily, reductive materialistically, say that something something chemical imbalance. But these chemicals aren't just there but they are also experienced, which is much different from describing them. I'm being complicated here, all I'm saying is we don't really have a choice than *believe* the patient when they say that they had a horrible time. The horrible time can have many sources. But if the source is the medication or maltreatment of the staff or doctors much more than the misery coming from the experience of the psychotic episode, we have to ask ourselves whether this is good (because it isn't).
As we learn through some historical tangents, there were 'mad' people before but they were often treated much differently. As Foucault talk s a lot about in Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, some mad people were deemed prophets or people that once a year get befallen by spirits etc. Hornstein brings up the example of Margery Kempe who was a holy person and people thought she can communicate with god. What made psychosis much worse for the experiencing people, according to the argument, is partly due to the pathologizing gaze we have on these things. And of course we don't have to go back to speaking people holy but as the Hearing Voices Network shows, just being normal and down-to-earth about 'weird' people (aka things that are not directly obvious to me) does a lot of mileage.
People with psychiatric conditions get locked away or mistreated in a big way and often we hear that the illness might be untreatable. But for one, this doesn't seem to be true on a large scale, as many schizophrenics lead a life that isn't different from someone with rheumatism that is considered untreatable: they manage and accommodate and it works. We don't just depreciate people.
Furthermore, the way these conditions are (un)treatable is mostly defined around medication. And I want to emphasize again that I, as a chemist, am a huge fan of medicine and chemistry. But it depends on what it does to the people. For instance electro shock therapy (or if we go back, lobotomy) seem to be much more pernicious than evidence or patient willingness would allow. Somewhat novel in Hornstein's book is the learning (from afflicted people) that it's also possible to concretely listen to the voices they hear. If people are administered Thorazine it might just subdue the voices but not get rid of them. Many patients might not want to get rid of them but we focus a lot on that. Many say that by 'engaging' with the voices they learn from them (and not in a esoteric way etc): it turns out that many schizophrenics have a traumatic event in the past and didn't 'just become' like that. As with maybe less severe forms of psychosis, it seems obvious that talking and engaging with the issue seems much better in many cases (not always) than sweeping it under the rug, as medication might.
Maybe a last point: it's very 'difficult' to figure out how to deal with a patient who is psychotic. Of course psychiatry has strict regulation on what you can do but at some point the patient is declared incapable of judging their own lives. But it's a tricky discussion on where that starts.
There might be a lot to be said about how world wide psychiatry also interacts with the pharma company complex but Hornstein doesn't talk about that. Furthermore, how we deal with women, prisoners, and ethnic minorities in regard to psychiatric treatment would also warrant an entire other book.
The actual Jacket of Agnes Richter, which is a jacket she wore in her home and stitched cryptic text into it, is more of a MacGuffin in a way. It's interesting and sort of an artefact, but I think the main strong points of the book are elsewhere. Some of these tangents are also the reason why it can feel a bit long and repetitive at times but if you're interested in psychiatric history, it's really worthwhile.
Companions to this that felt particularly synergistic were Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales, and maybe Simulacra and Simulation. Hornstein also recommends Girl, Interrupted, which I'm halfway through now and am really loving. I like her approach when teaching of introducing texts written by actual survivors of mental illnesses or institutions. For all the science that I love and think Hornstein might be strawmanning here and there, getting schizophrenics in the loop is super important. A broken leg is a super external thing and we can 'objectively' talk about it. It's so external, that it's almost external to person attached to the leg. But inside the brain, it's very difficult to be objective and we can't just disregard what they say.
One of my favorite books this year. Interesting for almost any reader.
March 7, 2017
What a fascinating read! Bravo to the author for this tale of mental illness as told from the patient and advocates side as opposed to the traditional psychiatric drs and professionals side.
Gail Hornstein offers a unique perspective on both mental illness and the treatment for those with mental illness. She is a psychologist but a non-practicing one, but she teaches psychology at a university. So she's part of the system but stands kind of outside it.
She spent many many hours talking with mental health survivors, within their own support groups, and looking at the ways that these people support each other with talking and trust and without medication.how they want to be asked what they want or need rather than things being forced into them.
