Mental Illness Memoirs

In this powerful memoir, Susan Ralphe employs sharp storytelling skills honed over a long newspaper reporting career to tell her own story of long-term, heart-wrenching bipolar madness. She recounts soaring accomplishments alternating with black periods of tenseness, brain freeze, and despair.

From the moment war broke out across Europe in 1914, the world entered a new, unparalleled era of modern warfare. Soldiers faced relentless machine gun shelling, incredible artillery power, flame throwers, and gas attacks. Within the first four months of the war, the British Army recorded the nervous collapse of ten percent of its officers; the loss of such manpower to mental illness left the army unable to fill its ranks. Soldiers Don't Go Mad tells for the first time the story of the soldiers and doctors who struggled with the effects of industrial warfare on the human psyche.

Despite his deep desire to overcome mental illness and lead others out of their own pain, pastor Andrew Stoecklein died by suicide at the age of 30. In the wake of the tragedy, his widow, Kayla, embarked on a journey to better understand Andrew’s harrowing battle, come alongside those with similar struggles, and help the church overcome the stigma of suicide.

Psychologist and expert witness Dr. Sharon Lamb evaluates parents, particularly in high-stakes cases concerning the termination of parental rights. The conclusions she reaches can mean that some children are returned home from foster homes. Others are freed for adoption. Well-trained, Lamb generally can decide what's in the best interests of the child. But when her son's struggle with opioid addiction comes to light, she starts to doubt her right to make judgments about other mothers.

The New York Times best-selling author blends a pitch-perfect childlike voice with keen adult observation as she shares her heartrending, groundbreaking insider's look into the fascinating and frightening world of childhood bipolar disorder.

In his early 20s, Mindy Greiling's son, Jim, was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder after experiencing delusions that demanded he kill his mother. At the time, and for more than a decade after, Greiling was a Minnesota state legislator who struggled, along with her husband, to navigate and improve the state's inadequate mental health system. Fix What You Can is an illuminating and frank account of caring for a person with a mental illness, told by a parent and advocate.

From New York Times best-selling author and blogger Heather B. Armstrong comes an honest and irreverent memoir - reminiscent of the New York Times best-seller Brain on Fire - about her experience as one of only a few people to participate in an experimental treatment for depression involving 10 rounds of a chemically induced coma approximating brain death.

Scheier’s mother Judith was a news junkie, a hilarious storyteller, a fast-talking charmer you couldn’t look away from, a single mother whose devotion crossed the line into obsession, and—when in the grips of the mental illness that plagued every day of her life—a violent and abusive liar whose hold on reality was shaky at best. On an uneventful afternoon when Scheier was eighteen, her mother sauntered into the room to tell her two important things.

In his early 20s, Nick Griemsmann was diagnosed with an incurable mental illness called schizophrenia. With little hope for the future, Nick turned to his faith. After his full recovery, Nick worked as an administrator at the very same behavioral health care provider where he was once a patient. Defeating Mental Illness is an encouraging true story to help you and your loved ones. Inside, you will find valuable insights, tools, and tips that may help you and/or someone you care about move forward in recovery.

The author describes in detail all the insanity, disturbing behaviors, oppressive symptoms, and various feeling associated with the mental battles within her own mind. The author suffers from clinical depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, and borderline personality disorder. She struggles with suicidal thoughts and attempts, self-mutilating behaviors, mania, paranoia, anxiety, and psychosis with intense hallucinations of all five of her senses, and multiple delusions, including the belief that she is the "second-coming of Christ".

Lauren Windas is one of the estimated 250,000 people suffering with CFS in the UK. Whilst at university in 2012, she fell ill with a viral infection and was later diagnosed with CFS. Since then she has devoted herself to reclaiming her health and being able to live a full life, drawing on the knowledge of experts to help manage her often mysterious and hard-to-manage condition. In Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Lauren recounts the highs and lows of her own health journey and experiences,.

When neuroscientist Susan Barry was 50 years old, she took an unforgettable trip to Manhattan. As she emerged from the dim light of the subway into the sunshine, she saw a view of the city that she had witnessed many times in the past but now saw in an astonishingly new way. Skyscrapers on street corners appeared to loom out toward her like the bows of giant ships. Tree branches projected upward and outward, enclosing and commanding palpable volumes of space.

If Naomi had picked tails, she would have won the coin toss. She wouldn't have had to go back for the yearbook camera, and she wouldn't have hit her head on the steps. She wouldn't have woken up in an ambulance with amnesia. She certainly would have remembered her boyfriend, Ace. She might even have remembered why she fell in love with him in the first place. She would understand why her best friend, Will, keeps calling her "Chief".

When I was 13 months old, I sat in the backseat of my parents’ Chevy Impala, on the way to my father’s first of many stays in a mental institution. Soon after, he was diagnosed with Bi-Polar I disorder, a severe mental illness that would shape our family’s life. His outbursts were unpredictable, confusing, and often violent. As difficult as that was, it was only the beginning of my story.

Following Rachel’s fatal overdose years later, her mother, Carolyn DiPasquale, stumbles upon her daughter’s diaries. Shattered, she searches for answers, retracing her steps to figure out how parents and doctors missed three major mental illnesses.

This is my life story. This is what mental illness looks like. This is how it breathes. A real life account of a man that is going through mental illness from the state of Ohio.

I Am Not Your Baby Mother was a landmark publication in 2020. A thought-provoking, urgent and inspirational guide to life as a Black British mum, it was an important call-to-arms allowing mothers to take control and scrap the parenting rulebook to do it their own way. It was a Sunday Times top-five best seller. Sista Sister is a compilation of essays about all the things Candice wishes someone had talked to her about when she was a young Black girl growing up in London.

"What was the likelihood my adopted daughter would have my father's hazel eyes and my mother's mental illness?" In this fiercely candid memoir, Dr. Pruchno, a scientist widely acclaimed for her research on mental illness and families, shows how mental illness threatened to destroy her own family. Not once, but twice.

An ambulance rushed her away to the emergency room at a local hospital. Her life was forever changed in that moment. In this powerful memoir and inspirational self-help book, Kimberly Muka Powers shares her triumphant story of living with bipolar type one disorder with psychotic features. Humbled by this life-altering mental health diagnosis, she learns to rise above the setbacks of her illness and empowers others to do the same.

Maj. Gen. Gregg Martin cut a striking figure in the Army: athletic, quick witted, devout, and studious, he was a natural leader. Thanks to his engineering and leadership knowhow, Martin was chosen to lead the thousands of combat engineers who paved the way for 100,000 Army troops to battle their way to Baghdad in 2003. Only years later would he learn how the pressure of organizing dozens of simultaneous life-or-death missions each day altered the biochemistry of his brain. Bipolar General offers a candid account of Martin's personal journey with undiagnosed mental illness.