Review #10 - Girl Interrupted

Author: Susanna Kaysen Rating: ★★★

Mental disorders - a very common topic of discussion, and two words that are often put as labels on people, as a passing joke, when the two words actually have anything but a joke feel to it.

Susanna Kaysen - 18, diagnosed with border line personality disorder in the late 1960s and admitted to a well known psychiatric ward of McLean Hospital, Massachusetts. What is the life of an 18 year old suffering from such an illness? And how does someone cope with it when she surrounded by schizophrenics and people with OCDs and depression? Well, you will have to read the book for that.

I'll be honest, I actually did not know what to expect when I was reading this book, and found it quite confusing at a lot of points. The woman seemed bramble on about topography, parallel universes and the continuous argument about how the mind works for normal people vs the mind of those diagnosed with some sort of disorder. In some instances, the book proved to be very disturbing too. Again, some of the stories proved to be quite funny. Overall, I did not enjoy the book as much as I thought I would've.

Maybe I did not understand the full crux or point of the memoir, or maybe I just struggled to relate to all the characters. But, it is definitely not something that is worth reading at, unless and until you're a psychology student or someone with interest in that sphere.

The most enjoyable part for a lot of the readers of this book would've been the 3 paged definition of borderline personality disorder. Hell, I managed to fit into some of the criteria, and almost doubted myself for a moment. But well, I guess given we're in the 21st century, a lot of us youngsters would be sharing some traits or the other of some disorder, given our extremist obsessions and fantasies with topics all over the globe!

#autobiography #psychology #memoir