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Diagnosis Human: How Unlocking Hidden Relationship Patterns Can Transform and Heal Our Children, Our Partners, Ourselves
"A provocative and revealing perspective.” - Booklist
Shows how mental distress is often caused by relationship imbalance, not chemical imbalance.
Diagnosis Human offers a compelling alternative to the biomedical model of mental health as it’s been promoted over the last 30 years--a model which says that mental distress is a problem of chemical imbalance, or brain chemistry. Promoted by the highly profitable Psychiatry/Pharmaceutical industrial complex, and followed by much of the broader psychotherapy community, biological psychiatry focuses on quantifying the “illness” by an almost exclusive focus on symptoms. In this model, symptoms are never good. They are always seen as a sign that something is wrong with that person, a sign of pathology that must be changed. People now have a name for what they “have” and receive a prescription for it.
What may appear as intractable individual problems, however, often aren’t individual problems at all. This book reveals how many of these distressing emotional states are created by nearly invisible, intimate patterns in our relationships. Human invites readers into the therapist’s office to be part of family therapy sessions, where they can experience practically first-hand what these intimate relationship patterns look and feel like. The authors present cases of adults dealing with depression, couples who come to therapy reeling from the betrayal of an affair, families with kids diagnosed with ADHD, teenagers with anxiety or young children with temper tantrums. Each therapy session includes the voice of the therapist, inviting readers to sit in as observers to watch and listen as the case unfolds, sometimes in dramatic fashion.
Shows how mental distress is often caused by relationship imbalance, not chemical imbalance.
Diagnosis Human offers a compelling alternative to the biomedical model of mental health as it’s been promoted over the last 30 years--a model which says that mental distress is a problem of chemical imbalance, or brain chemistry. Promoted by the highly profitable Psychiatry/Pharmaceutical industrial complex, and followed by much of the broader psychotherapy community, biological psychiatry focuses on quantifying the “illness” by an almost exclusive focus on symptoms. In this model, symptoms are never good. They are always seen as a sign that something is wrong with that person, a sign of pathology that must be changed. People now have a name for what they “have” and receive a prescription for it.
What may appear as intractable individual problems, however, often aren’t individual problems at all. This book reveals how many of these distressing emotional states are created by nearly invisible, intimate patterns in our relationships. Human invites readers into the therapist’s office to be part of family therapy sessions, where they can experience practically first-hand what these intimate relationship patterns look and feel like. The authors present cases of adults dealing with depression, couples who come to therapy reeling from the betrayal of an affair, families with kids diagnosed with ADHD, teenagers with anxiety or young children with temper tantrums. Each therapy session includes the voice of the therapist, inviting readers to sit in as observers to watch and listen as the case unfolds, sometimes in dramatic fashion.
- GenresPsychologyRelationships
230 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 11, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
August 18, 2023
Psychology is a wonderful field that opens our eyes to understand our minds and selves. Therapy is a wonderful tool that can help repair and heal many dysfunctions in our lives and relationships. I was able to read an advance copy of this book and was really excited. I wanted to learn how to help relationships in my own life and the benefits of therapy. I was disappointed, but at least the cases were entertaining.
The book proposes to show how therapy can help, which is true, therapy is a wonderful tool that can help many people. However, the book has a strong anti-medicine undercurrent. It is true that psychiatry isn’t perfect and there are problems in the field, but this book has a definite chip on its shoulder about it. In the introduction, it says how the “family systems theory” that they use is rarely practiced “due to the dominance of the brain chemistry focus in mental health, which is supported by powerful economic and political forces”.
It would be nice if this book backed up its assertions and fought against the science of medication using science as well. Unfortunately, nothing has a reference, and the Bibliography has eight sources, most of which are from blogs and news outlets, which have no peer review process beyond an editor who needs to sell sensational stories. I want this book to succeed, I want them to explain the benefits of therapy and caution against the overuse of medication. This is important! But the book's methods aren’t adequate to convince a critical mind.
One disturbing story centers on a boy with ADHD. After berating the inefficiencies of medications, the therapist talks about the case and how they handled the problem. This included therapy and also they say that “I grabbed him and physically held him, tying up his arms and legs so he could not move, in doing this, I am overpowering him, letting him know how much power he doesn’t have.” Then the therapist called the child names like "Twerp" and said “This way he came to understand how small he was. It is important kids learn that early in life.”
What the heck?! This is messed up. Not all readers are going to fully understand what this means. Someone is going to read this book and think, “My kid doesn’t need medicine, they need to be physically shown their own powerlessness compared to me and be called names!” Yeah, good thing therapy helps because that kid is going to need it later in life.
