Just Like Someone Without Mental Illness Only More So

JUST LIKE SOMEONE WITHOUT MENTAL ILLNESS ONLY MORE SO is Mark Vonnegut's follow-up to The Eden Express, his 1975 memoir of a series of psychotic breakdowns in his early 20s.

This is memoir also, of perseverance, told through a collection of thoughts, vignettes, and longer pieces. Vonnegut writes about attending Harvard Medical School (of twenty programs he applied to, his only acceptance); a passage describing his first patient death, alongside a staff nurse, reminded me how often nurses guide doctors-to-be through that experience. He writes about his practice as a pediatrician, including criticism of contemporary healthcare and the health-insurance industry. He includes passages about his own childhood -- his weirdly prescient (and mentally ill) mother; his plainly weird (and genius) father (before he was successful and famous); the orphaned cousins his parents took in and raised as his siblings. He describes a medical mission to Honduras. He examines marriage, fatherhood, being alcoholic ... and a fourth psychotic episode, wherein he takes us inside his mind as it breaks down.

Each chapter opens with a personal photo or sample of his own artwork, and he includes bits of advice about sanity and sobriety throughout, for example: "It's possible within any given moment of any given day to choose between self and sickness. Rarely are there big heroic choices that will settle matters once and for all. The smallest positive step is probably the right one."

Vonnegut is curious, optimistic, fun, philosophical ... and this gentle memoir is highly recommended.

This book will make you smile, smirk, chuckle and laugh out loud. It will also make you wince, perhaps in recognition, but certainly in sympathy. Because Mark Vonnegut's road to finding some measure of peace in his sixty-three years of life has been filled with bumps, collisions and countless stretches of "under construction." One would think that being the son of a famous author like Kurt Vonnegut would have made for an easy and charmed life. Nope. As it turns out mental illness ran in Vonnegut's family on both sides probably back three or four generations. With a family history like that, it's not surprising that Mark Vonnegut cracked up in his early twenties, the first of at least four major episodes in his life which each time left him hospitalized and scrambling to find purchase on a sudden downward slide. The last time it happened, Vonnegut had reconstructed his life well enough to have gotten into Harvard Med School and had successfully completed an internship and residency and was already well established as one of the top pediatricians in the Boston area. Alcohol and prescription drugs (Xanax) played a part, and denial played perhaps an even bigger role.

Mark Vonnegut has written only one other book, a memoir 35 years ago. The Eden Express, an insider's tale of mental illness, was a smashing success, enough to finance the author's med school and buy him a house. I must have read the book, probably soon after it came out, because my brother said I lent it to him years ago. But I can't remember it at all, so I'll have to find a copy and read it again. Since I'm a few years older than Mark Vonnegut, I guess I'll just chalk my forgetfulness up to age. Because I love this new book. While mental illness is not exactly a happy subject, Vonnegut's wit, wisdom and wry and dry slightly off-center sense of humor make the journey an extremely entertaining one. I found myself nodding in agreement to many of the things he had to say, smiling and chuckling at much of it. A confirmed introvert myself, I had to laugh at what he had to say about people like me and also about extroverts -

"Introverts almost never cause me trouble and are usually much better at what they do than extroverts. Extroverts are too busy slapping one another on the back, team building, and making fun of introverts to get much done ... I can pass for normal most of the time, but I understand perfectly why some of my autistic patients scream and flap their arms - it's to frighten off extroverts."

There's more, but you get the idea. This perhaps gene-propagated Vonnegut sense of humor is very much in evidence throughout the book. Here's another sample from pediatrician/would-be handyman Vonnegut - "Since I took up carpentry I measure children much more carefully, sometimes to 1/32 of an inch." Hmm ... I wonder if, like most good carpenters, he measures twice, so he'll only have to cut once.

Vonnegut has many points he wants to make and is pretty successful in making all of them I think. He is quite disenchanted, for example, with insurance and pharmaceutical companies and the general state of the health care business today, and pretty much everything he has to say on these things rings true and makes sense. He has numerous comments to make about his famous father, usually making allowances for his crankiness and ungraciousness, calling him "more like an unpredictable younger brother than a father ... [who] fiercely defended and exercised his right to be a pain in the ass on a regular basis." But he obviously loved Kurt, as evidenced in the chapter entitled, "There Is Nothing Quite as Final as a Dead Father," when he comments sadly, "I was no longer on deck."

The final chapter in this slim volume is called "Mushrooms," and is quite hilarious as he describes his late-in-life discovery and fascination with finding various fungi and cooking and eating them, which leads to what he calls the UNFORTUNATE INCIDENT. In a book describing a life filled with UNFORTUNATE INCIDENTs, Vonnegut somehow manages to end his story on a upbeat note, with "a wish to move forward. I love finding out what happens next."

