A review by themissyreads
Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen

dark informative reflective fast-paced

4.0

Its funny that the main issue i have with the book is that, for a memoir, I came away without a clear idea of who Kaysen is, and so had difficulty connecting to the main character. It’s ironic because her diagnosis is borderline personality disorder, and one of the chief aspects is ‘instability of self-image and relationships’ so in this way the book is a reflection of someone living with the disorder. It was fascinating to see a 1960s pre-healthcare reform adolescent psych ward. I’d read about adolescent inpatient experiences in ‘Suicide notes’ and ‘It’s kind of a funny story’ which are certainly influenced by Girl, Interrupted but differ widely simply by the time frame represented by the inpatient care nowadays. No one gets locked up for years on end in a mental hospital nowadays unless they have already been arrested for a violent felony. People struggle to get care when they’re actively suicidal because there just arent enough providers to go around. Im certain there werent enough providers back then either, they just got locked up without care. The hospital depicted is a high-end facility, and the book definitely shows the experience of more priviliged patients, who have families who can pay for their care. An inside profile of underfunded state or charitable facilities would have been much darker…
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