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Valerie C. (Chico, CA)
Insightful and Sad
This was an important book for me. I grew up with a family member with bipolar disorder, and experienced what the author's father experienced from the outside looking in. Behaviors during episodes were frightening and confusing. I found this book both insightful and horrifying. I often wondered what it was like for my family member. Now I know. While our medical and societal treatment of mental health disorders have improved since the 1940s, they still have a long way to go.
Lori K. (Palm Harbor, FL)
This Multi-Faceted Story Would be a Good Book Club Pick
Having had a family history rampant with mental health issues myself, I was especially interested in reading about the perceptions of bipolar disorder both from the person who has lived with it, and from the points of view of others who loved, couldn't tolerate, and/or treated Dr. Perry Baird. Mimi Baird did a great job in presenting Perry Baird's accounts of his stays at several different mental hospitals, especially gripping because he was trying to study himself in the process during a time when treatments were barbaric at best. His writings are interspersed with inpatient treatment notes from the hospitals
…more where he had been confined. These different accounts made me curious- his being colored by his disease, and the hospitals perhaps colored by agenda. I suppose that the truth lies somewhere in between, which I believe was what the author was ferreting out.
I know firsthand about the extreme difficulty of living with a family member who has a serious mental illness, and could relate to those who cared about Dr. Baird, but who also became unable to cope with the destruction left in his path. It is a sad, complicated, and real problem that families face, and the author did a marvelous job of integrating all of these facets into a short and highly readable book. There are many good discussion points in He Wanted the Moon, which would make it an excellent book club pick. (less)Depression is a killing disease and manic-depressives swing between full on living and the edge of death. Dr. Perry Baird was fortunate (if that's the right word) to be able to identify his illness to the point that he could write about it. This is an amazing journey into the mind of a man who catalogued his actions and thoughts through both spectrums. How he writes about his impressions of his actions and how he is viewed by others and the medical profession is a study of a man losing his grip. I didn't think I would like this book, but the story is gripping and sad. Dr. Baird's daughter, Mimi, has given us an
…more account of a man struggling with his life. If you know someone who is manic-depressive this book may be too much for you. To get a glimpse into a mind and soul on the edge, this is a fascinating read. (less)I was sure I would not really enjoy reading this book but chose it as "something different". How wrong I was! Once I started reading I couldn't put this book down. You become enveloped in Dr.Baird's plight as a patient with a medical background who knows that the treatment he is receiving for his manic depression is not helping him manage his condition. Even his writing during his manic phases keeps you oddly engrossed. I would have given this book a 5 but did not totally enjoy the daughter's writing as it was a bit drawn out at the end and seemed to focus on how we should feel sympathy for her.
Julia A. (New York, NY)
A Must Read for so Many Reasons
This book left me with so many conflicting and complementary emotions that I hardly know where to begin. Mimi Baird's quest to uncover the mystery of her father's life and illness was a multi-year project the completion of which should bring her much satisfaction. At times sad, funny, thought-provoking, enraging, tragic, horrifying, exhausting, and dare I say therapeutic, this is a book that must be read by anyone who cares about the history of medicine, the trajectory of mental health care, and less academically, family history. One of the tragedies of this bio-history is that Dr. Baird's early research into a
…more biochemical cause of manic depression/bipolar disorder was stymied by his own illness; one can only speculate how much sooner the connection would have become widely known if he had been able to continue uninterrupted.
Alternating among Perry Baird's own words, his medical records, and Mimi Baird's narrative, the book employs a different typeface for each, so that the reader is never confused for a moment about who is speaking. That's a novel approach that I wish more publishers and editors would employ.
I can't begin to imagine what it must have been like for Mimi to be deprived of her father at the tender age of six, not by death, but by an illness of which her mother refused to speak. That she finally came to the decision to find out more, late in her adulthood (she's currently 75) and spent so many years researching and writing is a gift to her father, her family, herself, and her readers. (less)Dr. Perry Baird, a brilliant, privileged physician, is the subject of his daughter's search for understanding who her father was. This book is a painful read with Dr. Baird's description of the horrors of the treatment of the mentally ill with straight jackets and ice cold water treatment. Acknowledging that in the throes of acute psychosis, these people and I emphasize people could be difficult to treat, they were and are more frequently dehumanized as less than worthy and somehow responsible for their behaviors. Ms. Baird's journey to find out about his father, his tragic end was a very thoughtful read.
…more However, as a psychologist, it left me with many questions. Severe Mental illness usually results in poverty, no matter where one started.
Those suffering from mental illness are still victims.
I read her book but at times, it was not easy to keep going. Dr. Baird is joined by Dr. John Nash, the poets, Robert Lowell and Anne Sexton, who all struggled with severe bipolar disorders. Lowell in "Waking in Blue" offers another view. This subject of how we as a society treat the mentally ill remains a very relevant topic. (less)Thanks to BookBrowse for the ARC of this book. I learned a lot about people suffering mental disorders and how their families learn to cope with episodes of illness. I think all adult readers will enjoy this book and feel great empathy for Dr. Baird as well as his family and friends who cared about him.
It was an informative book about the state of mental hospitals how they treated and mistreated patients, due to experimentation because of lack of knowledge about certain conditions. I was glad that Mimi found answers to her past and about her father. I am glad I had the chance to read this book.
Anne G. (Austin, TX)
He Wanted the Moon
It is very powerful to read the words of a man in the depths of a psychotic episode. At moments sounding very rational and at others he is completely lost. Mimi Baird at 75 years of age is finally able to acquaint herself with the father she lost to mental illness. Reading the accounts of Dr Baird's treatment, brutal and inhumane, was a grave reminder of how far the study of mental illness and psychoses has come.
Perry Baird was a world renowned dermatologist who was stricken with "manic depressive psychosis" at a young age. His promising medical career faltered and was ultimately stripped from him while he was
…more confined at the Westborough State Hospital. It was beyond heartbreaking to read of Baird's efforts to control the disease he knew was overtaking him. He writes, "I pray to God that in the future I shall be able to remember that once one has crossed the line from the normal walks of life into a psychopathic hospital, one is separated from friends and relatives by walls thicker than stone; walls of prejudice and superstition."
He wanted the moon but fell far short due to a disease that was only just beginning to be understood. Baird was perhaps the leading researcher on treatments that might have saved his own life. This is a powerful and personal account that will appeal to anyone who wishes to understand more about the impact of manic depressive psychosis now more commonly known as bi-polar disorder. (less)