I sincerely hope this guy is not finished telling his story, because he is an extremely talented and engaging writer. This apple didn't fall far. I want to know what happens next too. Take notes, Dr. Vonnegut, and please write it all down. Your daddy would be proud, but then again ... Well, he SHOULD be proud. - Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER

I rushed to buy this book when hearing Mark Vonnegut on National Public Radio.

Some books you want to read twice. Mark Vonnegut's "Just Like Someone Without Mental Illness Only More So" is one such book. Mark accepts, understands, and overcomes several bouts of mental illness, then creates a wonderful witty, honest and life-changing memoir.

As a person having suffered psychosis, I can relate to hearing voices. His words will forever be part of my buffer against future psychosis: "I've found it helps a lot to get older. Now when honking cars start sounding like my name or other things happen that could be the voices warming up, I'm not thrilled or terrified. 'I've got a lot going on,' I say, 'You'll have to wait your turn.'"

As a person who enjoys pushing boundaries, I found this passage both stimulating and thought provoking: "Once you've risked death or social embarrassment by eating something and it tastes good, it strongly rewards all the steps that went before so that time, place, shape, color, and weather all acquire richness and meaning.
'It is much more important to not eat a poisonous mushroom than it is to eat an edible one' - David Arora, "Mushrooms Demystified."
I read the sentence over and over. I can't figure out exactly where the error lies."

Several pages on, I laughed out loud reading: "Fifteen minutes or so after eating the new mushroom, which I did not serve to my wife, thank God, my heart started racing, painful muscle spasms seized the back of my throat, and sweat started pouring off me. I remembered seeing a picture of a mushroom, one of the ones with a skull and crossbones under it, that was called the sweating mushroom. Funny name, I had thought."

To be honest, my mind was like a sponge ready to suck up Kurt Vonnegut information. "Just Like Someone Without Mental Illness Only More So" did not disappoint. A picture says a thousand words, these words about Kurt Vonnegut paint a vivid picture: "Kurt fled upstairs holding his head wearingthe facial expression of someone in hell in a Hieronymous Bosch painting." That image of Kurt Vonnegut, one of America's greatest writer's, was worth the price of the book.

Mark ends with: "I like to think of it not so much as a lack of carefulness as a wish to move forward.
I love finding out what happens next."

Mark surely has the Kurt Vonnegut-writing gene, we simply must demand more wonderful feasts.

Since five stars is the highest ranking allowed, I'll also give it ten thumbs up.

Like most people who read this memoir, I was familiar with the author's father. Dr. Vonnegut proves that you can be mentally ill and still lead a normal life with professional career, although it sure helps having a celebrity parent if you want to get into Harvard (snicker). Enjoyed the last chapter since going on a wild mushroom foray is on my bucket list. Helped me forgive his preference for watercolor over oil. Truly art helps us to find and soothe our tortured souls and we naturally gravitate to it for self- therapy. Shares a typical "wounded child" perspective of his parents not being self sacrificing enough...don't we all wish our parents were more perfect instead of "dysfunctional". Wonder what his kids' think of his parenting, especially with his meltdowns and large gap between adult and toddler children. Sometimes the more we try not to be our parents, the more we become them or worse. Can't wait to read his adult son's book, lol.

Having worked in community mental health, I can relate to the dehumanizing struggle to put the agenda of my clients above that of corporate insurers. Vonnegut explores that terrain as well as what it was like to be diagnosed with schizophrenia and still be admitted to Harvard Medical School. This is a fascinating portrait of someone living an ordinary, imperfect life but still fulfilling their potential. Despite the feel-goodness inherent in this description, it is also, quite frankly a hilarious and brilliantly penned memoir by someone who can hold forth about Doctors Without Borders, the nature of mental illness, the problems with health care bureaucracy,and what its like to be the son of Kurt Vonnegut.

Great read. It is compelling just like Morley Safer says on the dust cover: "It's the original voice that describes the journey".
But I like a lot of books written by doctors; Oliver Sacks, Atul Gawambe, and others. The unusual case study here being the author himself.
Also his segment on the admissions process for Harvard Med School was good. All the segments were good though.
The family photos and painting images were a nice touch.
In Google, if you type in "Mark Vonnegut paintings" you get 90% Kurt Vonnegut drawings, images of him looking affable, and his aphorisms. That's not right in a couple of ways.

A gift to many areas of sociology: childhood, clinical health and community. When one considers his family background and then the faction of his personal struggle, this book is a valuable narration in society. He was raised in a large family and understands those dynamics and his personal history could have formed a different outcome -- yet, he took his life experience, brilliance, and gave it to early childhood development and health. We should be thanking him . . .

