Writer Esmé Weijun Wang‘s The Collected Schizophrenias: Essays consists of 13 pieces regarding her schizoaffective disorder, chronic Lyme disease, and other aspects of her life shown “through simply-conveyed research, powerful metaphor, and personal experiences” (NPR).
Perceived as “high functioning” regarding her mental health diagnoses, Wang admits she’s not comfortable around those who aren’t. “I’m uncomfortable because I don’t want to be lumped in with the screaming man on the bus, or the woman who claims that she’s the reincarnation of God.”
Can you blame her? As she begins her book, “Schizophrenia terrifies.”
Wang knew she had serious problems since early childhood. Lulu Garcia-Navarro, NPR: “And then, she says, ‘severe depression started when I was about 11, depression that was diagnosed by a doctor probably happened when I was 15 or 16. Bipolar disorder was diagnosed when I was about 17 or 18, and then the schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type, was diagnosed when I was in my late 20s.'”
Reportedly, there’s much more to tell: a history of sexual assault, PTSD, and the eventual diagnosis of late-stage Lyme disease.
The essays involve such issues as leaving college due to psychosis, involuntary hospitalization, society’s views of suicide, the health insurance industry’s faults, and the connection between mental illness and spirituality.
Further description of The Collected Schizophrenias (Publishers Weekly):
She explains her decision not to have children, while recalling time spent working at a camp for bipolar children, and muses about viewing her condition as a manifestation of ‘supernatural ability’ rather than a hindrance. Wang invariably describes her symptoms and experiences with remarkable candor and clarity, as when she narrates a soul-crushing stay in a Louisiana mental hospital and the alarming onset of a delusion in which ‘the thought settles over me, fine and gray as soot, that I am dead.’ She also tackles societal biases and misconceptions about mental health issues, criticizing involuntary commitment laws as cruel. Throughout these essays, Wang trains a dispassionate eye onto her personal narrative, creating a clinical remove that allows for the neurotypical reader’s greater comprehension of a thorny and oft-misunderstood topic.
Ilana Masad, NPR, reviewing The Collected Schizophrenias: “One of the more frightening things about any painful experience that isn’t outwardly obvious to the people around us — like some mental and physical illnesses or disabilities — is how difficult it is to communicate what it feels like to those around us. Writers like Wang, however, give us a gift in their ability to convey the indescribable through language.”