This book should be taken with a grain of salt, it should not be taken as an authority on the subject. Instead, it is more of an entertaining read of other people's biggest emotional, mental, and relational problems. It does show that therapy can be a useful tool to help people with their problems and how our relationships impact our mental pathologies. So, if you want to read interesting stories about other’s specific problems or if you feel like you or someone you know doesn’t need medicine and want these biases confirmed then this book is for you.
The book proposes to show how therapy can help, which is true, therapy is a wonderful tool that can help many people. However, the book has a strong anti-medicine undercurrent. It is true that psychiatry isn’t perfect and there are problems in the field, but this book has a definite chip on its shoulder about it. In the introduction, it says how the “family systems theory” that they use is rarely practiced “due to the dominance of the brain chemistry focus in mental health, which is supported by powerful economic and political forces”.
It would be nice if this book backed up its assertions and fought against the science of medication using science as well. Unfortunately, nothing has a reference, and the Bibliography has eight sources, most of which are from blogs and news outlets, which have no peer review process beyond an editor who needs to sell sensational stories. I want this book to succeed, I want them to explain the benefits of therapy and caution against the overuse of medication. This is important! But the book's methods aren’t adequate to convince a critical mind.
One disturbing story centers on a boy with ADHD. After berating the inefficiencies of medications, the therapist talks about the case and how they handled the problem. This included therapy and also they say that “I grabbed him and physically held him, tying up his arms and legs so he could not move, in doing this, I am overpowering him, letting him know how much power he doesn’t have.” Then the therapist called the child names like "Twerp" and said “This way he came to understand how small he was. It is important kids learn that early in life.”
What the heck?! This is messed up. Not all readers are going to fully understand what this means. Someone is going to read this book and think, “My kid doesn’t need medicine, they need to be physically shown their own powerlessness compared to me and be called names!” Yeah, good thing therapy helps because that kid is going to need it later in life.
This book should be taken with a grain of salt, it should not be taken as an authority on the subject. Instead, it is more of an entertaining read of other people's biggest emotional, mental, and relational problems. It does show that therapy can be a useful tool to help people with their problems and how our relationships impact our mental pathologies. So, if you want to read interesting stories about other’s specific problems or if you feel like you or someone you know doesn’t need medicine and want these biases confirmed then this book is for you.
December 26, 2023
A few years ago, I used to look forward to going online and reading Amy Begel and David V. Keith’s blog “Most Human.” When I learned that these two therapists had published a book entitled Diagnosis Human, I was eager to purchase it. And, I can assure you, that now that I have read the book, I was not disappointed.
The book is divided into two parts: Couples and Families. As readers, we go into the room where the therapy happens. The therapist, Amy Begel, describes her take on the clients…how they look, what their back story is, how they strike her, and what she is feeling as she listens to them, and watches their interaction.
With chapter titles such as “My Wife Hates Sex; The Sexually Boring Husband; The Boy Who is Scared to be Sick”, and others, you certainly feel compelled to learn more. I like that the stories of these sessions are short, and the reading is accessible without a lot of psychiatric jargon. I like being in the mind of the therapist as she shares her insights, her tactics, and her ideas about what to do to help her clients. (Of course, all of their names have been changed to protect their privacy.)
And, I appreciate the take-aways from the book: such as, it is a must to treat the whole family rather than just the individual who supposedly has the problem; and that psychotropic drugs are probably the least helpful way to treat the issue at hand.
Ms. Begel shows herself to be warm, compassionate, and understanding with her patients, but no pushover. Some cases work out very well. Individuals move on with better insight into themselves and how to improve their family dynamic. Some cases work out less well. Ms. Begel allows us to see her concerns about what she might have done differently to yield a perhaps more positive outcome. And, with Questions for Reflection at the end of each chapter, Ms. Begel gives us an opportunity to weigh in on what we have read, and to examine our thoughts about what happened during the therapeutic process with the clients in the chapter.
In any event, this book is quite a good read. I highly recommend it.
The book is divided into two parts: Couples and Families. As readers, we go into the room where the therapy happens. The therapist, Amy Begel, describes her take on the clients…how they look, what their back story is, how they strike her, and what she is feeling as she listens to them, and watches their interaction.
With chapter titles such as “My Wife Hates Sex; The Sexually Boring Husband; The Boy Who is Scared to be Sick”, and others, you certainly feel compelled to learn more. I like that the stories of these sessions are short, and the reading is accessible without a lot of psychiatric jargon. I like being in the mind of the therapist as she shares her insights, her tactics, and her ideas about what to do to help her clients. (Of course, all of their names have been changed to protect their privacy.)
And, I appreciate the take-aways from the book: such as, it is a must to treat the whole family rather than just the individual who supposedly has the problem; and that psychotropic drugs are probably the least helpful way to treat the issue at hand.
