January 2012

What Doesn't Kill Us: A Mini Review

As a consumer (I'm a nurse, but not a mental health professional) I sometimes find it difficult to judge the scientific merit of popular books on positive psychology. This is especially true for a book like What Doesn't Kill Us,. I really want to believe the book's premise; that trauma can lead to growth rather than disorder, but it seems at the same time classically “too good to be true” or too much like mainstream religions that instruct their adherents to accept suffering.

A Hell of Mercy

by Tim Farrington

There is no question that Tim Farrington's A Hell of Mercy is an accurate depiction of depression. In fact, it is such an accurate depiction of clinical depression it is nigh unto unreadable. But people interested in depression either for either person or professional reason, it's worth getting through, even if it leaves you, well, depressed.

A Hell of Mercy presents depression as a spiritual problem in addition to a mental health difficultly, which is not an uncommon model, really, even in very clinical books. The difference between Harringon's discussion of what the Saints have called “The Dark Night of the Soul” and other discussions of depression as spiritual condition is that Farrington seems aware that the Dark Night of the Soul and severe clinical depression may co-exist and in some cases, in some people may look like or be similar processes, but that they are not necessarily one and the same. This keeps Farrington away from the dangerous victim blaming in many allegedly spiritual texts; as a depression and possibly (it's not clear) suicide survivor, Farrington is all too well aware of how little about depression is choice, is lack of will.

Read more about A Hell of Mercy

I'm Grieving as Fast As I Can

(I'm Getting Rid of This Book As Fast As I Can)

I wanted so much to like this book. Even the title speaks to me and to my experience of grief. After all, one of the most frustrating experience of grief is to have folks who haven't been through what you've been through decide that it's time for you to “move on.” It's hurtful not to mention kind of obnoxious. And while this book has potential and parts of it might be helpful (even though it's an older book there are not a lot of similar books out there) the gross homophobia in the book actually made me physically ill. On the three whole pages the author devotes to same sex spouses, she

1. Ignores the fact that same sex widows die from anything other than HIV/AIDS
2. Implies that gay men who die of AIDS are not supported by the community.
3. Says the following "the only positive thing that has come out of the AIDS epidemic is that it has matured and united the gay community. AIDS has taught gays the meaning of commitment to a cause and to relationships." Really? Really? We weren't committed to our relationships before that? Really? Of course, it's the exact opposite of the truth: which is that LGBT are very committed to relationships, a gay relationship is not something you just "fall into."

Feeling Good

Read more about Feeling Good

Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy has been the go-to book on cognitive behaviorial therapy for depression for decades. In Feeling Good: the New Mood Therapy (which,because the book was published so long ago, isn't really “new”) Dr David Burns makes the case that cognitive methods of treating depression are as good or better than antidepressant medication. He spends the first few chapters making the case for this claim with extensive quotes from the research and accounts of multiple studies. The rest of the book is a series of exercises in changing thinking to change mood.

He includes tips and techniques to help recognize what causes mood swings, immediately address negative feelings as soon as they begin, handle other people's hostility, move beyond emotional needs for love and/or approval and build self esteem.

Psychology Book Club

Psychology books, from your favorite theorists to textbooks for sale

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What Doesn't Kill Us: A Mini Review

A Hell of Mercy

I'm Grieving as Fast As I Can

Feeling Good