Dan is back with his weekly blog post today. Also, this post contains affiliate links which means YBC® will earn a small commission if you purchase through the links. Thanks for the support!
I am still trying to work through the stack of books I received on Christmas. The latest on is Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker . This book caught my eye a few months ago and I am glad it was under the tree waiting for me. It was an Oprah’s Book Club pick of 2020. I am about 1/3 of the way through. A few days ago I sat down and could only get through the first 20 pages, it started off a bit slow. The next two nights I was able to get about 60 pages each night and now I am really looking forward to getting back to it. Should only be a few more nights at this pace. The book follows a family that seems about as average, middle class as could be. A young couple meet in the 1950’s, marry, and decide to start a family. Then, they never stop. They end up having 12 children, 10 boys at first, followed by 2 girls. The father jumps around from Navy base to Navy base as an engineer and the mother is at home taking care of the children. All is well. Until the boys start to grow up. As they grow older, stories of sibling rivalry start to emerge. Not just the typical nagging, but full on fist fights, bullying, tormenting, and abuse. The two older boys particularly have a power struggle that is wildly unhealthy. All the while, mom and dad are too busy in keeping up their image to acknowledge these problems.
As the boys grow older and move off to college, their problems grow. They enter abusive relationships with their significant others and signs of mental health trauma start to emerge. The oldest boy, Donald, is finally evaluated by a college psychologist and this is where we first hear the word schizophrenia. Again, mom and dad are quick to dismiss any troubles and cover their tracks as much as possible. They can not let this get our and ruin their image of a perfect family. Just as the oldest boy starts to unravel, the rest follow suit. The next oldest shows similar signs of schizophrenia and is too evaluated by psychologists. As it turns out 7 out of the 12 children are diagnosed with schizophrenia.
At the time of these diagnoses, psychologists throughout the world were battling each other as they try to figure out why. Some say it is nature, some say nurture, some say both. This family was a huge help to all those studying the brain. One of the biggest misconceptions is that schizophrenia is a split personality disorder. This is not true, the term schizophrenia means “split from reality”, not a split personality. It was a slight error in translation that has caused some confusion over the years.
The book does a nice job of detailing the families struggles while also teaching, and informing, the reader about the history of mental health in our country. It is no surprise that early on these patients were abused, given cocktails of mind numbing drugs, and treated as guinea pigs. Lobotomies, straight jackets, rubber rooms, electroshock therapy were all too common. We have certainly come a long way, thankfully.
I am hoping to finish this week, let me know if you’ve read it or if you have any other recommendations.