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Smoking cigarettes, eating glass : a psychologist's memoir / Annita Perez Sawyer, PhD.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Sawyer, Annita Perez.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Sawyer, Annita Perez--Mental health.
- Sawyer, Annita Perez.
- Mentally ill--United States--Biography.
- Mentally ill.
- Psychiatric errors.
- Psychiatric hospital care.
- History.
- Mental health.
- United States.
- Psychologists--United States--Biography.
- Psychologists.
- Psychiatric hospital care--United States--History.
- Psychiatric errors--United States.
- Genre:
- Biographies.
- Autobiographies.
- Physical Description:
- 324 pages ; 22 cm
- Edition:
- First paperback edition.
- Place of Publication:
- Santa Fe, NM : SFWP, [2015]
- Summary:
- What would lead a lively, high-achieving teenager to shrivel into a dark, inaudible wraith dedicated to her own destruction? How would she survive? How might healing happen? Dr. Artnita Sawyer's memoir is a harrowing, heroic, and redeeming story of her battle with mental illness, and her triumph in overcoming it. In 1960, as a suicidal teenager, Sawyer was institutionalized, misdiagnosed, and suffered through 89 electroshock treatments before being transferred, labeled as "unimproved." The damage done has haunted her life. Discharged in 1966, after finally receiving proper psychiatric care, Sawyer kept her past secret and moved on to graduate from Yale, raise two children, and become a respected psychotherapist...until 2001, when she reviewed her hospital records and began to remember a broken childhood and the even more broken mental health system of the 50s and 60s. Revisiting scenes from her childhood, and assembling the pieces of a lost puzzle. Smoking Cigarettes, Eating Glass is a cautionary tale of careless psychiatric diagnosis and treatment, both 50 years ago and today. It is an informative story about understanding PTSD and making emotional sense of events that can lead a soul to darkness. Most of all, it's a story of perseverance-of pain, acceptance, healing, hope, and success; a unique voice for this generation, shedding light on an often misunderstood illness. Book jacket.
- Contents:
- Part I Locked Up 7
- Chapter 1 Swept Away 9
- Chapter 2 Hamlet and Me 21
- Chapter 3 Shocked 33
- Chapter 4 Let's Try Again 41
- Chapter 5 Ode to Joy 53
- Chapter 6 Gargoyles, Saints, and Harold Searles 67
- Chapter 7 More Life Inside 77
- Chapter 8 Finishing Touches 95
- Part II Moving Out 109
- Chapter 9 By the Front Door 111
- Chapter 10 Courtship 127
- Chapter 11 Champagne, Cake, and Uncooked Rice 129
- Chapter 12 Modified Magic 143
- Chapter 13 Bat Radar 151
- Chapter 14 The Other Chair 157
- Chapter 15 The Next Chapter 169
- Chapter 16 His Tongue Cut Out 177
- Chapter 17 Up the Hill 187
- Chapter 18 Working Out 193
- Chapter 19 The Right Thing 207
- Chapter 20 Here for Today 213
- Chapter 21 Look What I've Overcome 223
- Part III Lost and Found 231
- Chapter 22 One of Those 233
- Chapter 23 Hanging On Backward 247
- Chapter 24 Rewind 255
- Chapter 25 The Body Knows 261
- Chapter 26 The Little Annita 273
- Chapter 27 Opera with Genny 281
- Chapter 28 Ghost Dreams 289
- Chapter 29 Are We There Yet? 297
- Chapter 30 Balance, Moderation, Peace 303
- Chapter 31 Reunion 311.
- ISBN:
- 1939650267
- 9781939650269
- OCLC:
- 883749022
- Publisher Number:
- 99963133174
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