Part memoir of growing up with an unconventional family, part criticism of the modern healthcare industry, part insight into living with mental illness, Mark Vonnegut's Just Like Someone Without Mental Illness Only More So is a fascinating read. The narrative reads like a bipolar brain might think - disjointed, non-linear, without transitions. The result is a quick, bumpy, jaunt through Dr. Vonnegut's life. What's most striking is that other than his polymathic tendencies, his famous family, and his psychotic breaks, Mark is pretty much a regular guy with the problems and issues many of us face. And, really, I think that's the take home message.

This memoir includes some valuable and hilariously presented insights into some of the challenges with the U.S. health care system, particularly as it pertains to mental health. Whether intentionally or not Vonnegut expresses his beef with the way we provide health care, as well as his hopes and his appreciation for what works about the system. As a social work grad student interested in working in the mental health field, I found his frankness, optimism, and humor refreshing. Also his musings on Harvard and the aura which surrounds its campus, students, and alumni was laugh out loud funny. I must admit I'm an avid Kurt Vonnegut fan so I went into reading this with a bias towards the Vonnegut flair of tongue in cheek phrasing, however I think Mark stands on his own with a voice worth hearing given his life experiences and his ability to perservere. Overall it was an entertaining and quick read that may hopefully spur more thinking on the way society treats people and families dealing with mental illness.

Mark Vonnegut is an excellent writer and medical doctor who conveys real humanity in describing his struggle with mental illness.
A worth-while read from a man and his supportive wife who are "saltwater ocean people" in the best tradition.

As gripping, well-written and emotional as his first book, the Eden Express, written with more perspective and maturity. Mark can turn a phrase or adopt a narrative tic that reminds one immediately of his father; whether it is a deliberate affect, or an unconscious, perhaps even inherited trait, it is a pleasure to encounter throughout the book. It is impossible not to empathize with Mr. Vonnegut, who tells his story without an excess of drama or a trace of self-pity; as one who suffers from bi-polar disorder myself, and has experienced the ravages of the disease, I respect Mark's ability to come to terms with his condition, and not only manage it, but become a better person for it. Good reading, and I hope to see more from him.

i have given the 1ST edition hardback copy of this book 1 star. i hope to be able to kick up my rating for a later, edited issue. why? well, i just can not read the book beyond mark vonnegut's whining in the early chapters.

i site mark's complaint that his parents failed to recognize the little boy's shortsightedness, did not ensure that mark had eyeglasses for reading the blackboard in school. but i imagine that in this childhood experience he is not alone? and i contend that mark vonnegut might not be the fine painter we, his fans, know him to be if his "vision" had been corrected immediately for elementary school. so, there mark is a silver lining.

further, i hope that in a later edition of "just like normal people..." mark, should he decide to include tales of his parents w/ in a book admittedly about himself, he consider more carefully just what his parents must have been going through when committing the errors mark seems to so deeply feel. manic-depression (bipolar disorder) i am certain is a terrible burden. but there are other people in the world, mr V. and if the physical circumstances of his youth that mark describes he considers even relative "poverty" mark vonnegut should be me--or, i suspect, a lot of Kurt Vonnegut Jr's fans.

but mark does write exceptionally lovely prose. must have inherited this from his abnormally exceptional mom & dad? it's one thing to be grateful for, mark vonnegut? yet another silver lining.

The author's account of his struggle with bipolar disorder is informative and fascinating, especially because of his father's literary celebrity, but stands on its own as well.

Anyone interested in (Kurt) Vonnegut's work would be interested to read the family history detailed in the book, and anyone interested in or touched by bipolar disorder would benefit from this man's openness about his own struggle and his insight on the subject.

I particularly liked his note on the title:

"At one talk I was asked, 'What's the difference between yourself and someone without mental illness?'

At another talk I was asked, 'How do you make the voices be not so mean?'

I wish I knew."

This book is a captivating account of an intelligent and willful man's ability to successfully manage his
mental illness. He comes out of it with a family, a remarkable career, and an ability to feel empathy and
engage in meaningful relationships. It is an account of his vision of the life he wants, his struggle and the tenacity and determination he demonstrates to achieve his goals. It is a very moving and enjoyable read.

This humorous tale is fun and a good read until one realizes that a Harvard educated doctor with a personal and family history of mental illness blew away his wife and kids and almost lost his profession and educational training with daily doses of booze, denial and xanax. The insightful humor and comments cover up his failure to respect himself and protect the many blessings life afforded him. To infer that his history of mental illness is responsible for his most recent breakdown following 14 years of indulgence, or plain stupidity by a doctor in his personal life, without taking any personal or moral responsibility for the pain to his wife and children among other things, is to give by omission a vivid description of weak character having nothing to do with his propensity for mental illness. These were not the medications that ended his previous hospital stays as he well knew then and when he wrote this book. Sanford A Kowal, Newton, Ma.