Five selected memoirs about living with various manifestations of bipolar disorder.
I. I Hope I Get Well: A Memoir of Bipolar Disorder (2024) by Adam Gerhardstein
Unlike many others who’ve written about bipolar disorder, this author was diagnosed relatively early—while still in college and experiencing a bout of mania. It took decades later, though, for effective therapy to help him adjust adequately.
II. That’s Mental: Painfully Funny Things That Drive Me Crazy About Being Mentally Ill (2019) by Amanda Rosenberg
Among the many favorable reviewers is comedian Sara Benincasa, author of Agorafabulous!: Dispatches From My Bedroom (see my previous post): “Amanda Rosenberg writes in a very funny, wonderfully accessible way about her experience with bipolar II. ..Then, just when she’s got you comfortable, she punches you in the gut with a small snapshot of agonizing grief or a particularly evocative, elegant turn of phrase.”
PureWow tells us that Rosenberg finally received her correct diagnosis of Bipolar II following “a mental breakdown, suicide attempt, stay in a psych ward and misdiagnosis of borderline personality disorder.” Bipolar II involves not having full-blown mania but having both depressive and hypomanic episodes.
Mental health stigma, grief and loss, trauma, unhelpful advice offered by others, growing up non-white, medication and therapy issues, and the difficulty of taking mental health days are just some of the topics covered in Rosenberg’s book.
III. Notes on a Banana: A Memoir of Food, Love, and Manic Depression (2017) by David Leite
The Banana? The author’s nickname. Food? A significant part of his career. Love? His relationship with “The One”—otherwise known as Alan. And the Manic Depression? His bipolar disorder that surfaced in childhood and didn’t stabilize until his late 30’s or so.
B. David Zarley praises Notes on a Banana as “one of the finest portraits of bipolar disorder I have ever read.” Like Leite, Zarley has lived with hypomania. He states the following about Leite’s diagnosis: “Bipolar II, to be specific, the form of the disorder marked by deep depressive modes and hypomanic episodes (hypomania being, as Leite describes it, ‘a watercolor version of bright-neon manias’). It is the alternating currents of depression and hypomania that have galvanized and rendered black Leite’s life, a perpetual rolling brownout.”
In addition to medications and therapy becoming parts of his “bipolar arsenal” there are “…(t)hings no shrink can prescribe and no therapist can analyze—namely, cooking and writing about food.”
IV. Resilience: Two Sisters and a Story of Mental Illness (2015) by Jessie Close
You may already know that actress Glenn Close has had an active role in helping to eradicate mental health stigma and that both her younger sister Jessie and her nephew Calen, Jessie’s son, have spoken openly about their own mental health issues.
Jessie’s memoir reveals that a diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder with psychotic features was a long time in coming. 50-ish when she began to learn about her condition, Jessie had already experienced five failed marriages and a history of drug/alcohol addictions. Also, her son had been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
V. Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, and Me (2012) by Ellen Forney
Publishers Weekly raved about Marbles, which preceded the author’s Rock Steady: Brilliant Advice From My Bipolar Life (covered in a previous post). “Witty and insightful…The long journey of medication and therapy is kept from gloom by Forney’s lively, likable cartooning…Readers struggling with their own mania or depression will find Forney good company, and others searching for insight into the minds of troubled artists will find Forney an engaging storyteller.”
