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| Madness: A Bipolar Life (Unabridged) | 
| Author: Marya Hornbacher
Publisher: audible.com
Category: Book
List Price: $27.95
Buy New: $14.68
You Save: $13.27 (47%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  38 reviews
Media: Audio Download
ASIN: B00188ABLQ
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Product Description
When Marya Hornbacher published her first book, Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia, she did not yet have the piece of shattering knowledge that would finally make sense of the chaos of her life. At age twenty-four, Hornbacher was diagnosed with Type I rapid-cycle bipolar, the most severe form of bipolar disorder.
In Madness, Hornbacher tells her new story. Through scenes of astonishing visceral and emotional power, she takes us inside her own desperate attempts to counteract violently careening mood swings by self-starvation, substance abuse, numbing sex, and self-mutilation. How Hornbacher fights her way up from a madness that all but destroys her, and what it is like to live in a difficult and sometimes beautiful life and marriage?where bipolar always beckons?is at the center of this brave and heart-stopping memoir.
Millions of people in America today are struggling with a variety of disorders that may disguise their bipolar disease. Marya Hornbacher's fiercely self-aware portrait revolutionizes our understanding of this all-too-common, all-too-misunderstood disorder.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 33 more reviews...
 Riveting October 4, 2008
I read this book in 2 days and felt the rush and lows - if you or someone you love has bipolar, depression, PTSD, or even is just plain crazy as as a loon you can hear Marya's voice that imperfection is ok...if anything i learned that much. My favorite quote in this book is this:
"But if you're not trying to be perfect then how do you know if you're doing things right"?
Addiction Feeding Bipolar September 19, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Marya Hornbacher has poured her heart and soul onto every page of this horrifying account of bipolar disorder beginning in childhood.
However, the entire story demonstrates the loopholes in conventional psychiatry that almost exclusively focuses on treating the mind while leaving the body and spirit out of the equation.
This memoir demonstrates how intertwined addiction and bipolar are and how hard it is to treat one without treating the other. Although Hornbacher overcame anorexia, her eating addiction just became less extreme and she traded starving herself for drugs and sex. The addict within her wanted her to be mentally ill so it would have an excuse to perpetuate itself.
Within the medical journals, within metaphysics books, there is so much information on techniques for healing from mental illness, yet conventional psychiatry focuses almost exclusively on psychopharmacology. This is ironic, because if you have a chemical imbalance to begin with, you are going to be more sensitive to side effects than the average person. Although for those who have bipolar disorder, medication is often a necessary part of the mental health equation, it should not be the entire equation. There are so many ways to help balance brain chemistry. Meditation, nutrition, exercise, and deep breathing are just a few of them.
Hornbacher did end up with an exceptional psychiatrist who never gave up on finding a way to get through to his patient. What returned Hornbacher to functionality was a combination of such elements as medication, light treatment, and nutrition.
 A Poor Book for Voyeurs September 6, 2008
1 out of 6 found this review helpful
This is not literature, even though the author poses as a writer. This is a girl's diary, and a bad one as that.
Marya, more as good marketer than a good writer, gives us voyeurs what we want: a peep hole into the life of someone extreme, a lifestyle that most of us, in our boring 9 to 5 lives, maybe would like to taste once in a while. We live in a world of celebrities, of gossip, of tabloids paying millions of dollars for the pictures of a newborn. Marya was very lucky to carve a niche, as the troubled teen who cuts herself, has promiscuous sex and a wild life. Who wouldn't want to peek into that? Had she tried to make a herself a name with a non-fiction book, she wouldn't exist as an author today.
But literature this isn't. The book is totally monotonous in its maniac self-absorption. Bipolar? Where is the depression? Where is the self-analysis that comes with a reflexive mood? Not there. It is just a succession of very superficial daily happenings, one after the other, and their superficial effect on the author. In order to build the story, the impressions she brings from her childhood sound totally fake and constructed. Who the heck remembers vivid feelings when you were a 8 year-old?
This is a lost opportunity for a reflection on the existential and philosophical aspects of bipolar disorder, on the role of the bipolar person in the world. Again, this is just a diary.
 Intense to say the least September 3, 2008
I wanted to read this book because I am a fan of Marya's and have read both "Wasted" and "The Center of Winter". Mostly I was anxious for this one because I've always suspected I myself was Bipolar, and was needless to say more than curious to read about a first hand account of living with this disease from someone I so admire. The book is certainly really intense. There is virtually no detail left uncovered, she spares no expense when describing her worst hells and best highs. She does seem to at times have a flair for the dramatic, taking seemingly innocuous events and making them into grandiouse experiences. But then again, I guess in a way thats exactly what part of being Bipolar means, right?
It was extremely informative and harrowing to read, and although she doesnt seek people's pity or sympathy, you can't help but feel for this woman because of all the stuff she's been through. Whether some of it was brought on herself or if it was from things she couldn't control. I experienced mild bouts of anxiety just reading this because it seemed that she had so many burdens at once at times. Just, wow. Its a lot for once person to balance and deal with on a daily basis. Needless to say I admire her even more because of this. She is an extremely gifted and eloquent writer, that much cannot be ignored. While I suspect I have a much more mild version of Bipolar, Bipolar II, I could definitely identify with a lot of what Marya depicted. The feelings of being invincible, untouchable at times....even though it was completely unwarranted and random. Wreckless and indulgent behavior, impulsive decision making with little to no care in the reprecussions. Depressions so low that I don't even want to think about the next day and the one after that. The way the two feelings can fluctuate and intertwine themselves so quickly and effortlessly, it's scary. You truly feel like you're no longer at the helm and something, someone bigger than you is steering and taking over.
This book was very helpful for me because it made me realize I need help to get this under control, if I want to ever live a healthy and functioning life, I can't just self medicate, self-diagnose, and turn a blind eye to whats become so obvious. There is a lot of information following the end of the book, as far as useful links and facts about Bipolar Disorder. She dispells a lot of myths and sheds light on many facets of the disease. There's long, long, lists of websites and the like to go to for info and help. Some of which I have already visited myself.
But the book- overall it was really good, maybe a bit lengthy and somewhat redundant at times, but the good far outweighs whatever bad there might be.
 Wasted with a new title August 27, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
I have read both of Marya's books and while I do believe she has suffered from both a mental illness and eating disorder, I find parts of it to be either exaggerated or written for creative flow. Also, in a way it is like the same book twice as she covers the very same years she covered in her previous novel Wasted. Only here we hear nothing of her problems being realated to being bulimic or anorexic but rather she was bipolar from the age of 5 and no one knew.
What I find to be unbelievable is her recall verbatim from the age of 5. Who really can remember their childhood or even last year that vividly? Also, being in a state of disorientation begs the question again of how believable the incidents are in the novel.
I find that as in Wasted Marya tends to blame society, the health care system anyone but herself for the problems she has faced last time she wrote it was her against the diet industry, against the culture of being thin equates with beauty now it's the healthcare industry not recognizing mental illness for what it truly is a life debilitating illness with no real cure.
The most disturbing concept she brought forth that compelled me to review this is her theory of being bi-polar by age 5 and that by age 10 or 11 the psychiatrists she had seen couldn't see that, I am sorry there are reasons why a child is not given a psychological diagnosis a child's mind is still growing and developing and to suggest giving psychoactive drugs to a 10 year old is not only irresponsible but dangerous. I have a feeling this is not the last we will hear of Marya as mental diagnosis can and do change, I would not be surprised if she were to develop other personality disorders along the way.
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