There is also a fair bit of time spent on the medications that are used in the psychiatry field. How psychiatrists and drug companies are linked - somewhat scarily- together. How little of what happens in psychiatry can actually be tested and how much the field has grown since the 1950s.
I don't think the author is advocating that no one with mental illness should be taking drugs, but I do think she is saying we need a different model for these people. Because they are actually human beings and not just their diagnosis. There needs to be compassion and empathy and probably a more science-based approach to this field. It's not really good enough to "guess" that psychotropic drugs might work for this condition that we really aren't sure is there!!
Absolutely great read. Thoroughly recommend. Probably should be read more widely in the profession and see if it makes a difference there, where it counts?
Gail Hornstein offers a unique perspective on both mental illness and the treatment for those with mental illness. She is a psychologist but a non-practicing one, but she teaches psychology at a university. So she's part of the system but stands kind of outside it.
She spent many many hours talking with mental health survivors, within their own support groups, and looking at the ways that these people support each other with talking and trust and without medication.how they want to be asked what they want or need rather than things being forced into them.
There is also a fair bit of time spent on the medications that are used in the psychiatry field. How psychiatrists and drug companies are linked - somewhat scarily- together. How little of what happens in psychiatry can actually be tested and how much the field has grown since the 1950s.
I don't think the author is advocating that no one with mental illness should be taking drugs, but I do think she is saying we need a different model for these people. Because they are actually human beings and not just their diagnosis. There needs to be compassion and empathy and probably a more science-based approach to this field. It's not really good enough to "guess" that psychotropic drugs might work for this condition that we really aren't sure is there!!
Absolutely great read. Thoroughly recommend. Probably should be read more widely in the profession and see if it makes a difference there, where it counts?
March 22, 2016
I feel conflicted about this book. It was extremely one-sided, which is understandable, because Hornstein is arguing a viewpoint that is held by people who (at least in the US) are marginalized and discounted constantly, and she wanted to concede as little as possible. She has some credibility as an academic, but she throws it away when she makes broad generalizations with iffy evidence. I'm all for "nothing about us without us," and, in fact, the parts of the book that I most enjoyed were her interviews and stories from people who have personal experience in the mental health system. However, her personal stories lost my interest, and her long (sometimes repetitive) rants made her argument less and less convincing.
Still, there are points and experiences expressed in this book that we really need to hear. It challenges many tenants of mainstream psychiatry, and it does hold some eye-opening data that makes the reader question them. I'd love to see a collaborative work between a mainstream psychiatrist and one of the ex-patient experts that Hornstein met. Overall, I wouldn't recommend this book to someone who knows very little about the mental health system, because it is so biased, but for someone who has done a bit more research and reading, I would definitely recommend it.
Still, there are points and experiences expressed in this book that we really need to hear. It challenges many tenants of mainstream psychiatry, and it does hold some eye-opening data that makes the reader question them. I'd love to see a collaborative work between a mainstream psychiatrist and one of the ex-patient experts that Hornstein met. Overall, I wouldn't recommend this book to someone who knows very little about the mental health system, because it is so biased, but for someone who has done a bit more research and reading, I would definitely recommend it.
March 15, 2021
This was generally speaking a good book, but I am having a hard time rating it. While I found some parts extremely important (and I would recommend them to every psychologist, psychiatrist, or scientist working in the domain of mental health), the other parts seemed rather unscientific and repetitive.
In a nutshell, the author claims that mental health specialists should start focusing more on what happened to a patient, and not only on "what's wrong with them". She goes on with the explaining how much the environment influences an individual's mental health (eg. sexual abuse in childhood can be connected to hearing voices later on, etc.). Which I completely agree with, and is also widely accepted in the scientific community.
The part of the book that is a bit problematic for me are the following claims:
1) there is absolutely NO biological basis for mental illness and everything is caused by the environment,
2) whole psychiatry is rejecting that eg. trauma can result in mental illness.
To start with the first one. I am not sure how to explain this to myself. Is the author taking some dual mind-body perspective, and how can our experiences have no connection to what is happening inside our brains? To continue with the second one, my studies are also closely related to the field of psychiatry, neuroscience, psychology, and in all scientific journals I have encountered, I have never seen an article saying, that mental illness cannot be a consequence of severe trauma.
And as the last thing, isn't the dilemma of nature-nurture kind of obsolete? As far as I know (at least this is what is written in most of my neuroscience textbooks) is that while nature clearly plays a huge role, nurture can hugely influence and changes it. I don't really see this as a conflict anymore.
However, in the author's defense, I would like to add, that she is coming from the USA, where the pharmaceutical industry is really powerful and make a disgusting amount of money and therefore influence. From that perspective I can understand the author's content toward psychiatry and only prescribing medications instead of talking to people, providing therapy. She also mentions that the approaches in Europe differ from US ones, so her critique is mainly focused on the US.
All in all, it is definitely worth reading the book.
In a nutshell, the author claims that mental health specialists should start focusing more on what happened to a patient, and not only on "what's wrong with them". She goes on with the explaining how much the environment influences an individual's mental health (eg. sexual abuse in childhood can be connected to hearing voices later on, etc.). Which I completely agree with, and is also widely accepted in the scientific community.
The part of the book that is a bit problematic for me are the following claims:
1) there is absolutely NO biological basis for mental illness and everything is caused by the environment,
2) whole psychiatry is rejecting that eg. trauma can result in mental illness.
To start with the first one. I am not sure how to explain this to myself. Is the author taking some dual mind-body perspective, and how can our experiences have no connection to what is happening inside our brains? To continue with the second one, my studies are also closely related to the field of psychiatry, neuroscience, psychology, and in all scientific journals I have encountered, I have never seen an article saying, that mental illness cannot be a consequence of severe trauma.
And as the last thing, isn't the dilemma of nature-nurture kind of obsolete? As far as I know (at least this is what is written in most of my neuroscience textbooks) is that while nature clearly plays a huge role, nurture can hugely influence and changes it. I don't really see this as a conflict anymore.
However, in the author's defense, I would like to add, that she is coming from the USA, where the pharmaceutical industry is really powerful and make a disgusting amount of money and therefore influence. From that perspective I can understand the author's content toward psychiatry and only prescribing medications instead of talking to people, providing therapy. She also mentions that the approaches in Europe differ from US ones, so her critique is mainly focused on the US.
All in all, it is definitely worth reading the book.
November 14, 2023
This book is very good source for people who don’t know about HVN (Hearing Voice Network). Which is a very good organization for people who have paranoia and delusion problems. The book has showed that a lot of people have gotten help in this organizations and others kinda like it. The author also talked about how psychiatrists use medications to solve all problems. Medication most of the time can’t solve deep seeded traumatic events that people have been through. According to the book a creative type of psychoanalysis is needed to solve chronic mental health problems . This book even did a good job In telling the history of mental health patients in asylum. Some of the information I found about people who have mental problems and art was a little bit erroneous, but sometimes interesting.
September 15, 2017
Another wandering-the-stacks library find. The title object is a jacket made by an institutionalized woman who hand-stitched words all over it--outside, inside, overlapping--it is covered in formal German script which hardly anyone can read anymore. The book explores art objects created by people (like Agnes) who were locked up in asylums, many of them for their whole lives. It goes on to explore various movements toward self-directed and peer-supported treatment for psychiatric problems. Gave me (with my bipolar & PTSD) a lot to think about.
October 14, 2021
My first audiobook! I expected it to be more about Agnes and her jacket, but instead it was mostly about the HVN (hearing voices network) and other support groups for voice hearers. There were many interesting stories, but I'm a little hesitant to rate this any higher because of the disparagement of medicine.
Yeah, I get that it isn't the answer to everything, but I know people with other disorders who have greatly benefitted from it. It felt like the author was really pushing just the one agenda. I wasn't sure how I felt about it.
Yeah, I get that it isn't the answer to everything, but I know people with other disorders who have greatly benefitted from it. It felt like the author was really pushing just the one agenda. I wasn't sure how I felt about it.