Ms. Begel shows herself to be warm, compassionate, and understanding with her patients, but no pushover. Some cases work out very well. Individuals move on with better insight into themselves and how to improve their family dynamic. Some cases work out less well. Ms. Begel allows us to see her concerns about what she might have done differently to yield a perhaps more positive outcome. And, with Questions for Reflection at the end of each chapter, Ms. Begel gives us an opportunity to weigh in on what we have read, and to examine our thoughts about what happened during the therapeutic process with the clients in the chapter.
In any event, this book is quite a good read. I highly recommend it.
March 25, 2025
This book is a very easy read, bringing a lot of examples about different couples and their issues. What I loved the most was that instead of boasting with successful therapy sessions, the examples often end up divorcing or separating, and the author gives a list of ideas what she might have done more (although sometimes the best thing IS to separate and find better partners).
“Couples create each other” - we evolve with our relationships and there is no problem only on one side - both are to blame on some level. Even when someone cheats. Oh, and “fixing” that yes, the first phase is for the cheater to be/feel lower than dirt. But phase 2 is to find all the underlying problems - and here BOTH parties have to find their own faults, and nobody should go back to phase 1 and playing the victim.
In a relationship we tend to be too domesticated, playing by the partner’s tune and hiding our real selves.
BTW. Suffering is normal and we cannot have a human experience without it!
“Couples create each other” - we evolve with our relationships and there is no problem only on one side - both are to blame on some level. Even when someone cheats. Oh, and “fixing” that yes, the first phase is for the cheater to be/feel lower than dirt. But phase 2 is to find all the underlying problems - and here BOTH parties have to find their own faults, and nobody should go back to phase 1 and playing the victim.
In a relationship we tend to be too domesticated, playing by the partner’s tune and hiding our real selves.
BTW. Suffering is normal and we cannot have a human experience without it!
December 16, 2023
Sometimes you read a book that shifts the way you think about the world. Diagnosis Human is one of those books. From why so many kids are being diagnosed with disorders like ADHD to how the family member who appears the unhealthiest may be the healthiest, this book upends a lot of assumptions, ideas, accepted truths and gives a whole new framework for understanding families and our own mental health. If you are struggling with a pattern of behavior in yourself or someone you love, I can't recommend this book more. Because it is written in stories and not in a prescriptive form, the pages turn swiftly as if you're reading a novel. A truly great book.
December 28, 2023
Diagnosis Human by Amy Begel and David Keith is a great read. It is written in a way that is comfortable and accessible. It helps readers to envision effective solutions to states of depression that don't involve chemical remedies, allowing for the possibility of examining the quality of our relationships over the quality of the drugs we are often compelled to consume. The book reminds us that relationships are truly shared experiences, in which "couples create each other". It is a simple concept with great power. I encourage everyone interested in developing and maintaining healthy relationships to read the book.
Perry G.
Perry G.
November 22, 2023
A very timely and necessary book about facing our problems head on. Diagnosis: Human takes the opaque and complicated world of mental health and gives actionable, long term support. Using real-world examples, the authors give us all a third person view of our own problems and family dynamics. It subverts the short term, quick fix solution of prescription medicine for an emotional and psychological roadmap towards deep change and radical acceptance!
September 19, 2023
Exceptional!
There are many varying books in the relationship genre, however, "Diagnosis Human" shines above the rest.
The reader is able to quickly identify with, and relate to these cases, as the authors were descriptive, eloquent, and will undoubtedly be relatable to a wide audience.
Thank you for providing me the opportunity to review "Diagnosis Human” prior to publication.
I am appreciative and leave my sincerity review voluntarily.
There are many varying books in the relationship genre, however, "Diagnosis Human" shines above the rest.
The reader is able to quickly identify with, and relate to these cases, as the authors were descriptive, eloquent, and will undoubtedly be relatable to a wide audience.
Thank you for providing me the opportunity to review "Diagnosis Human” prior to publication.
I am appreciative and leave my sincerity review voluntarily.
December 7, 2023
At a time when truth-telling and the courage to face up to it are so important, it's fitting that we should be able to draw on examples that illustrate the therapist's role in (re)constructing dialogue between human beings who have decided to share their lives.
October 6, 2023
These doctors present a convincing case for mental illness being a family or at least relationship disease.
November 21, 2023
Very well written! loved reading this as a clinician, the cases were very well presented
November 27, 2023
Very readable, interesting case studies of individuals and/or families in distress. I could definitely see people from my world reflected in what I read.
December 6, 2023
We’ll written. Very insightful.
February 9, 2024
A very insightful and interesting read! I was impressed by th author’s unique handling of every situation presented.
April 26, 2024
Many case study examples of how the apparent distress of one family member can have roots in the subconscious patterns of the whole family, sometimes across generations
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews