The Collected Schizophrenias Essays

What if you couldn't trust your own brain? Wang delves into her experience living with schizoaffective disorders in this collection of 13 essays. The writing at time verges on clinical, though most of the time Wang's prose is beautiful and a pleasure to read while also being extremely informative and enlightening to someone as unacquainted with the condition/s as myself.

"When the self has been swallowed by illness, isn't it cruel to insist on a self that is not illness?"

It is interesting, but also written in a manner that does not keep my attention.

Schizophrenia remains one of the most heavily stigmatized disorders in our collective consciousness and Wang does a great job in drawing from current events and previous experience to create a sometimes clinical but also compassionate glimpse into her life. As with all essay collections, I saw more value in select pieces compared to others (personal favorites are Yale and Slenderman) but overall, a really important read that I would recommend to anyone whose mind is open enough to unlearn what we’ve all been too ashamed to admit.

beautifully written and so accurate in its description of living with mental illness as well as chronic illness. such a great read.

This series of essays chronicles the author’s experiences with mental and chronic illness. She gives insight into and commentary about mental health and the way it is stigmatized and issues and discussions within the medical community while also sharing personal experiences and anecdotes. . I requested this book from my library after seeing @bowtiesandbooks talk about it on their channel. I am so glad I did. From the beginning, I was gripped by the writing style. Esme Weijun Wang’s journalist background came through in the best way. She combines hard facts and research with a personal approach and it comes together in such a way that really spoke to my approach to thinking about my own mental health as well as to the way I like to write. I enjoyed learning about the history of schizophrenia and the different approaches and views medical professionals and groups such as NIMH take when talking about and treating patients. The more serious and researched approach did not detract from my connection to Wang’s story and drawing parallels to my own life particularly when it came to conversations surrounding voluntary and involuntary hospitalization. There were times I had to stop and reflect on my own experiences and just take a break because many of the conversations hit close to home. Not being diagnosed with a type of schizophrenia, I still found my own connections into the material and learned so much about what another diagnosis can look like. If you are mentally in a place where you can read about this topic, I would definitely recommend this collection.

"When the self has been swallowed by illness, isn’t it cruel to insist on a self that is not illness? Is this why so many people insist on believing in a soul?" This book was quite an interesting yet difficult read because it highlights the challenges that still persist in our society when it comes to mental illness. Many of the critiques I've read about this book said that they didn't feel like the author was talking about her personal experiences as much, but I disagree. By exploring these issues in a larger context, it shows the systemic problems that mentally ill people face everyday: from abuse in medical care to homelessness to the stigmatization of their condition in media, to the challenge of deciding if you are capable to have children or not. This was such an important read, I found it engaging and informative, without getting too heavy.

This starts out wonderful, fascinating, and enrapturing, until it's over and you realize it isn't. Maybe that's a soft metaphor for surfacing out of an attack of psychosis? I realize she doesn't exactly say what she's thinking or doing in these episodes she carefully glides around, skating on ice, and maybe it's not something that can very easily be put into words. Knowing these are essays, there is a lack of hard data that my non-fiction gremlin misses dearly to put this into context, because some chapters are almost dreamily romantic even though it's repeatedly stated that nothing about the mental illness is romantic. The descriptions of being completely out of your control once involuntarily committed is stressful at best and disturbing at worst, and it's a lot like the stories I've had from my close friends who have been in the unfortunate position of rehab or alcoholic rehab - a lack of control, expected to be on point and say you're "better" and act like it. It's the only to get out of that place where the other "crazy" people don't contribute to your recovery. There's a lot to muse on if these group places for rehab are helpful, harmful, a place to playact at normal even when you're not feeling that. If you're acting, are you existing as normal? Where is the normal buried under our mental illness? It definitely lends you questions to think on, or scare yourself with, depending on your brain.

Wow. I can feel myself changing after reading this book. It’s hard to put into words how I felt while reading it. It’s an important book to read and reflect on. I encourage everyone to read it.