October 8, 2017
Brilliant look into how psychiatry has failed people over and over again. Patient advocacy and support groups thrive in the UK and elsewhere, but the US stubbornly sticks to its mental illness as brain chemical imbalance theory in spite of the lack of clinical evidence. Extremely interesting if you have been diagnosed with a mental illness or know someone who has. Highly recommended, and I sincerely hope this is being taught somewhere.
June 1, 2019
An exploration into madness, this book reexamines what it means to be crazy. It challenges conventional perspectives regarding psychological treatment and offers suggestions on better ways to help support individuals suffering from mental illnesses. A lot of talk regarding hearing voices specifically.
November 5, 2017
Interesting book but also a heavy read. Some parts were too long for me and there is some repetition.
I did enjoy reading the examples of the people, what their story was and how they survived and (sometimes) thrived.
I did enjoy reading the examples of the people, what their story was and how they survived and (sometimes) thrived.
July 19, 2019
I'd expected this to be more about Agnes's jacket itself, but it was mostly about how American psychologists and psychiatrists are failing mentally ill people. Still a worthwhile read. Enjoyed the bits about art
May 4, 2022
Great book about madness, little longer than it needs to be though.
October 23, 2021
I liked how this book really delved into the personal experiences of those experiencing mental health issues and offered real, practical treatments.
I disliked how closely this book came to pseudoscience, it didn't, but it definitely played on the line of it, and the last chapter needs a rework because the author discredits all of the work that they have done by comparing themselves to less scientific treatment measures.
I learned to see mental health at an even deeper level than I already do, which I didn't think was likely.
I disliked how closely this book came to pseudoscience, it didn't, but it definitely played on the line of it, and the last chapter needs a rework because the author discredits all of the work that they have done by comparing themselves to less scientific treatment measures.
I learned to see mental health at an even deeper level than I already do, which I didn't think was likely.
March 12, 2011
I guess I thought this book was going to be more of Agnes's story. I found that viewing Agnes's jacket on display is what got the author inspired to write the book. The book is mostly about the author talking to people attending the Hearing Voices support groups in Britain. They consider themselves to be survivors of unsuccessful treatments for their mental illness (shock therapy, meds, psych wards) and are trying to find a way to learn to live with their "normal" selves, hearing voices, etc. Since most mental illness like schizophrenia is traditionally treated with meds and considered to stem from a biological imbalance, the author presents the point of view that drugging patients into mindlessness is not the answer. I'm sure that is true for some people. I'm not sure that she should discount that drugs work, at least in some degree, for many people with these types of problems. It was interesting to read her point of view at least.
August 21, 2009
Hornstein's examination of the "psychiatric survivor" movement is interesting, but reads more as a paean to psychotherapy and other alternative therapies than Kramer's Listening to Prozac was an apologia for Prozac. (Admittedly, it's been a long time since I read Kramer's work, but I remember being distinctly uneasy about Prozac after reading Kramer's work - not a reaction one would expect from Hornstein's description of the work.) Hornstein's analysis of outsider art is more balanced and certainly more interesting - one wishes she had brought some of the same objectivity to her analysis of those who reject traditional, drug-centered psychiatric care, as her arguments - and those of the "survivor" community- are valid and thought-provoking.
June 8, 2010
A better review is forthcoming. In short, the author did herself a disservice by dismissing entirely opinions that disagreed with her thesis. The book would have been much much stronger if she wrote about the possibility that some people are helped by a biological understanding of mental disorders and by pharmaceutical treatments. There was also a lot of focus on mental hospitals in the 1960's and earlier without much discussion of how they have changed since then, leaving the sense that the author needed to rely on old data to support her argument Still, the stories contained within are compelling glimpses into the lives of people suffering with mental illness and into the growing network of people who advocate for themselves.
January 13, 2017
Another book in my list on the clash between *data* (i.e. reality) and opinions in the mental health. I know no one who ever uses antidepressants in my close field, how do I got interested in mental health? Long story, let's say, trading led me to questioning all the beliefs (and propaganda) around me. Trading let me realize several simple things: 1) reality always works much better than fantasies, 2) the only reality is data (=numbers) based. So:
There are No Tests in Existence That Can Prove Mental “Disorders” are Medical Conditions. Psychiatric Diagnosis is Based Solely on Opinion.
Book is excellent, well written, interesting first-person view stories, some facts and data included.
There are No Tests in Existence That Can Prove Mental “Disorders” are Medical Conditions. Psychiatric Diagnosis is Based Solely on Opinion.
Book is excellent, well written, interesting first-person view stories, some facts and data included.
July 8, 2010
I thought this book would be much more interesting than it turned out to be, but it was still pretty good. Hornstein states her thesis at the beginning--that psychologists have lately swung too far in the direction of understanding mental illness according to a biological model and it's high time for the pendulum to swing back the other way. But the book doesn't go much farther than that. It has some interesting stories. And as someone who anticipates working occasionally with people who have severe mental illness, I think the book is helpful in developing my attitudes and orientation toward schizophrenia in particular.
January 22, 2014
Honestly, I didn't really like this book very much. While I did enjoy hearing stories about what some people were going through, I found the rest of the book to be rather dull. I understand that the information in this book is important (HVN does some amazing work), I just thought the author could have presented the information in more of a captivating way. I found the authors writing style dull to read, I had a hard time keeping my focus on what the author was saying because I was so bored with her writing.
While there is some good information in this book, I was disappointed with the overall reading experience.
While there is some good information in this book, I was disappointed with the overall reading experience.
August 13, 2014
This book needs to be read widely by anyone whose life has been affected by mental illness, who has known someone with a mental illness, or who is interested in the mental health system. It offers an alternative way of looking at mental illness - one that is not motivated by fear or profit, but rather by a genuine interest in the illness and the patient. My one criticism is the author's complete rejection of there ever being biological reasons for mental illness or that medication is ever appropriate. As with other areas of medicine, it seems that a blend of the allopathic and naturopathic is worth considering.
June 19, 2014
A fascinating topic and a dull read. The book is about the success some psychiatric patients have using "talk" therapy highlighted here with examples from the self help groups HVN (hearing voices network). The author weakens her assertion of the superiority of talk therapy by not only discounting but vilifying biologic research in mental disorders. The research she uses to support this is sketchy at best and heavily anecdotal. The book is preachy and dull but useful in highlighting an alternative approach for some folks.
September 25, 2020
Much information about mental illness and the internal debate on appropriate treatment.
9/24/20
I was reminded of this book by a quilter friend who is going to an exhibition of William Rush Dunton, who used quilting as therapy
https://quiltershalloffame.net/dr-wil...
9/24/20
I was reminded of this book by a quilter friend who is going to an exhibition of William Rush Dunton, who used quilting as therapy
https://quiltershalloffame.net/dr-wil...
April 28, 2014
Fascinating book, and I am sympathetic with much of the view point expressed. But it's very one-sided. The voices of patients who have felt helped by biological psychiatry, for example, are glossed over, not attended to. It's clear that Hornstein's interest in the voices of patients is in large part an interest in the ones who challenge psychiatry. That's ok, but we shouldn't pretend that's all there is.
January 14, 2016
Long, but informative. Sets the "chemical imbalance" theory of schizophrenia on its ear. Interesting and thought provoking. Learned a lot from the chapters related to the pharmacological drive behind the DSM. Was somewhat disgusted by the historical statistics regarding the number of people in the U.S. with psych diagnoses and the increasingly close relational proximity of the licensed mental health practitioners and the all powerful drug companies.
August 6, 2011
This book investigates the "underground network of psychiatric survivor groups all over the world" to support her claim that it's people, not pills and isolation that help the mentally ill find ways to cope and heal. The book's full of history and first person stories. Great bibliography, namely for resources and narratives of madness.
July 12, 2012
A very different and enlightening view from western psychiatry/mental health treatment. The mind is a truly amazing thing.
With the state of our economy in the US and the world, America could use more services and programs like Hearing Voices Network to support people in the ways they need and will benefit most from.
With the state of our economy in the US and the world, America could use more services and programs like Hearing Voices Network to support people in the ways they need and will benefit most from.
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